I sipped my whiskey at the local dive. Cheap stuff. Not trying to impress anyone. My story's a cautionary tale. Starts where they all do, I graduated college, fell in love, got a wife...for all the good it did me. You work, that's what you're supposed to do after college. Work hard, get ahead, support your family. My wife made more than I did. That didn't bother me. She pressured me to get a better job, earn more. That did bother me.

I crawled out of my well-worn rut and hit the street. I went to so many interviews that it made my head spin. Got a new gig downtown. Started out working more than 50 hours a week. The pay was good, so I didn't question it. Attrition hit the company. Lay-offs piled more responsibility on my plate till I was working more than 60 hours, regularly. I didn't want to let the wife down, especially while she was pregnant, mid-term.

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I worked so much that the only way I could relax was hitting the bottle after my shift. A little at first, more to follow. A low ambition man with pressure heaped on him will rise to the occasion, at a price. If someone takes a job so they can live their life, they need time to live that life. Soon, I was at the office more than I was home. Barely saw my wife...sober anyway. I worked so hard I barely noticed being handed the divorce papers. Work had become my wife and the bottle, my mistress.

So now I drink here. Everything I cared about in my life having been chipped away, leaving me an island in the vast, lonely sea...waiting for a shipwreck.