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 During
my passionate dialogues at the wine tasting sessions, I often tell people
the medical benefits of regular drinking a couple of glasses of wine.
Occasionally, all of us slip up happily but to make a routine of excessive
drinking could be unhealthy. 'After all, how many people stop at two glasses?'
I am asked rhetorically. The consequences can be dangerous. Nothing could
make it more obvious than the book authored by an English wine writer-
turned alcoholic Alice King who has luckily survived the addiction to
write a book on the potential probem.
As a professional and successful wine writer, Alice
King had a dream job. The daughter of a wine salesman and blessed with
a superb palate, Alice had always been surrounded by alcohol. But the
more she got into her job, the more she found herself drinking.
A hugely successful wine expert, author and columnist,
with a beautiful country home and three healthy sons, Alice King, 46,
seemed to have it all - until her drinking took her to depths she could
never have imagined. In her new book High Sobriety, she gives a brutally
honest and moving account of her descent into alcoholism, and eventual
recovery.
'As I grew up, it became clear I had a talent for tasting
wine. After taking a course in journalism, I got a job as an editorial
assistant on Decanter. I quickly rose through the ranks and by the age
of 22 had become deputy editor. My inexperience didn't faze me. I was
determined to taste as many wines as possible, and simply couldn't pull
the corks fast enough.'
When she got married to a man in the wine trade she
'packed two cases of champagne with my trousseau.'
'Settling into married life, not a day passed without
us sharing a bottle or two over supper. It was perfectly normal to talk,
write, taste and drink wine all day at work, then come home and carry
on,' she writes.
She worked hard and began to travel extensively and
started enjoying the life of a cosseted journalist, treated to the best
of everything - first-class tickets, the best wines, restaurants and hotels.
She got so addicted to drinking that, after going to
one particularly drunken party without her husband Niall, 'I woke to find
myself naked in bed in a stranger's spare bedroom. Shocked, it took me
quite some time to work out where I was and how I'd got there.'
Her downfall continued till she was divorced, sold the
house, lost the custody of the kids, had several affairs and sought the
help of AAA and was able to stop drinking wine and other liquors totally.
The book can scare you with the truths and makes you
feel sorry for her. But it can also be a warning to wine (and other liquor0
drinkers to watch out for the pitfalls. It has not yet been released but
can be reserved with amazon.co.uk for £9.34. Her account can be
read on the Daily
Mail.
Subhash Arora
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