Drinking was not a totally new hobby in our house. Daddy always drank, and with few ill effects that I can see. By always, I mean he drank every day. He kept a six-pack in the fridge. Plus there was a fifth of whiskey ratholed under the seat of his truck. You knew he was heading for a drink when he made the mysterious pronouncement that he was going out to check on his truck, the idea being—or so I thought for years—that it might be scared out in the garage by itself or lonely for him. That was just maintenance drinking, as I see it now, as opposed to drinking so’s you’d notice.
