Thoughts about this new year

Some people like to make new year's resolutions. I'm not one of them. Resolution is a strong word. It's something that someone resolves. I like goals. I've lived with goals most of my life, and I'm happy to say I've achieved many of them over the course of the years.

I haven't decided what my personal goals are for 2012, and I think that's okay. The year isn't very old yet. It's just begun. I can tell you my personal goals include finishing Sexton Retribution and publishing it. One goal is to write at least the first novel in a new series.

That new series will be about an American by the name of Nick Galizzi. If you've read Sexton Sand, you know who Nick is. He's an American, and he's a wizard. The new series will be fantasy, but it'll be set in this world. Nick can move around in time in ways most men can't, and I think he's going to have dealings with the most prolific serial killer in the history of this country, and evil man by the name of Herman Mudget who used the alias H. H. Holmes.

I also intend to do more to try to increase awareness of Wernicke-Korsakoff disease. The more I learn about it, the more I believe that recovery is possible. It's not easy to recover from that one, but it can be done. Read Green Goblin or Blackout: a Look Inside Wernickes (linked on this page) to find out more about that.

I'm sure other things to do and try will come up during this new year. I don't know what they are yet, of course, but I'm comfortable in my ability to face them without hiding under the bed too much.

Happy new year, my friends!

"Blackout: A Look Inside Wernickes" --closing paragraphs

I finished the first draft a few minutes ago. The book I'm writing, Blackout: A Look Inside Wernickes", which will be available for purchase in a week or two, is ready for final edit and publication. The book contains the text of Green Goblin, as well as details of my struggle with Korsakoffs.

I thought I would share the closing paragraphs with you. The 'how it came to be' is what makes up the rest of the book, a short book of 140 pages.

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Sobriety

I remember what the doctor I mentioned earlier in the book said about having one or two being okay. I’m not going to do it. In my case, it isn’t okay. I’ve “slipped” once or twice, but not often. The slips are followed by a period of self-anger I don’t like. I don’t do that anymore. On those couple of occasions when tested myself, and had a beer, I paid for it with bouts of dread and uneasiness in 24-48 hours. It’s not worth it.

I’ve had foods prepared with alcohol in the recipe: a beer dumped on hamburgers prior to grilling, in a rum cake, and maybe one or two recipes others prepared. Same deal as above: uneasiness, and random twinges of unidentified fear. Now I ask if there is alcohol in the preparation of food, and if there is, I have something else.

That doesn’t mean there aren’t times when I would love to sit down and drink a few beers. There are times when it sound great. Then I don’t do it. I just don’t. I have too much to lose, and I’m not going back to that dark place with the red hills. Sobriety is key. I still have no desire to attend AA meetings, though I know they help a lot of people. I do my best when I don’t think about drinking, and do other things with my time, like write, and cook, and bake, and read, and spend time with my wife, and, and, and...

I still enjoy situations where alcohol is present. I like bar environments, and restaurants, and parties. I actually like them better now that I’m sober. Some people who have had struggles with alcohol and alcoholism don’t or can’t be around those situations, and most people respect that. I think I’m lucky I can go anywhere and not drink. If it bothered me I would avoid those situations, and that’s probably not easy. In my present, paying job (other than writing books), I spend hours at a time less than ten feet away from the bar. Not only does it not bother me, I like it.

You see, my friend, every time I don’t drink...every day I’m sober, every night I fall asleep sober...I win. When I go to the grocery store or drug store, I go out of my way to walk past the beer, wine, and booze. If you’re next to me you might hear me hum and chant, “Nee-ner-nee-ner-NEE-NER!” I’m singing to the containers. I won.

I’m not going to play again, mind you, but I won.

It's not easy to write about Wernicke-Korsakoffs, but I feel like I have to do it.

I survived Wernickes, and although I have Korsakoffs, few know it unless I tell them. That makes me a rarity, unfortunately. I wish everyone recovered from that set of serious illnesses, I wish no one suffered from it, I wish no family member had to deal with a loved one who is lost to either illness. I wish more people knew about the disease, if the other wishes can't come true.
   I wish a lot of things. Wishing isn't enough. I wrote a little book called Green Goblin, and it's selling some copies. It's a good little book if I do say so myself, and I hope more people read it. Green Goblin is my account of the acute phase of the illness, the part that takes place in the hospital for the lucky ones. Undiagnosed and untreated, Wernickes can be fatal.
 Green Goblin is good as far as it goes. Few who have had Wernickes have ever, and I mean ever described what it was like. Most can't. And since I can, I felt I should. I felt I had to do it.
   I wrote that book a couple of years ago, and now I feel I have to take the next step. I have to face the disease again...this time from the comfort of my chair. This time from the discomfort of my chair. I'm sober, but have to look back on getting sober, if I have any hope of helping people get to and through what I had to go to and through.
   I intend to give it my best shot. I'm not sure when I'll be done with it, but look for an announcement here when I finish and publish it. I think the writing of it will go quickly. I think when I peel away the mental bandages and examine the wound, I'm going to want to rip away the gauze and look fast.