Why I Quit Alcohol

Sobriety starts with a warm beer.

It’s about 43 degrees Celsius, and the house is too hot. The only thing close to a breeze barely touches the front porch. I’m sitting on the doorstep, swatting away flies under a small patch of shade, protected from the scorching afternoon Spanish sun. It’s beating down, and the landscape reminds me of my tour of Afghanistan in 2007. But here, the only …