What follows is a piece I am reluctant to share due to its massive exposure of, well, me. It seems a lot of my vulnerability went into these short paragraphs. But I am sharing it, in the hope that it makes some understand me better.
N.B. Since I wrote this, I have stopped drinking.
My Nan was a drunk. I can see why.
Every dim memory of existence fades into insignificance in the presence of grog. Life is a fantastic thing in the face and mind of the naïve and unwise. An experience provided only through youth and alcohol.
She was onto something my Nan.
Her death face was a pained and elfish withdrawal of features; slender, with pointed ears. Her oxygen mask-scarred features drawn into a grimace as her breath drew heavy and her heart ceased caring. The hangdog expressions on her face betraying a near universal fear of that; the most inevitable of inevitabilities; the most ultimate of ultimate. If she’d been drunk, in the presence of my father and me, her face would have been the picture of nostalgic joy. Instead, it hung heavy, like a gaping, toothless, pained invertebrate.
She was far from that. My Nan was a paragon of strength defiance, injustice and, essentially, ‘fuck you’ism. Life was a constant struggle and she always fought it. “It’s just you and me against the world kid!” she used to say, apparently.
Well I agree. Fuck the world, like she has always fucked me. I owe my environment no favours, like the government that rules her, or the ceaseless dictation of marketing forces that control her.
Fuck sobriety, fuck tee-totalism and fuck thinking substance abuse is bad. It masks the truth, and the truth is life, love, dignity and joy all end. In death. In eternal.
If it just ends, why defend it. I’m no nihilist, I believe in something greater but really, what is offered so great as to be entirely virtuous for it. Not much, in all honesty. Even Dante Alighieri speaking of hell as a place of eternal pain and damnation can’t make me repent for my faith in booze. If hell were really full of sinners what the fuck makes Satan powerful enough to control billions? Because sinners far outweigh saints, let us remember that.
Heaven may seem an endearing prospect, but, all that virtue? Really? No offence but no one but God and Jesus are good enough to enter the kingdom of Heaven, and if they let in any other I’d assume a slip in standards,
When I die, I know where I’m heading.
I’ll be at your bar grampy, The Dommy of the deceased, make mine a red wine and I’ll chat with you all about how I tried to do better. I’ll let auntie know I worked hard at it, I’ll let Nan know I fought for it, and I’ll let you know I wanted a Daimler like yours, and I always took care of my mum and dad. Most of all I’ll let you see the self-righteous, pretentious tosser I am, and hope you’ll appreciate the wisdom-beyond-years that plagues me, the fact that I tried to do better, and improve the family name.
I’m intelligent without being smart; Wise without experience, and, ultimately, sarcastically immodest. Better assets with lesser opinions, unfortunately, do not mix.
Fuck life, I’m inferior. But better than most.
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