The Outer Fringe of a Blackout

There are those times when you are out drinking, and a sudden, distinctive feeling comes out of the back of your mind. You may have had ten, fifteen, twenty, or more drinks at this point, depending on how long you've been at it. This chirp, a mild alarm in the back of your head, is trying to tell you something. Something like, "Whoa, buddy. We've been here before." It is telling you that you are on the outer fringe of a blackout. You are in a state of suspended animation, like how time seems to slow in the brief moment before a car crash.

It is like peering over the edge of a cliff, into a deep, black chasm. Here, you know that one tiny slip, one pebble skidding underfoot, and it is down into the dark. In this case, that pebble is your constitution. It is your will to turn down that next drink.

A gambling man may say to himself, "Hey, it's not getting any more fun sitting here thinking about all this." Perhaps his pebble slips and he buys another drink. He falls, but catches a branch on his way down. He is safe, avoiding the blackout abyss, and is no worse for the wear. He steers his course, and has a good, drunk time all night.

Now, say he takes the drink, slips, and misses that branch on the way down. At the bottom of that cliff are the scariest things to any heavy drinker. Sex with fat/ugly women, waking up in the hospital, or the drunk tank, stories of being thrown out of bars, waking up in a place you've never seen before, and the list goes on. I am a gambling man, and this abyss is a place I've ventured many times.

These days, when I am afforded this momentary cosmic pause to reflect on my drinking that evening, I turn down that next drink. I would suggest, that should you find yourself at this edge, you do the same. This is because it is a rare event, at least for me, that you should find yourself aware of an impending blackout. Often--far too often--the liquor will hit you before you have a chance to recollect, and like a man shot in the head by a sniper, for you everything just goes dark.

So when you are given this opportunity, this absolute gift, to salvage a night, take it. I say this with the experience of a man who has been there, and who has both heeded and ignored my psyche's advice. Once the moment passes, and you know you're in the clear, then by all means go ahead and order that next drink. But if you see yourself on that cliff, and you give in, allowing your footing to slip, and you wake up next to a she-hippo, don't say I didn't warn you.