Monday, August 09, 2004

Saving Pops Santos

This month marks the one-year anniversary of my buddy, we'll just call him Matt, last drink or, as he calls it, “pop”. I know this a touchy subject but I need to talk about it.

I’m calling for an intervention. An intervention? For what? He's already stopped drinking. Precisely the problem. I need everyone’s help in getting him back on the wagon. No. Literally, I can’t lift his big ass up onto the wagon. Are you nuts!

Start Slow.Send him liquor-filled chocolates. Bake him Rum cake. Take him out for beer-battered seafood. Enroll him in the Beer of the Month Club. Anything!

A "reverse" intervention might seem odd, but let me explain. Interventions are used when a friend or family member hits the proverbial bottom. They can’t function in society. They might forego their love ones and job. They might be doing harm to themselves or others. He has told me that his body aches and co-workers tell him that he’s been so cranky. I’ll be blunt:

I miss my Matty Balou!!

I cannot sit back and see the greatest living drinker this land has ever produced drink Kool-Aid any longer. Imagine a world without Babe Ruth hitting home runs. Imagine Bob Dylan throwing away his acoustic guitar. Imagine Jonas Salk wallowing his life away making cough medicine. Imagine Ronald Reagan saying, “Mr. Gorbachev, leave that wall there. It’s good for the West German racquetball team”.

I’ve seen Matt Santos drink 15 Seven and Sevens and not even stagger. I’ve seen so many amateur drinkers literally challenge him in a drinking contest only to fail miserably. To see Matt Santos step up to the bar is to see the confidence and dominance of a drinking legend.

You can do it!