clues at the scene

clues at the scene

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Writers and Drink



I'm out with members of the oldest and most esteemed angling club ... which would have me for a member. I'm rather like Groucho in my selection of organizations which I'll join.

I am an MWA member - associate member - and I endorse any organization that allows murders, liars, and those who lie about murders to join.

I don't know what to think about drink.

I have drunks in my family. I say that in the best Irish-American tradition. Ruined marriages. Some that should have been ruined and were not. I've lived with drunks. I've impersonated one.

A great many writer's I've admired had problems with drink.

I've never found alcohol to be helpful in my composition efforts. I've never made notes while drinking which I found later and thought "brilliant!"  I seldom had new or wild ideas.

Now, I have sat in bars with a beer waiting on something - friend, lunch - and wrote something wonderful or new in a notebook. I've done that at 2 AM in a Canadian fishing cabin. I've done it on a Saturday morning on my deck. The drink didn't do much for it in my estimation.

I can't write from inside a bottle. For now, that's a good enough reason to lay off it. I can't contribute to the legend of scotch soaked writers.

Your take on ink and alcohol?

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