Isn’t that like saying that able-bodied people know just as much about being a wheelchair user because able-bodied people also spend time sitting? The life of

Isn’t that like saying that able-bodied people know just as much about being a wheelchair user because able-bodied people also spend time sitting? The life of a teetotaler is not just your life minus the time you are drinking. Indeed, you explicitly make GP’s point when you say, “I never saw those wonders of the “never-drinking life” that I am supposed to be missing.” Now, I would not argue that being a teetotaler is wonderful. I don’t drink because my father was an alcoholic. I feel like I have missed out of vast swaths of life. To me, the experience varies from fine to quite isolating and painful (especially when I was younger and conformity mattered more). When I was younger, going to a bar and not drinking was like being a virgin late in life while everyone is talking about sex. Once you’ve had sex, you realize no one judges virgins. But as the virgin, you feel painfully alone. You know your friends’ awareness of your difference is harshing their mellow a bit. But in the end, it is absurd to argue with people on the internet over who knows more about life. That’s a conversation better over a beer. I guess.