“Bottle of wine, fruit of the vine—
when you gonna let me get sober?”
I wasn’t looking for a problem.
I was looking for a pinot.
It started sweet—
a little flirt with fermentation.
A clink, a smile.
A casual affair with Cabernet,
a tender tango with Tempranillo.
Maybe it started with Twisted Palms—
Wind Down Wednesday in Vallarta.
One drink in… me creí bien chingona.
It sat beside me like a lover.
Dark, full-bodied.
Understanding.
A velvet voice.
in a stemmed glass—
full-bodied,
low maintenance,
and always game to stay in.
It wasn’t drinking—
it was dining.
Pairing.
With pasta.
With Jazz.
With candlelight and clever
conversation.
Just “a little something”
to bring out the flavor of my personality.
Quaffable.
“Red, red wine…stay close to me…”
It joins you.
In the bath.
At brunch.
On your birthday.
On a Tuesday.
Dinner guest.
Date night.
Girl’s Night.
End-of-day “deserved it night.”
A glass raised high
to everything that almost broke
you—
but didn’t.
One glass to soften the edges.
Two to sparkle up my sentences.
Three—
I’m suddenly fluent in Italian,
channeling Sophia Loren,
offering unsolicited life advice
to strangers and potted plants alike.
And isn’t it so chic?
So civilized?
So Sex and the City meets self-care?
I mean… it’s red grapes.
That’s fruit.
That’s basically wellness.
It’s not addiction
if the label has gold foil
and a quote from Rumi.
Besides—
the wine aisle says I’m worth it.
The labels whisper:
Uncork the magic.
Let your bold notes shine.
Pairs well with empowerment.
It’s always there.
When you’re happy.
When you’re lost.
When you don’t want to feel
alone.
And don’t want to say why.
“Drink, drink, wherever you may be,
I am the Lord of the Tipsy She.
And I’ll follow you all to the ends of the bar
with a sweet rosé and a shot of ennui.”
It’s not a drinking problem.
It’s a lifestyle.
A soundtrack.
A silent guest at every gathering.
The friend who never cancels,
never judges,
never forgets your birthday—
just your boundaries.
It’s a liquid laugh track to
relationships.
Toast the wedding.
Toast the break-up.
Toast the awkward in-between
where two people stop talking
but keep pouring.
They call it a spirit, you know.
And like all spirits, it wants in.
This “dark fruit-forward with notes
of oak”—
wants your voice.
Your rhythm.
Your fire.
Your evening—
your next morning, too.
But sometimes,
You don’t even recognize the woman
You become when the bottle breathes for you.
You hear yourself talking
but it isn’t really you.
It’s the borrowed bravado
of something that entered gently
and started speaking for you
when you forgot how to say no.
A voice that’s no longer your own—
it has an edge now.
Or a slur.
Or a sadness
that’s been waiting
for a curtain call.
Wine is… charming.
Until it isn’t.
And that’s the part
they don’t show you on the label.
It lingers.
It waits.
It shows up in your photos
with red lips
and clever comebacks—
and tired eyes
that stop shining
somewhere between sip and spin.
Relationships tend to go flat.
Dissolve in the bottom of a bottle
Quietly.
With polite clinks.
You’re so vain—
you probably think this wine is about you…
But wine was there for it all,
wasn’t it?
Toasting every good-bye
as if it were a beginning.
Yet, there’s a moment—
in the quiet
when I see her,
the woman I was
before the stemmed glass became
an accessory to my soul
The moment I started to wonder…
Who’s holding who?
They say,
“Hope is what we gain
when we put the glass down.”
But maybe it’s this:
Clarity doesn’t come in the last glass poured—
but in the first one refused.
I haven’t.
Not yet.
But I might.
Not because I hate it—
but because I remember
who I was
before I started pouring over
the parts of myself
that only needed presence.
Maybe the bravest thing
I’ll ever do
is sit with myself
and not pour anything at all.
But for now,
I lift my voice—
and I sing it soft,
to the quiet inside me
that still knows the way home:
“Leave me alone, let me go home,
let me go home and start over.”
