A look at drink­ing respon­si­bly for pleasure

Why do I drink? To answer hon­estly, I drink because I enjoy it. I don’t do it to escape some hor­ri­ble real­ity of life and I don’t do it to show off, I do it because it is enjoy­able and can enhance sit­u­a­tions if used properly.

I’m not one to go out and drink 15 cheap beers on a Friday night, but I do make my way out to those par­ties occa­sion­ally. I don’t go to the bar and order shots of whisky until I pass out, but I do like the atmos­phere of a bar and enjoy a few bour­bon and cokes with some friends.

If you are some­one who enjoys being three sheets to the wind and mak­ing a fool of your­self, by all means go ahead. As long as you don’t drive or throw up on me, that’s your choice.

A cock­tail is a great way to relax after a long day. It calms the mind and the nerves and will pro­vide a pleas­antly euphoric feel­ing. Actually, in mod­er­a­tion, many health jour­nals have pro­moted things such as a glass of red wine to help the heart or a drink or two a day to pro­mote healthy circulation.

According to a 2008 MSNBC arti­cle, there is sci­en­tific evi­dence that says alco­hol, specif­i­cally wine, in mod­er­a­tion can have pos­i­tive effects on your health. It rec­om­mends up to one drink per day for women, and two for men; much beyond that and the health ben­e­fits are lost. Having that drink per day can help reduce the risk of heart dis­ease and slow neu­ro­log­i­cal dis­or­ders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

I must admit that I am not think­ing of health rea­sons when I have a drink at night, but it is nice know­ing that mod­er­ate intake is not a bad thing.

As much as our par­ents have told us that “you don’t have to drink to have fun at a party,” a case can be made against this. Some peo­ple are out­go­ing and can have a great time being sober, but for oth­ers who are more socially intro­verted and want to break out of their shell, alco­hol can serve that pur­pose. There is a rea­son that at a major­ity of social gath­er­ings for both col­lege stu­dents and par­ents, alco­hol is often present. People don’t like to admit it, but it can be fun and enhance socialization.

I am not con­don­ing binge drink­ing or drunken mis­takes. There is some­thing else at play for some­one who is going out mul­ti­ple nights a week and for­get­ting what hap­pened, or who hap­pened, when they woke up the next morn­ing. They are drink­ing for some other rea­son, and it is not a pos­i­tive one.

There is noth­ing inher­ently wrong with alco­hol. It is nei­ther good nor evil, but sim­ply indif­fer­ent. It can be an art form for wine enthu­si­asts, or it can be a cat­a­lyst for alco­holism for those who use it in excess; but it is the per­son who decides if it will neg­a­tively or pos­i­tively affect their life, not the drink.

I drink, for one, because I can (I am of age), but also because it pro­vides some­thing that sobri­ety does not. As Aristotle says, live mod­er­ately. There are times when sobri­ety is prefer­able and there are times when a nice buzz is prefer­able, don’t let one mind­set rule your life. n