The Open Gate

Catastrophe had beenyears in the making, a slide into a profound dependency on drink, so cunning and subtle that I hadn't noticed. Outwardly, I appeared to function--perhaps I simply refused to acknowledge my long, slow descent. But when booze stopped working, all at once, I imploded and collapsed. The world crashed. Adrift on an ocean of calamity, clinging to a life buoy they called "treatment center," my mind was numb and thick with fog.