Drinking, smoking, trying to be free

Drinking, smoking, trying to free my mind, goes a song. It rightly strikes a chord but for many drinkers and smokers. Like me. Drinking, smoking, I have blown my life away. Over a drink, over a cigarette, I have seen people change, from meek, hesitant first timers to habitual guzzlers. That’s how they begin their drinking careers.

Thereon life is never the same without the regular diet of alcohol and dose of nicotine. I have tried it all. Just for fun. Now I am hooked to it. Sadly. I start my day by lighting a fag. What a way?. But I have been doing that for years now unless when I am home with my parents. Period. I don’t know until when I will do so. Not very long perhaps.

I have often contemplated of giving up smoking. Many a time I tried. People say it depends on our determination and will power. Thousand and one times, I have tried to quit the cancer stick. At the most I could do was for two months. After that I was back again with my old, hard-to-die habits. That’s why somebody rightly said: “It is easy to quit smoking; I have tried it several times.” I did try several times, too.

It’s a lame excuse. I thought the banning of tobacco in Bhutan would do me some good. Not really. It just raised the price of being a smoker. One time in Bumthang a few years back, I paid one hundred and fifty bucks for a packet of cigarettes. It was the most expensive smoking of my life. To hell with the ban.

I enjoy the smoke and the liquor so much. Despite the killer it is. When I am alone, the smell, the fire, and the smoke gives me company. Although it is bad company. When I am depressed, the icy chill whiskey going down my throat offers an unnatural comfort. The high afterward is an added pleasure. The combination of the two as a close, great boozer friend of mine puts is the perfect combo.

”Drink wine and make merry. This is the moment with drunken friends. This moment is life.” (This is a little diluted version). I have plagiarized this lines from the movie, “Unfaithful”, where the notorious playboy uses this pickup line to seduce the gorgeous heroine-a married woman and a mother. I use it otherwise. I use this line time and time again just to have a reason to celebrate life.

There is a charm in being drunk. While some turn boisterous, others become violent. Some drink to forget pain. Some drink to rejoice. That is what makes a bar such a fun place to hang out in. You meet people with stories. The talks doing the rounds. The gossips. Who did who? And who did what? You name it, you have it all. And you have action (fights) too. There is drama, there is emotion, there is comedy, and there is tragedy. If this is life then there is too much of it out there.

Me-I drink because it is in my blood. My father drinks like hell even now. My father’s father and his father’s father drank. Mind you, they did not die of liver cirrhosis. Whenever I go to see my father, we drink together. It is a pleasure drinking with my dad and to listen to all his stories. Sometime later I would like to write down his stories as well. I have already thought about the title, how about, “The drunken days of my dad.”

So Drink and make merry! But if you are driving better make sure, your sober friend is the one who is at the wheels. In an ad which features Michael Schumacher was a line from this F1 champ: “When I go out drinking. I have got somebody to drive me.”
I completely agree.