Filed under: Daily Specials | Tags: addiction, alcohol, insanity, life, love, lust, men, personal, sex, thoughts, women
Tonight’s drink: Capsula Viola Galestro.
As I sit here and enjoy a second glass of wine on a Monday night, I start to wonder: How do you know – really know – when you’re addicted to something?
First, I try to identify my current feelings. Yes.. they feel unusual, but when do I ever feel usual? Yes, I get excited thinking about it, but since when did excitement absolutely mean something was the real deal? Yes, it sort of makes everything seem a little bit brighter, but so does glitter. So those are dead ends.
So then, I start to compare these feelings to other feelings I’ve had before. The urgency of wanting it, and the extreme relaxation once it’s been obtained. The way you feel like, if you don’t have it right now you’re going to rip patches of hair from your body and implode. But I feel that way on long car trips when I just want to be home, or when I really -really- have to go to the bathroom. So that can’t be the tell-tale sign, either.
Is it that I think about it during the day, or make sure that I can at least have it within reach when I get home? I could say the same thing about my bed, or my blog, or Milton’s 12 grain bread. I don’t think I’m addicted to those.
Addiction must be more than emotions. Just like love is more than that butterfly feeling in your stomach, or sharing a milkshake. Addiction must be more masochistic… where it hurts if you can’t have it, or you feel like you’d do anything – even kill big crunchy bugs – for it. It must be something that rips you apart inside and then grabs you in an infinite swing and launches you into the blue where no one can touch you. It’s very peaceful. And then, just like that, you’re falling again. And even though it tosses you to oblivion, in Hokusai waves and Oz tornados, you can’t get enough of it. Eventually, it gently sets you down, and you forgive it. Then you forgive yourself. And you vow you’ll never do it again.
Until you do. And it makes you warm. And it makes your eyelashes flutter. It makes you talk nonsense, and smile a lot at work. It makes you suddenly artistic, open, and unafraid. Until the gears start to lurch in their forward motion, all over again.
This must be what addiction is like. And for once, I’m not talking about alcohol.
Filed under: Daily Specials | Tags: alcohol, drinking, family, life, men, personal, Thanksgiving, thoughts, warnings, women
Last night’s drink: chicken wonton soup broth.
This year, I had the most inebriated, belligerent, hungover Thanksgiving I’ve ever had – and I was the most sober of them all. From aunts to grandmas, the bar was rocking with tequila shots and Sonoma County chasers. It was a new experience to see not one, but many of my relatives about one open-toed shoe away from dancing on the wet bar. I suppose it’s a blessing that I was on dish-duty, otherwise I’m sure I would’ve jumped right into the competition for most photo-worthy topple.
The alcohol experience wasn’t the only one that raised my eyebrows over the short time I spent in Northern California. On our drive from the airport, my dad and I had a great conversation in which I discovered that: 1) he actually respects my opinion a lot, and 2) he would prefer that I date (and probably marry) a man that can instinctually whip out 50 ways to kill someone. While in the academy, my dad was told to approach everyone you don’t know as if you will have to kill them, and he’s lived, dare I say survived, by that mantra. Now I understand why my father wore his ankle piece to Disneyland.
Of course, I had my fair share of vodka after we bid our relatives a happy recovery. My sister and I carried on our new post-Turkey tradition of going to a dive bar and playing pool after we tried, unsuccessfully, to get the party started at the Hilton (I swear, one of these days I’m going to write a full blog about my hatred for the Hilton). There was some removal of clothing, stealing of numbers, casual death threats, blackjack, moonwalking, bad music, and passing out. Oh, and we kicked ass at pool. The Color of Money, baby. Or, so I’ve been told.
I can’t escape the feeling that I’m getting too old for these pictures, though. I was wearing a blazer for gosh sakes.
The trip was a whirlwind, no matter how you slice it. I landed drunk on Thursday and came back more wrecked on Friday. I saw sides of my relatives, and people in general, that I didn’t know existed. I got up close and personal with my current extreme frustration with men. I came back to San Diego and felt around for an anchor that wasn’t there. When the spotlight spins around you like that, you have to really focus on what’s being revealed to you. More importantly, you have to decipher whether or not it’s a warning that you’re about to crash into the coastline.
It’s not going to stop me from visiting Edward in L.A., though. At least once.
Filed under: Daily Specials | Tags: , emotions, leaving, life, love, personal, thoughts
Last night’s drink: vodka and soda, with two limes.
Although emotions are intangible and unpredictable, there is one thing about them that clearly joins them to the human body – they can be wounded. Since emotions don’t bleed, the wounds can stay open longer, and reopen more easily. The scar tissue is more like tissue paper. Any attempts to stitch them closed manually are a joke.
Zack will be on the road to Dallas by this evening. We had a really good time last night at Nunu’s, the bar he introduced me to years ago. It took him leaving for us to open up to eachother again. We had shut down and turned off our front porches to eachother, so that the past behind them would just wither, decay and dissolve into the ground. But, like a zombie, that past stuck around in a half-alive state, until it was awakened by the fact that more than a couple of bedroom communities would be between us. Last night we were the way we used to be, so long ago. But more mature, more open, more us. I’m not really one to get gushy or romantic, but it was really beautiful in its purity. Just two people on one level, with an entire world fluctuating around them.
So him leaving today is just like it was then, only worse. Worse because things are so much better, whereas back then the foundation was so much weaker, that when you stepped outside of he and I, you could say, “Yeah.. that makes sense.” The only thing that makes sense now is that he is going to a happier place in his life – a place where he will finally start to feel complete. And I’ll continue to grow in San Diego until I can’t grow anymore.
Then maybe it will be my turn to leave. And maybe, finally, the way Zack and I know eachother will make sense in a different way.
Filed under: Daily Specials | Tags: life, love, personal, random, thoughts
Last night’s drink: White wine, but I really wanted a beer.
Wednesday night, before the fight that caused my final eviction from his place, we actually had a calm conversation about what was wrong with us. I finally told him that I was afraid of losing my independence. His response was that relationships were about giving up your independence for something bigger.
But I feel strongest and most like myself when I can exercise my independence to its limits. This “bigger” opponent has done nothing for me that compares. In fact, its most obvious effects have been atmospheres of confusion and heartbreak, and a lame, limpy version of myself, all of which are self-perpetuating. But that night, something snapped inside me, and I could finally see clearly. I knew this was the last time. And as I sit in my old apartment again, with all of my clothes put away and just a few boxes to unpack, I have this funny feeling inside of me that can only be described as Christmas Morning. I feel like I’ve just opened a gift that I can’t wait to use.
My youngest sister is almost 10 years my junior – only one year away from graduating from high school. Of course she wants to marry her boyfriend, which I think is somewhat normal at that age. What is not normal is wanting to start a family soon thereafter. Of course my first reaction is a heavy-handed NO. My grandma and I were never really close, but I always remembered her one piece of advice to me: Do not get married until you graduate from college. That mantra was my guide and, dare I say, my saving grace. My grandmother is intelligent, beautiful, and strong, and she married at 35. That just tells me that I am still young enough not to worry about all this business.
I always valued education above all, which is what helped me not to marry my high school sweetheart. Education doesn’t seem to motivate today’s youth, though. Money does, however, which is why I set up an automatic savings account that will accumulate monthly until her wedding or graduation day, whichever comes first. It’s more than just a bribe, it’s more like a metaphor for waiting. Singledom is an investment that can feel long and sometimes be a strain, but it is satisfying and so valuable the longer you keep it going. Then you can roll that investment over into a bigger investment: marriage and kids.
Which brings me back to his original comment about giving up your life for a we life. Is this really true? Can’t two people have to independent lives yet be partners and lovers together? Actually.. forget that I asked. With my renewed sense of clarity, I can confidently answer this with a yes. A relationship is something that two people create together – not something that two people melt into into. At least, that’s what I want out of mine.
I promise I’ll drink lots this weekend, if nothing more than for the sake of these blogs.
