Peter Goers

I was waiting for the same friend to return from the same honeymoon and I was sitting in my house and I'd put a huge mallee log on the fire, an open fire, and I fell asleep waiting for my friend.

And suddenly I'm being woken up by Snowy the Wonder Dog barking and pulling, jumping on me.

And the log had fallen out of the fireplace and was burning on the hearth rug.

So I quickly gathered it up on the rug and threw it out on the front lawn and put the hose on it just as my friend arrived.

So Snowy saved my life.

But I think people were very understanding and they had to be.

You know, my friends had to be because it put me into a period of the next five years of self-destructive behaviour.

I could see no point to life.

So I was doing my level best to...

really just diminish my own life.

How were you doing that, Peter?

Drinking.

I was not an alcoholic, but I was a binge drinker, shocking binge drinker, until I stopped that in 1987 and never looked back.

But, yes, I was very... Because what's the point?

You've just lost two people in the prime of their lives.

You know, what's the point of life?

You know, I could go tomorrow too, so, you know, why not have another drink?

You know, I was compulsive and self-destructive.

How hard was it for you to give up the drink entirely?

It was easy.