Sublime

I had a fantasy of myself drinking just then, not drinking in the sophisticated, martini-glass sense but in the raging, obliterating sense, drinking to get drunk, drinking in order to yield to that rebellious urge and show everyone in the room just how angry I was, just how out of place I felt, just how self-destructive I could be in response.

those neurological reward circuits have extremely long and powerful memories, and once the simple message—alcohol equals pleasure— gets imprinted into the drinker’s brain, it may stay there indefinitely, perhaps a lifetime.

Para-alcoholics are reactors rather than actors.

The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.