When Terri asks Mel is he is drunk, he becomes defensive because he realizes that something about his personality must be changing. In other words, he is getting drunk and behaving drunk but does not want to admit it and continues to drink to cover his emotions.
Perhaps the most compelling aspect of the story in relation to drinking is the fact that the characters are drinking as if it were second nature to them. They are drinking gin and it as if this is something they do every day. The gin and the water "kept going around" (Carver 170) the table and the coupes drink freely, conversing as if everything is normal. They are pouring gin into their glasses as if it is iced tea. When Terri finishes the last of the first bottle of gin, she shakes the bottle and Mel simply gets up from the table, gets another bottle of gin and they proceed. As Mel pours everyone a new glass of gin, no one stops him and no one seems to be pathetically drunk. It is worth noting, however, that Mel does get drunk and it becomes evident in his behavior. It is safe to assume that Mel is a character that Carver might have molded from his experiences with alcohol. While no one in this story gets sloppy drunk to the point that they pass out, Mel does exhibit drunken, loud, obnoxious behavior and the result of this behavior is nothing.
Mel, with all of his success, cannot answer the question that he posits for everyone in the room and this is the problem. Certainly, he attempts to describe love but the fact that he cannot relate to it is what seems to be eating away at him. He has seen love, or what he perceives to be love, in the old couple and he simply cannot relate to it. This leads him to feel a sense of regret and sadness that he cannot put into words. He knows these feelings stem from his lack of love and passion and he drinks to cover these feelings and perhaps cause him to feel better if for just a short time. In fact, the entire group is drinking to escape something. Mel and Terri are teetering on the edge of something that looks like divorce if they are not careful and Nick and Laura are just along for the...
I also began to realize that due to the fact that any family is a complex and often unique entity in itself, that there are many subtle and underlying aspects to alcoholism in the family that are often not visible at first sight. Many of the interviewees when describing their feelings as children noted a sense of guilt and a sense that in some way, through bad behavior or
It is interesting to note that Tambour and Quertemont studied the effects of the same two drugs plus Disulfiram, an alcohol-deterrent drug. Their findings, in reviewing other studies, indicated slightly different results from Richardson. Since different drugs target different neuro-inhibitors, the drugs were used both separately and together. Quertemont discovered, in reviewing the results of previous and current studies, that none of the drugs worked particularly well, and that the
exist between alcoholism as a learned behavior (rather than as a condition arising from any genetic predisposition) and self-esteem. This research is based upon the assumption that there is a direct connection between self-esteem and learned behaviors: While a person's self-esteem may of course be affected by inherited conditions (such as a birth defect) it is much more likely to be affected by conditions that the person believes that
Native American's With Alcoholism And Diabetes The health situation with regard to Native Americans is shown in numerous studies to be seriously below the standard and average of other groups in the country. This fact is underscored and emphasized in research studies such as Richardson's, The Need to Empower Indian Tribes, in which he states that, As the nation reviews its health needs, it can look to American Indians as the ethnic
Alcohol I began my research with an open mind. Alcohol was a huge topic, and I needed to narrow it down and come up with something meaningful to research. As I looked at the different aspects of drinking habits, one issue kept resurfacing that drew my attention. That issue was the long-term effects of drinking on the individual. I was interested in binge drinking, as well as heavy drinking sustained over
Introduction One of the most disturbing aspects of life as a Native American is the fact that this population suffers from historical trauma—the trauma of having lost their land, their way of life, and essentially their freedom to self-determination when the American colonies began to assert themselves and push the Natives off their land. The Cherokee were expelled from the East, for instance, by the Indian Removal Act in the 19th
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