Alter Ego: Redefining Alcoholism-Wole Salami

Just giving an intro to this piece because of my respect for this guy in writing and drinking, also because of the cravings of certain readers for his work. You can follow him on twitter @woletino and contact me if you wanna get to him directly. Enjoy! - Gbotemi Falade


Relief in the bottom of a drink, is an over use cliché that all sober people would gleefully point to my alcohol-soaked brain to be only a product of culturally correct though morally and from a prejudiced point of view a no do good er. Yes I am alcoholic and proud of it! Mind you, by alcoholic I do not mean the image perpetuated by African magic of a wasted middle class man having problem both in his marriage and professional career and as such finding relief in the bottom of a bottle while also inadvertently ending up in the gully on his way home.
I seek to redefine what an alcoholic is by using my not so perfect life as a paradigm of a new wave of alcoholism that is premise on intellectual freedom only which alcohol would help release. Many of you would quite remember some of our childhood super heroes who possess super powers but not until they have adorn themselves with one prop or the other. So, for example we would see Green lantern becoming a hero through his ring, Batman in his custom made suit becomes a relentless and formidable opponent, Thor and his hammer, Ironman and his million dollar robo-tecno suit and of course Leo Messi with his addidas boots(apologies to all madristas). The point that I am trying to make is that it's high time that Professor Xavier school of the gifted enrol my kind of superhero. Yea, I said it, am a superhero. If you doubt the previous statement then allow me to dispel your scepticism (takes a swig from the bottle). First of all (go down low) being a hero implies engaging in heroic deeds. Heroic deeds therefore constitute those deeds that are bourne out of altruistic motive while also sacrificing one's being if necessary to stop the proliferation of evil(whatever that is). Your question is thus; how does drinking from a bottle of wine constitute as an act of heroism? If anything it should be a criminal offence and punished with the harshest severity of the law! Well my answer is quite simple, enforcing a rigid no alcohol ban in the world would rob mankind off his humanity. Whether you are a creationist or a big bang theorist you would agree with me that there is encoded in man some mystries(be it the soul or the unconcious mind depending on your choice of words)which alcohol helps bring to the fore.
My purpose is not to turn you all to alcoholics but to correct your bias and misconception that all alcoholics are the same. As a matter of fact, any bar would prove to you the diversity and uniqueness of each drinker. So you can have the brooding drinker who never says much but concentrate on not spilling his drink, there is also the talkative who creates discussion from the passing of a housefly, we also have the ridiculously funny drinker who, has a dozen of jokes and outlandish stories that would even crack up a humourless person, there is the boasting drinker who has performed innumerable feats such as outfoxing the devil and getting away unscathed, we also have sexual innuendo talking drinker who has had multiple sexcapdes with phantom females while also turning every innocent discussion into sexual one, there is also the political aware drinker, who somehow has detailed information on the inner lives of our political leaders while also giving political explanation and implications to your choice of drink, there is also the lamenting drinker whose personal woes and tragedies are curiously peculiar to him alone never mind that virtually all mankind have similar stories, there is the occasional female that is curiously the spokesperson for her gender simply because she possess mammaries like billions of females, the sagacious drinker who churns out aphorisms in between sips from his cup, there is of course my kind of drinker who is characterize with a multiple personality and thus can be both the boasting drinker and sagacious drinker depending on the gathering and the occasion, the list you can imagine is endless. All these characters are proof that all drinkers are not the same and that your frequent visits to the bar is an opportunity to educate your self with the complex and diverse human traits while also unleashing a core that you are hithertofore unaware you possess.

What I find therefore heroic about drinking alcohol is that only the noblest of man can devotes his life to an ecumenical understanding of man particularly by visiting several human laboratories(beer parlour) where a hidden part of man is readily revealed with the aid of alcohol.