Free Books and the Devil Whiskey

Saw an excellent play last week, "The Seafarers." In it, several Irishmen who have been downing glass after glass of whiskey, beer and "poteen" (strong Irish moonshine) on a Christmas Eve refer to some vagrants who are carrying on in an alley as "dem winos." You have to love it, don't you, the Irish pot calling the Irish kettle black? Anyway, on the drive home through downtown, trying to contemplate the message of the play, I noticed a bunch of young people rummaging through boxes of books that were being thrown out for trash day. I slowed down my car, lusting after the goods as only a true trash-picker can. "Anything good?" I asked one young woman who was holding onto an old, hardcover book. "Just some funny stuff," she replied, showing me the title, "1,000 Things to Do Before You Get Married." Ha, I advised her, it's more like a million things - no rush! We both had a good laugh at that one - the young twenty-something, out  for the night with her friends, and me, the old married broad who was single until she was 46. But I didn't tell the youngster that long tale, nor did I compete with her and her pals for literary treasures on the curbside. I just waved goodbye, drove off and left them to their foraging and the pursuit of fun things to do before they - maybe - get married some day. Then I returned to ruminating about the play in which the Devil visits two of the Irishmen to collect their souls in a deal they made with him years ago. Could the Devil symbolize alcohol, which we learn during the course of the play, is the root of all the considerable misery in these characters' lives? Hmmmmm. I'll have to think about that one - preferably, over a nice cuppa tea.