I had wine. White. I don't know when I last had wine. One glass does the job. I'm a cheap date. I really need to drink wine more often. I haven't allowed myself to dwell on all that I'm missing because self pity is ugly, especially when Flip is missing out on so much more. But such reasoning, followed to its logical conclusion, would prevent me from eating at all since some people are starving. Depriving myself would not help them - it would merely add to the casualty list. It could even be argued that by enjoying life as much as possible, I am helping to create balance in the world. And how could that be wrong?
I couldn't resist telling my friends that two people caring for Flip in the last few days asked if I was his daughter, and nobody could have been more surprised than I. "You look young," said Tom, "but you don't look that young." Truth, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
"Were you bad when you were young?" he asked. Except for some high school truancy, I wasn't. I didn't do drugs or drink to excess, and I wasn't promiscuous. What a fucking waste. But it's never too late. We reinvent ourselves every day, and the woman I am becoming is going to have more fun. Today I will buy a bottle of wine so I can enjoy it every night. Who knows where this could lead? The butterfly struggles to emerge from its cocoon, but without the struggle it could never fly. It's time to shed my cocoon and learn to fly again.
