Methodist Church,” Maggie said. “I could meet you there.”
“Uh, okay,” I said. I wrote down directions and hung up. “Shit!” I said and sat at my kitchen counter staring off into space. I called my father at work. He answered the phone and I began blubbering again.
“I called a recovery program.”
“You did what? Well. Good for you.”
One of my dad’s nicknames for me was Bernice. Bernice was my fall-off-the-barstool alcoholic aunt. I called my dad Norman. Norman was Bernice’s mean-as-a-snake alcoholic husband. My dad and I partied a lot together. When I was twenty, I quit college for a year to figure out what I wanted to do with my life and went to work for my dad thinking I’d, perhaps, take over his printing company. I packed up my stuff at Northern Illinois University and moved back into my parents’ house near Chicago. Every morning my dad and I would get into his car, pick up his friend Jack, who worked in the same building, and drive downtown. At the end of the day, we’d hop back in the car and stop for happy hour at a rib joint named Bones. We’d hook up with one or two of my dad’s customers or suppliers, and my dad and his buddies would down manhattans like kids drinking Kool-Aid. I’d drink Heineken and do my best to keep up. Holding your liquor was a badge of honor with these guys. Thank God there was a large buffet table of hors d’oeuvres.
“If you’re gonna drink, you gotta eat,” my father told me. “Your grandfather always said that. You gotta lay a foundation. The skinny drunks who don’t eat, the booze kills ’em.”
My grandfather died of a stroke when I was twenty. One day he fell in the bathroom and my grandmother couldn’t get him up. An ambulance whisked him to Illinois Masonic Hospital in a coma-like state. My grandfather, hooked up to a ventilator for the next several days, swatted at invisible spiders and rats in delirium tremens. A week or so later, he died.
My father handed me a cocktail rye he’d smeared with chopped liver. He popped one into his mouth and said, “One more drink and we’ll go.”
My friend Ecklund, whom I’d been partying with since high school, called me one post-happy-hour evening and started yelling at me. “What the hell, Brenda?” he ranted. “The last few times I’ve called you, you’ve been wasted by six thirty!”
I was hung over all the time. One morning, as we drove to work, my father had to stop the car three times so I could vomit on the side of the road.
“You drank too much yesterday,” he said sternly.
“I’ve got a little bug,” I said, wiping my lips. “I’ll be fine.”
After a year, I enrolled at Roosevelt University’s School of Journalism in Chicago. I moved into an apartment with my friend Audrey, waited tables part time, and, for the most part, saved getting loaded for the weekends.
At that moment, on the phone with my dad, I told him, “I don’t think I have the guts to meet Maggie and go to that meeting tonight.”
“You want me to go with you?”
“You’d go with me?”
“Probably wouldn’t hurt,” he said. “I don’t need it, but I’ll go with you.”
My dad picked me up and parked his car by the side door of the church. A woman with graying hair was standing next to it, smoking.
“Are you Brenda?” she asked as my dad and I walked up.
I introduced my father to Maggie and the three of us walked downstairs to a lounge area where roughly fifteen people were seated in a circle. All of the dilapidated chairs were occupied. Someone got us metal folding chairs, and my father and I sat next to each other. Maggie took a chair directly opposite us. A thin, older woman with reading glasses perched at the end of her beaky nose rang a bell. “Is this anyone’s first time at a meeting?” she asked. My father and I raised our hands. “Welcome,” she said, and everyone clapped. People took turns reading out of a recovery book, and the chairwoman announced that the members were
“Uh, okay,” I said. I wrote down directions and hung up. “Shit!” I said and sat at my kitchen counter staring off into space. I called my father at work. He answered the phone and I began blubbering again.
“I called a recovery program.”
“You did what? Well. Good for you.”
One of my dad’s nicknames for me was Bernice. Bernice was my fall-off-the-barstool alcoholic aunt. I called my dad Norman. Norman was Bernice’s mean-as-a-snake alcoholic husband. My dad and I partied a lot together. When I was twenty, I quit college for a year to figure out what I wanted to do with my life and went to work for my dad thinking I’d, perhaps, take over his printing company. I packed up my stuff at Northern Illinois University and moved back into my parents’ house near Chicago. Every morning my dad and I would get into his car, pick up his friend Jack, who worked in the same building, and drive downtown. At the end of the day, we’d hop back in the car and stop for happy hour at a rib joint named Bones. We’d hook up with one or two of my dad’s customers or suppliers, and my dad and his buddies would down manhattans like kids drinking Kool-Aid. I’d drink Heineken and do my best to keep up. Holding your liquor was a badge of honor with these guys. Thank God there was a large buffet table of hors d’oeuvres.
“If you’re gonna drink, you gotta eat,” my father told me. “Your grandfather always said that. You gotta lay a foundation. The skinny drunks who don’t eat, the booze kills ’em.”
My grandfather died of a stroke when I was twenty. One day he fell in the bathroom and my grandmother couldn’t get him up. An ambulance whisked him to Illinois Masonic Hospital in a coma-like state. My grandfather, hooked up to a ventilator for the next several days, swatted at invisible spiders and rats in delirium tremens. A week or so later, he died.
My father handed me a cocktail rye he’d smeared with chopped liver. He popped one into his mouth and said, “One more drink and we’ll go.”
My friend Ecklund, whom I’d been partying with since high school, called me one post-happy-hour evening and started yelling at me. “What the hell, Brenda?” he ranted. “The last few times I’ve called you, you’ve been wasted by six thirty!”
I was hung over all the time. One morning, as we drove to work, my father had to stop the car three times so I could vomit on the side of the road.
“You drank too much yesterday,” he said sternly.
“I’ve got a little bug,” I said, wiping my lips. “I’ll be fine.”
After a year, I enrolled at Roosevelt University’s School of Journalism in Chicago. I moved into an apartment with my friend Audrey, waited tables part time, and, for the most part, saved getting loaded for the weekends.
At that moment, on the phone with my dad, I told him, “I don’t think I have the guts to meet Maggie and go to that meeting tonight.”
“You want me to go with you?”
“You’d go with me?”
“Probably wouldn’t hurt,” he said. “I don’t need it, but I’ll go with you.”
My dad picked me up and parked his car by the side door of the church. A woman with graying hair was standing next to it, smoking.
“Are you Brenda?” she asked as my dad and I walked up.
I introduced my father to Maggie and the three of us walked downstairs to a lounge area where roughly fifteen people were seated in a circle. All of the dilapidated chairs were occupied. Someone got us metal folding chairs, and my father and I sat next to each other. Maggie took a chair directly opposite us. A thin, older woman with reading glasses perched at the end of her beaky nose rang a bell. “Is this anyone’s first time at a meeting?” she asked. My father and I raised our hands. “Welcome,” she said, and everyone clapped. People took turns reading out of a recovery book, and the chairwoman announced that the members were