The Top Shelf

We start drinking because we are not old enough to drink and we know that. Shoe polish liquor is all we can get our adolescent hands on and it runs like lava down our throats, provoking unexpected tears and unknown words to slip from between our discontent lips. We start drinking because it’s in the mysteriously kept cupboard above the sink. When we finally open it, we see the dusty bottles, just out of reach. The top shelf smiles down at us; inviting us to compromise our morals in order to quench our curiosity. We don’t know what Casamigos is, but it’s way better than Jose Cuervo. We start drinking because even though our brains are not fully developed, we still feel the weight of the world regardless of lived experience and context.

We drink because it’s fun and seemingly free. There’s no cost, right? We drink because one of our friends has a shitty fake ID and we live in the suburbs. There’s nothing to do, and besides, we’re young and have time to kill. We continue after everyone else stops at 3 am because it helps us sleep and forget about the stupid thing we said 4,286 days ago. But we wake up in the morning and the California fault line swallows us up and we fall deep into sweet rumination. We don’t know what to do so we reach for the fifth but it’s empty because it always is.

So we go to the liquor store; the one on top of the steep, worn concrete hill that doesn’t care how old you are as long as you leave a little something in the everpresent tip jar. We tell ourselves just one to cure the headache, but sometimes it’s hard to stop because one is never enough. One is never enough.

We confidently state that “our drinking never gets in the way of our responsibilities,” and we actually believe it. In a way, we are not lying. We are truly convinced that no problem of the drink exists within us. After all, we are eighteen years old. We’re supposed to have a good time.

We keep the buzz going because it makes the professor with long gray nose hairs and that irritatingly monotonous voice seem more interesting. It makes the infinite colors of life brighter and the musicality of mundane noises more fruitful. Situations that once felt gruesomely daunting now feel insignificant. We will be okay as long as we keep drinking.

Drinking around others becomes a chore because they always make comments, so for now, we drink alone. If we wanted to know their opinions, we’d fucking ask. Instead, we throw away our clear water bottles and buy hydroflasks because they’re not see through. Plus they keep the cold ones cold.

We stop eating, and instead, spend the money on cheap, bitter booze. Fifteen grand in less than a year. Ouch. Our stomachs hurt before we get drunk, so we drink quicker. We begin to love the burn of whiskey and the mouth watering scent of tequila reposado. We know no chase except for that of the next glass.

We haven’t drawn a sober breath for God knows how long but we don’t dwell on it because it feels better that way. We don’t dwell on anything anymore because the drink makes it so we don’t have to. Sometimes we run out of alcohol and turn to other things to suppress or bind to our tattered receptor sites. Prescription sedatives and stale weed — individually or all at once — usually does the trick.

Then one day “we” becomes “I” because everyone else has died or quit or has shipped themselves somewhere to get a fresh start. I won’t be alone for long because there are so many of us. We are in every office, law firm, grocery store, and government building. We exist in alleys and mansions and everywhere in between. We are the oppressed and the oppressor. We hold power; Power over everything but ourselves, so in a sense, we are always powerless. We never know enough is enough until something horrible happens. We never know when to stop. That’s what makes us us.

Friends will casually scatter hints into banter as to perhaps lead us towards the better path and it will slowly plant the deep rooted plant of self awareness into our sick minds. They wish for us to flock to these ideas like birds to seeds but we are weary; always on guard. We do not heed their words, in fact, we try to ignore them. No matter how hard we try to suppress those fateful words, we still have them attached firmly to our hippocampus; ever present and unfailing. The words they share come crashing down like an avalanche when we get hospitalized. When we wake up with engorged hands and crippling headaches.

Eventually, we will wake up with the cruel vultures of reality perched upon our shoulders and we will try to quit. This time for good. “We” becomes “I” once more. It doesn’t last long because I can’t do it alone, but I also can’t do it with you. So I feel stuck, lost, and ready to give up. I express my pain while I lay on the rough, paneled white carpet in my parents living room. I break down and cry and say I will pick up the bottle again. After my emotions subside, I mutter about how no one understands me and no one ever will.

My dad sits me down and tells me that I don’t have to be alone. I don’t have to fight for my life in solitude.

“It’s a parent’s delusional faith in their children,” I tell myself. Every parent wants their kids to succeed and sometimes they become blind to the truth. I don’t want to believe him but his unwavering blue eyes communicate more information than I could ever ask for. His eyes have, are, and always will be unconditionally honest eyes. He’s never lied to me before. Why would he start now?

I learn to live with my faults. I learn to love my faults. I learn to accept and acknowledge my many, human shortcomings. Perfection is not achievable so why set such an unrealistic bar. It is better to set a standard and strive to meet it each and every day.

Eventually, after seven months, complacency rots my brain and I slip back into old habits. I find myself nodding off in class again, except this time, there is something more sinister at play. My usage is no longer fueled by boredom and youthful rebellion. My habits had cocooned and hatched into necessity. I start over again, but this time, I know what to do.

It has been an arduous year and my life has changed. The last drops of alcohol at the bottom of the bottle I used to obsess over no longer seem so pornographically seductive. A legal drink will never touch my lips but I am more than fine with that. I’m fighting a strenuous lifelong war, and true soldiers don’t care about arbitrary birthdays when their lives are held in the balance.

A year ago, I once again won the first battle: 24 hours without dreamy inebriation. Rather than call it a day, I geared up for the next battle. I will have to overcome these skirmishes for the rest of my life, so for now, I will keep training.