A family member addicted to alcohol who drives under the influence of same is a combination that will truly destroy a family. I know. I was a part of that combination as a youngster growing up.

In 1947 my father sent me off to military boarding school for three years, for third, fourth and fifth grades. I did not understand this move. Later, I found it was to keep me from the surroundings of my mother who was an alcoholic and unable to care for my little sister and I. My sister was being cared for daily by an outsider.

My first year in military school my mother picked me up each Friday at 2 p.m. for my weekend pass at home. One Friday she did not show by 2 p.m. I waited and about 6 p.m. the superintendent along with one of my classmate’s parents informed me that my mother and sister were in a serious auto wreck on Highway 101 in Marin County.

She was driving a two-week-old Cadillac totally impaired, crossed all traffic lanes heading north and jumped a creek. The car was bent in the middle and totaled. My sister was thrown out of the car into the creek. My mother was stuck in the car with her face smashed into the steering wheel.

The rescue personnel freed my mother and took her to the hospital. About an hour later the tow truck driver found my sister in the creek about 25 yards from the auto. She was taken to the hospital and checked out OK. My mother spent five months in the hospital and left with a terribly disfigured face for life. She never recovered, and ultimately drank even more.

Three years later I returned to public school for the seventh through 10th grades. Many days after school I would find my mother drunk in her car parked in our garage, passed out. I would get her out of her car and carry her two flights of stairs to her bed. She never learned a lesson about drinking alcohol after her wreck. She was never able to care for her family after the incident.

The sad part of this story is her consumption of alcohol on a daily basis literally destroyed our family. Mother and Dad lost most of their friends. We had a wonderful close-knit family with lots of friends that was lost and torn apart by alcohol.

Curt Giambruno is mayor of Clearlake and a member of Team DUI, a group of local individuals and officials working to stop drinking and driving and underage drinking.

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