ALCOHOLISM ADVISER LEARNED HARD LESSON : DRINKING COST EXECUTIVE AN EARLIER CAREER.

Byline: Bettie Rencoret Senior Columnist

Clancy Corbet is a very busy man.

Sitting in his Antelope Valley Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependency office talking to a visitor, he interrupts the conversation when the phone rings.

The caller is from an insurance company, investigating the death of an alcoholic killed when he stepped off a curb into the path of an oncoming car.

Into the phone, Corbet says: ``Call Social Security at this number and then, if you need me for identification or anything, just call me back. We've been worried about him because we haven't seen him for a while.''

He hangs up and talks about the dead man: ``He was only 50 years old and looked 80. He was crossing the street to go into a bar.''

A staffer comes into Corbet's office seeking money for a client who showed up in the waiting room after getting out of jail. Corbet reaches into his pocket for enough to tide the man over.

``I just went to the bank to deposit all our cash,'' he said.

Corbet, 65 and executive director of the agency for 21 years, understands alcoholism because he has been there.

It took two years of lost weekdays as well as lost weekends to convince him that he needed help to lick the disease of alcoholism.

He started drinking at parties when he was 16, continued to drink through one year of college, then joined the U.S. Navy.

``Of course, people in the Navy drank. I fit right in. I was a heavy drinker in the Navy.''

At a dance in Japan in 1953, he experienced one of the consequences of his drinking.

``I must have stepped on somebody's toes, but I never knew who or why or exactly what happened,'' he said. ``All I knew was that somebody hit me and broke my jaw. I spent six weeks in the Navy hospital because of that.''

When he came back home to St. Joseph, Mo., he went back to school and didn't drink too much.

He was graduated in 1957 with a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Missouri at Columbia, bought a car and moved west to San Diego, then to Canoga Park.

From 1958 to 1974 he traveled as a salesman of wholesale pharmaceuticals. His bosses, cohorts and customers all drank, and he did, too.

``I was a very good salesman,'' Corbet said. ``I did such a good job that I was transferred to territories that had been neglected - to build them back up. When I got one going well, they transferred me to another.''

His trouble-shooting brought him to Lancaster in 1971, working accounts from what was then called Sepulveda to Bridgeport, drinking all the way.

``By then my alcoholism was in a rapid state of progress. The morning drink became a necessity,'' he said, and then there were more drinks all day.

In July 1973 he was fired for drinking on the job.

He was 41 and jobless, subsisting on his retirement savings and unemployment compensation, and he proceeded to drink himself into oblivion.

In April 1974, he wound up hospitalized by damage from acute alcoholism.

``My body just almost quit. I couldn't stand up. I was totally dehydrated. I couldn't eat. My 6-foot frame had gone from 205 pounds of bloated blimp down to 175,'' he said.

Along the way he had collected three drunk-driving citations. His attorney got him continuances until he was sturdy enough and sober enough to appear in court.

``The hospital dried me out. By the time the third continuance date arrived, I had finally gotten sober. The question was not so much whether I could stay sober, but whether I would live long enough. I looked like hell, and I didn't want to go back to drinking.''

He attended his first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.

``The late Ernie McBride, local car dealer, became my sponsor,'' he said. ``He picked me up and took me to that first meeting. It still took months for my mind and body to get back to functioning normally.''

In the early stages of recovery, he said, the crucial part is handling crises as they happen without regressing.

``My mother died in November of 1974. That was the first major crisis I had to face. I was able to handle it due to AA.''

That December he went to work as a tax preparer and began volunteering at the Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependency.

He submitted his application when the executive director's job opened up, and he was hired in September 1975.

He had always been a confirmed bachelor, he said. Then in August 1974 he married Genie Fields.

``My only love was booze until I met Genie.''

Genie works in the office with him doing much of the paperwork.

``Nobody has to feel hopeless,'' said Corbett as he offered some statistics.

``In the Antelope Valley alone, there are now 160 Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings every week. When I first got sober there were only 10 AAs and no NAs.''

The reason for so many, he said, is the Alcoholism Council's drinking-driver programs, the employer-employee assistance programs, and the programs required by the courts and Probation Department.

``Help is out there just for the asking,'' he said. ``Call us.''

Menus for the week at the senior life nutrition sites in Lancaster, Palmdale and Pearblossom have been announced. All meals include bread, margarine and coffee, tea or milk.

Monday: Salisbury steak, mashed potatoes, green beans, pineapple/cottage cheese, pears.

Tuesday: Chicken Dijon, rice pilaf, peas and carrots, coleslaw, gelatin with peaches.

Wednesday: Baked ham, sweet potatoes, cabbage, tossed salad, pudding.

Thursday: Juice, spaghetti and meatballs, Italian squash, tossed salad, cheesecake.

Friday: Baked fish, baked potato, mixed vegetables, marinated beets, apple.

Alcohol problem can hit seniors

Senior citizens sometimes rely on alcohol as a defense against many of the conditions of aging, says Clancy Corbet, executive director of the Antelope Valley Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependency.

He sees three major factors in the alcoholism of seniors.

The No. 1 problem is retirement, he says. During their working years, they maybe had a beer now and then, or a cocktail or two before dinner.

``After retirement, if they are not involved in some constructive and absorbing activity, they can become addicted to alcohol, and when coupled with prescription drugs that are required for most of us after a certain age, this can be deadly,'' he said.

Second is the death of a spouse after many years of marriage. This often leads to extreme depression or suicidal tendencies, Corbet said.

``These are often aggravated by drinking to forget,'' he said.

Thirdly, there is just plain loneliness and isolation.

``It doesn't have to be like that,'' he said. ``The Council, my staff and I, are here for them as are the people of Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous. All they have to do is call [phone].''

CAPTION(S):

Photo, Box

Photo: (color) Clancy Corbet, who sobered up and changed his life more than 20 years ago, helps others trying to get sober.

Bettie Rencoret/Special to the Daily News

Box: Alcohol problem can hit seniors (see text)