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Liquid Comfort

John Ragusa

    Things had been bad for Bubba Dapner lately. He’d received a ticket for speeding, was audited by the IRS, and was demoted at his job, all in the space of one week. He felt like the worst kind of loser. His whole world was spinning out of control, and there was nothing he could do about it. He was full of distress.
    And he hadn’t even done anything bad to deserve his misfortune! He was suffering without having committed any sin. It was totally unfair!
    That’s when Bubba prayed to the Lord for help. He hoped the Father would hear him and end his troubles. If He were a kind God, He’d do that.
    Bubba found that alcohol enabled him to cope with his problems. It gave him comfort when he was feeling bad.
    But he was drinking too much of it. He was afraid he was becoming dependent on it. He needed it to relieve his despair. He didn’t know what he’d do without it.
    Bubba realized how dangerous his alcoholism was. If he drove while drunk, he could get into a car accident and kill himself and other people. He must give up booze before it led to tragedy.
    But he couldn’t bring himself to stop drinking it; he was hooked on it. He needed professional help. But that was expensive, and Bubba wasn’t sure he could afford it.
    His life was now so screwed up that Bubba didn’t think he wanted to live.
    Soon he was sneaking drinks behind his wife Kendra’s back. He figured he wouldn’t get in trouble if she didn’t catch him drinking.
    He couldn’t get too close to her, either, because he couldn’t let her smell liquor on his breath.
    But Kendra was suspecting the truth now.
    “Have you been drinking when I’m not around?” she asked him one day.
    “What makes you think that?” he said.
    “Your speech is slurred and your walk is wobbly, as if you’ve been hitting the bottle.”
    “That’s ridiculous. I don’t ever drink alcohol.”
    “Well, if you are helping yourself to the sauce, you’d better stop, or else you’ll regret it.”
    A week later, Bubba left his bedroom in the middle of the night and walked softly into the den, where he got a bottle from a cabinet. He was about to drink from it when Kendra entered the den.
    “So! You have been drinking!” she said angrily.
    “I swear this will be my last drink,” Bubba said, covering the bottle’s label with his hand so that Kendra wouldn’t see the skull and crossbones on it.

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