Alcoholic Anonymous

I don’t know exactly when it started or how, but I'm pretty sure it was sometime in 2006. I want to chronicle the whole journey from the start of 2006. But that; maybe in a later chapter. I was in love, hell, I was crazy in love. And I was going through a phase in my life. I had decided to quit engineering after failing twice and wasting 4 years. Pune was my city of choice because the girl I loved stayed there. I shifted, joined the course and tried to settle down. A very close friend of mine shifted too, to pursue his MBA, since he couldn’t get through the Indian Army due to his colour blindness. I might have underestimated the seriousness of his alcoholism then as I knew him since the time we used to look down upon people who smoked, let alone drink. But, that was as it turns out was one of the biggest mistakes of my life. He had been my best friend for 6 years now and more like family to me. We stayed at a friend’s apartment while we looked for an accommodation for ourselves. Another friend of mine from engineering dropped in soon (we call him bangali) and said he wanted a place. We became brothers from different mothers.

The hunt for a flat wasn’t too easy; we used to spend entire days looking, with brokers and landlords. And every evening once we came back, he suggested we go out for a drink, and drink we did. He had a crazy capacity for alcohol; he was one guy who could drink the bar dry. The ritual went on and so did the search and we finally found a place, 2 BHK, nice view, decent rent, not too far from college and a few friends close- by. It was perfect, we were happy. We just didn’t realise, now we had started drinking every night as there was a bar right outside the society. And the drinking increased. I started having fights with my girlfriend, over little issues in my drunken state. She didn’t approve of my drinking or smoking or for that matter, even my religious views (that’s a story I’ll write some other day). Life was good and the intoxication even better, we used to laugh, listen to music and play cards in a drunken state and we loved it.

The routine went on for months and in the process I started having more and more fights with my girlfriend. My priorities had changed, from career or love to alcohol and beer buddies. Without me even realising, my life had taken a downward spiral. I lost my girl by the end of the year. I was devastated and the first thing I did was getting drunk. It seemed like a medicine for pain, helping me go to sleep with all the pain going through my mind. It became my lifeboat, my saviour; the Old Monk was my friend, philosopher & guide.