The bottle wasn't supposed to make it in the shopping basket. I felt strange, like some other woman putting it in there.
The bottle wasn't supposed to make it home
The bottle wasn't supposed to be uncorked with a glass sitting next to it. I laughed, all those times I never bothered with a glass.
It wasn't supposed to make it up to my mouth where it's full bodied sweet-sour aroma, immediately twinged something in my brain, like my brain was already gearing up for show down migraine hangover. Breathing in what started to smell like toxic fumes, my arm started to twitch from holding the position too long.
A voice said, "Jennifer, pour it down the drain. The whole $16 bottle, pour it out now. You are in this place because you've forgotten that small simple adage of turning it over. That ole' give you the grace to handle what you can, realize what you can't, and the smarts to know the difference? Yeah, that one. This is what happens when you start bearing up arms and readying yourself for a battle that is too big for you. Now, pour it out, or I will kick your ass with a migraine that will send you to ER. I've done it before, I'll do it again."
$16 bucks literally, down the drain. The stench of a too-big-for-its britches Cabernet filled my nostrils and made by stomach hitch. How the fuck was I able to drink turpentine all those years? I stood there at the kitchen sink. I was worried, not because alcohol almost made it down my gullet. But because of what transpired to get me there.
What is so hard about all of this, is that we can't really name it. It's a big game of who can handle the apocalypse better? Who looks the best on FB? Who's killing it in their career? Who's excelling? Who is not doubting? Who's taking up the bullshit marketing of their brand and using it as their calling card in society, when really it would just be more helpful if they told the truth about themselves?
To someone like me, it wasn't just a bottle of wine. For someone like me that could have been a loaded gun or a butcher knife. It simply said, "I don't want to play this game anymore. I'm tired of feeling like one half of my life is inhabited by A Great Gadsby-esque group of people who dance as the world burns and the other half, frozen in fear, trying to figure out how to feel, let alone what to do."
This is not to become anyone's burden here. People don't have the bandwidth for that shit. I will just say that honesty is probably a helpful component now. If I needed to be reminded to turn it over, then there may be others as well.
I laid down last night sans a migraine, but something else happened. It was astounding. It was a flush of the most astonishing neurochemicals I so rarely experience. It washed over my brain and untied my muscles, I started to feel almost like I could float. Then, off into twilight and off into dreamland. I felt carried by something, covered and protected. Maybe this was all I was looking for.