Ohhhh… was I drunk, and sick, and late for Thanksgiving dinner, and too sick to eat even if I had been on time. It’s hard to believe that the day had started off so well. Did I mention that I was deathly ill?
It was Thanksgiving Day 1952, the day of the traditional football game between Union-Endicott and Binghamton Central high schools, and I was four months short of my seventeenth birthday. My buddy, Don Natoli, was almost eighteen, so we figured that he could probably pass for the legal drinking age when he tried to buy a bottle of whiskey for us to share at game. We weren't at all familiar with the different brands of whiskey or the sizes of the bottles available for purchase. I believe that we were thinking of buying a pint (16 ounces), but Don bought a fifth; that’s a fifth of a gallon, 4/5 of a quart… almost 26 ounces. I think that’s where things started to take a left turn.
The day dawned bright and moderately warm for late November, and Don had decided to go hunting for a while - we would meet later at the game. It must have been around 09:30 when I left the house to attend the game which began at 10:30; my parents had instructed me to be home for dinner by 2 PM. I didn't foresee any problems with the schedule. We all met at U-E high school just before game time, there were five of us as I recall Gerry Hickey, Gary Miner, Joe Sabol, Don and me. The game was to be played at our home field, and the atmosphere was charged with excitement. Don didn't have any luck hunting rabbits that morning, but his luck improved at the liquor store…we had a bottle with which to celebrate the first touchdown.
Our team scored the first touchdown in the game as I remember it now, and we started the celebration with a long pull on the bottle. The whiskey really didn't taste too bad and it had a nice warming effect as it settled into my almost empty stomach. That’s about the last thing that I remember clearly until I arrived home about 2:30 PM, late for dinner, the intervening hours are just snippets of blurred memories.
The game must have been a good one, and our team probably did well because I certainly celebrated something… quite frequently. The bottle was passed around but refused by the three levelheaded members of the group - Don and I didn't much care… all the more for us. The next thing I noticed was that I was having difficulty negotiating the steps as we exited the bleachers at half time. Don wasn't doing much better. By the time we made it across the field to the concession stands I couldn't have found my butt with both hands if you had held a gun to my head; I was beyond drunk. Someone spotted Don’s father, off in the distance, and it looked as if he was heading our way. Two of our friends hustled Don into a rest room so that he wouldn't be seen; I don't know if his dad saw me or not.
My next recollection is waking up in the front seat of Don’s car with an urgent need to throw up I managed to get the door open just in time. My opinion regarding the taste of whiskey had changed drastically for the worse by the time that episode was finished. I sat up in the front seat to get my bearings and saw that the game was still in progress, and that Don was passed out in the back seat. I called to him a couple of times but he didn't move a muscle. Then, as I turned back to look toward the field, everything in my field of view started to roll slowly upward… I opened the door and leaned out just in time for a repeat of the last sickening performance.
I woke up, some time later, in a diner where Gerry was trying to get me to drink a cup of hot black coffee; it burned my mouth but I got it all down. That “old wives tale” about giving black coffee to a drunk to sober him up is pure bunk all you get is a wide-awake drunk on your hands. My next recollection is of walking around and around an exercise track that was used by horses the guys were trying to keep Don and me awake and moving things were beginning to come into focus. I soon discovered that it was past 2 PM and I told the guys to take me home. They didn't think that was a good idea but I insisted… what did I know I was drunk. Minutes later I was left standing on my front porch the guys were off to work some more on Don who didn't have to be home until 4 PM. There was nothing left but to walk in and try to fake my way through what was left of dinner.
I must have been a sorry sight as I entered the kitchen because all fell silent and my dad began to question me I remember this part vividly, beginning with his first question…
“Why is your face so blue?”
“I don't know… is it?”
“Have you been fighting?”
“No.”
“Drinking?” The questions were getting shorter.
“Yes”
“What were you drinking?”
“Whiskey.” With that I dashed into the bathroom and ended up hugging the porcelain while I waited to die. Then I began to think that I wouldn't die I didn't know which would be the worse fate. I finally emerged to face my dad who realized my terrible condition and told me to lay down on my bed saying, “I'll talk to you later.”
I was surprised, when we spoke the next day, that he didn't yell or even raise his voice. He did, however, give me a stern lecture, the sum and substance of which was that I was never to come home in that condition again… ever. And to be certain that I didn't, I was to present myself in his bedroom each night, as soon as I came home, for inspection. This continued all through my seventeenth year and got to be a boring routine, until the night that I decided to have a little fun pretending to be drunk. Dad heard me come in (I was making no attempt to be quiet) and called me into his room for the usual look-see. I turned the light on and started my little charade when I saw him throw the covers back and start to get up… the act ended right then and there. Funny he didn't seem to see the humor in it. I wondered, later, just what he would have done if I really had been drunk, but I never gave him reason enough to show me, probably because I couldn't stand the sight or smell of whiskey for at least two years afterward.
F. A. Zedik
June 20, 2000