Alcohol, like tobacco, is a legal drug,
and it’s a drug that can kill. When
Zachary was a year old, three teenagers Christina Valzano,
15, Scott Gerfen, 18, and Kevin Eineke,
21, rammed a tree in a Pontiac Trans Am close to where we lived in
I’ve never liked alcohol of any
kind. During my twenties, alcohol
lubricated social life, and people thought you were a blue nose if you didn’t
drink. In more recent years, however,
there has been a sea change in perception, largely due to the carnage on the
roads. I no longer feel embarrassed when
I decline a margarita and ask for lemonade.
But is there any need to dwell on the toxic power of alcohol? In moderate doses, it disturbs appetite and
murders sleep. It makes me think I’m
charming when I’m an ass—thereby slandering the name of a perfectly fine
animal. It excess, it makes me vomit and
extinguishes that dim flicker of reason in my poor mind. Alcohol soon overcomes the strongest man and
turns him into a bellowing beast that flails against imaginary enemies. It shipwrecks families and careers, and
besots the brain and destroys the liver.
I don’t drink for the same reason I don’t use cocaine. All that I have between me and abject failure
is a basically average mind and body.
And if abstaining from alcohol is one more thing that will keep me from
failure, then abstain I will. I don’t
view my rejection of alcohol as a moral choice, but as a matter of personal
taste and, more importantly, a pragmatic decision that will give me that tiny
edge over those with whom I compete.
My parents disapprove of
alcohol. While we were planning for our
wedding, they wrote that “we would be disappointed to see any drinking of
alcohol at all. Alcohol associated with
so much destructive behavior and is not pleasing to God. It should be possible to have a real fun time
without either drinking or dancing.” To
my parents, I wrote that “I appreciate your comments about your concerns on
alcohol. Both Nancy and I don’t drink,
and in general we endorse your point of view.
In our wedding plan, I wrote the following, largely to clarify my own
feelings. “My missionary parents would
view drinking with dismay and there are many on my side of the family who would
be hurt and offended. From a practical
standpoint, I cannot justify spending almost $1,000 for something we both don’t
like. From a moral standpoint, this is
an opportunity to make a stand. From a
social standpoint, organizations such as Mothers Against
Drunk Driving and Students Against Drunk Driving have raised people’s
consciousness against the evil of social drinking, and it’s no longer as
socially acceptable as it used to be.”
In deference to this, Nancy and I have decided not to have an open
bar—alcohol on demand. But
Neither of my parents drink coffee nor tea.
“Years ago in grade school, I learned that children should not drink
coffee or tea,” Dad writes. “I took that
teaching seriously and at face value.
Bottled and tinned beverages have little to commend themselves from a
nutritive standpoint. About 15 years
ago, I was having trouble with rheumatics.
One thing that we did that I think helped was to virtually cut out as
far as possible all white sugar.”