THE BLINDNESS OF THE ARROGANT MIND

Although I understand the seriousness of the situation, I knew my worst day wasn’t the day I earned my first, second or even third driving under the influence (DUI) offense. It wasn’t the day, I begged the court to release me from custody, and it was promptly denied. It wasn’t the day, I mourned about being severely dehydrated and begged for fresh water, and was denied. It wasn’t the day, I looked in a hazy mirror and the reflection revealed a slow demise. It was a different day, unlike any other day I had had in my life up until that point. I had lived a privileged life, but, one day things changed.

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Dear Alcohol! I was visiting a restaurant one day many years ago and while sitting alone at a table I observed two men causally sitting and talking. As they chatted, I watched them dip their cigars into shot glasses filled with your presence. I had never witnessed that happen before and became very curious. I noticed many flattering things about their appearance as I sat and watched them repeatedly dip once or twice then ordering fresh shots to continue to dip their cigars. Since I was not aware of this dipping thing, I quietly asked the bartender why and what they were dipping their cigars into. He explained to me that in that situation your name was King Henry IV, the finest of the cognac genre. There you cost a robust $50.00 a shot and that equally expensive cigars were intensified in flavor by your presence. At that moment, I knew I wanted to explore your boundaries.

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I was once employed in an environment where you are permanently housed. In this house, a total of three trusted employees, with a well-earned reputation, were the only ones endorsed to access your private entry. This was because of the tightness of your ownership at that time. The members of this environment tend to prize your nomenclature as an indication of their stature. It is of general opinion that people assign prominence in pairing you to lifestyle, intellect, culture, race, food, palate, cornucopia and Earth’s soil and climate. People believe it makes good conversation to discuss your reign. It expresses a refined and sophisticated demeanor. There’s talk about your pH balance and how to entertain with you in hand.  You sit on shelves everywhere. I chose to ignore my highest values over you the Proverbs 23:29-35 explains: “Those who tarry long over wine; those who go to try mixed wine. Do not look at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup and goes down smoothly. In the end it bites like a serpent and stings like an adder. Your eyes will see strange things, and your heart utter perverse things.” Peter 5:8 tells us: “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a lion, seeking someone to devour.” My guilt is evident; my lures hang low, then you ruled over me.

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Dear Alcohol! In breach of all that I had loved, I accepted you in my life. But, true to your nature you set my whole life in flames because of my love for you. As your charm over me wears away, I waited in in a dungeon of silence for forty days appealing to my Creator, to give me a new name. I am and still can be a daughter, a wife, a mother, a friend, a good neighbor. I have been educated. As a professional I procured high level employment at one of the most prestige firms in this country, having access to abundance. But with you all I am is a drunkard. Desiring the feeling you gave me, I enjoyed the drink but your spirit is denatured, and the results are demeaning and traumatizing which lead me to a lonely bottom. The worst thing that can happen indeed happened. I experienced the separation of my spiritual presence. I felt that I was left alone.

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Before then, I thought naturally that I had arrived and was living the glam life having full access to a seemingly endless supply of your spirits. My family teased me saying “the bar never closed at your house.” Oh yes! It didn’t. I thought the nights I shared with close friends and families weren’t complete without a strong presence of your spirits. We would all arrive at a particular destination with bottles of you in hand. All eyes gleaming at the exterior labels assigned to each offer. Some bottles possessed labels such as Hennessy, Grey Goose, Dom Perignon, and many others considered to be expensive top shelf variety, with some brought from underground sources.

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I’ve seen documentaries on your chemical makeup and how advanced and mysterious you are.  You own a special fury and once in the grips of your abode the results turn devastating. You possess a strong bearing in the Nebulous too. Your nature is in such abundance that you appear in places I’d never dreamt of. I read about a discovery that Nasa found proof that the Comet Lovejoy, releases large amounts of your being in the atmosphere equivalent to around 500 good bottles of spirits per minute.  To my muses, researchers confirmed that ethyl alcohol; the substance I drank is just one of the many names you go by, is the same substance released by the comet. You my dear Alcohol has been observed in a comet. I couldn’t imagine that.

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I am aware of another phenomenon in the Universe.  A woman who’s contributions to science is most abundant. Just like you her presence can be found in the most unsuspicious places. She too can be traced to space. NASA rocketed her cells into orbit. The mystery of the cancer cell’s belonging to Henrietta Lacks, and your amazing particles are without boundaries.

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Alcohol, just like Lacks cells you can be found in surgical environments where you do important work to save lives. You, help to heal and make people healthy again, just like the cells of Henrietta. But, Alcohol, you have a dark side. As many lives as you save, you destroy. You have an alluring nature about you.  Books have been written about you. Books like “Alcohol Anonymous.” You see the irony, Interesting isn’t it. I’ve read some of the books written about the dark places you will take people like me that once adored you. You see, I was consumed by you in my younger years and without any misgivings I developed an allergy over time. I did not think nor did I understand anything about the allergy I developed against you. I knew for a long time something was wrong with me when I thought I had enjoyed you. What I understand today is that your nature and my nature do not mix well together. The book I mentioned states that people who suffer the allergy usually do not mix well with life when you’re involved. I’ve been restored from a seemingly hopeless state with regards to having you in my life.

However, between then and now a great deal had occurred. I’ve got a story about you. I’m gonna tell it to the World. I won’t protect you anymore. You no longer have my consent. I can no longer pretend to be in good terms where you are concerned. You need to know without prejudice our drinking business is finished. Just six months ago, I found myself in a strange place I thought I’d never go. Much like my shock of you in the comet, I was shocked when I found myself there. Things happened to me so dark, yet I have trouble distinguishing the reality of it. I stood handcuffed feeling isolated, abandoned, baffled and weak defending and protesting the demoralization I bear witness due to my consenting involvement with you. Never again, I told myself. Your seeds don’t always produce luscious fruit; the harvest of your season didn’t blossom with gaiety. It’s true Alcohol! I had been forewarned to beware of your soft whisper and not to answer your wooing. But, in your nature you certainly had me. You oblige me soulfully with your charm. You had the audacity to demand my attention, and I surrendered. In my weakness, I gave in to your beastly ways, only to awaken to the raft of your loud and scorning temperament. I will proceed to deprive you and me the lustfulness of my eye.

I trembled in my likeness to you and that thrust derived of the allergy that has plagued me. I earned what resembles a Scarlett. With it comes graveling discernment of new friendships determined to win over you. When the judge said to me “go get better,” I screeched in my inherited agony.  They wrote about my attachment to you commending me that I had grown a full blown characteristic of a menace, no longer to be trusted in my own wit. My worst day was born from this ruling. The ruling was a collaborative effort. My mother came there to console me. Her eyes cried out in misery to see me held in abrupt captivity. I stood locked away through a shield bearing witness to her powerlessness. I can testify today no jail could manufacture the pain radiating from within me, than the look in those eyes. My poor heart howled in melancholy. Death would serve me better than to take my refuge in the fear in those eyes. I knew her deepest prayer was not to come there on that day, to that place, to claim me. Seeing the pain in her eyes made this day the worst day of my life. Something in me had to die, root and all, for me to live again.

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 From now on there will be no more of you and I. There is no more of “us”. I had a new birth with The Great Power I called upon to save me; the alpha appellate who separated me from you. It heard my cries and my prayers in the darkness and mercifully answered my call. I know you know it to be true. I want you to know right here and now, there are many paths that lead to the top of the mountain. The view from the top is the same. It is you that helped me get here. The time has long passed to proclaim a final farewell. I’m gonna sail on down the road to a happy destination. You’re not on the guest list. You can’t have a seat at the table. You were once at times kinda sorta a friend.  My voice today is well reserved and without recourse I command to you a final farewell.