Breakin' da law! Breakin' da law!

Every night, right around dinnah time (7:30ish for us Iberic types, which is widely considered early among our tribe) we break the law.

We allow NOS a modest ounce of wine or two of beer. My sister and I were bought up thus, and so were my parents (we'll set aside the issue of TFBIM's ancestors, as there seems to be a strongish caveperson streak therein) and I guesstimate all previous generations of Jokes. At some point or another, we climb far up the family tree and we bump into a Centurion and/or a Celt (they also settled the North of Spain, along with Normandy and parts of the British Isles).

Beer and wine, right there, hardwired into the DNA.

So, because we believe that certain beverages are a natural and desirable and civilized* part of the meal, we let NOS (NTS won't go near the stuff) have a tiny sherry glass' worth of wine or a pony glass if we're talking beer.

One of the things that struck me most as a kid visiting the family in Spain was watching 1) American teenagers going bonkers with the relative freedom to drink--and puking by 11am--and also 2) Kids my age having wine and beer and coffee. Not gallons, sure, but being socialized to the whole thing. The idea being that some beverages contain alcohol and while sometimes they serve to take the edge off, you really don't drink them to get hammered.

So we give NOS a tipple.

Of course, being my kid, he does it all obnoxious-like. He takes his little wineglass by the stem, he swirls, he sniffs, he holds it up to the light, he sips it with his eyes shut. He then says things like "This wine goes with the spaghetti."

All of which is against the law.

I'm just old enough that I can remember the drinking age going back up to 21 from 18. I was just old enough to be grandfathered in and so I was, as they say, golden. But what changed? Nothing. High school kids still got drunk. Binge drinking went up. All the hallmarks of progress. (Before you get the wrong idea of me as some sort of young sommelier in my college years, let me remind you of this dumbass blue dot I have and shall have for the rest of my life.)

Mind you, I went a bit nuts in college, but t'was nothing to compare with other freshpersons who were away from home for the first time. I recall being out-of-my-skull maybe 5-6 times. There were other more, um, Macchiavellian reasons why I often erred on the side of sobriety, but I digress.

So, now you know. If one among you is a mandated reporter, you'll surely show up in time to see my body go limp--forcing 3-4 members of the local constabulary to move me--as I sing, in a ringing tenor, "We Shall Overcome."

-J.

* So are cocktails, but we have to draw the line somewhere. After all, there's a limit to everything.