9. And Lord, I half wonder if lightning and thunder was made from the plunder of whiskey, me boys.

 

I like to believe I'm a woman who knows what she likes.

I like Frank Sinatra. I like watching the same TV show over and over and over again. I like neck kisses and the taste of coffee in my lover's tongue. I like burning incense and candles and yellow dim lights where I feel pretty. I like being told I am pretty. I like it when people notice slight things about me and tell me, I like it when I haven't noticed myself. I like making food for my friends and I like hearing people telling stories about exciting moments in their lives.

I like being drunk. I like the romanticism behind cocktails and how they're basically magic spells, with all their ingredients and intentions.

I like songs that remind me of when I'm drunk. That happy drunk. That comfy drunk. I like it when whiskey feels like a warm embrace from the inside. I like listening to Sinatra and Dean Martin, wasted on a Las Vegas stage in 1963 telling inappropriate jokes. I like Hozier's singing of Humours of Whiskey, sounding exactly like I imagine fae music would sound in the middle of a forest.

Come guess me this riddle, what beats pipe and fiddle,

what's hotter than mustard and milder than cream?

What best wets your whistle, what's clearer than crystal,

what's sweeter than honey and stronger than steam?

I like wine and wine stained tongues. I find them funny. I like how it smoothes any difficult conversation. I like popping open a bottle of Cabernet with those I love and sharing the moment. I like popping it open for myself and starting the longest skin care ritual while listening to Ariana Grande tell me I want finer things in life and that a man should leave me the fuck alone because I'm a star in space.

I like beer when it's a party and we're celebrating. The first beer I liked my cousin Aarón gave to me at a New Year's Eve party in my cousin Alma's backyard, next to a fire pit, and he recited Alan Poe's Lines on Ale and I couldn't but contain my excitement for a sip of poetry in liquid form.

Filled with mingled cream and amber,
I will drain that glass again.
Such hilarious visions clamber
Through the chamber of my brain.
Quaintest thoughts, queerest fancies
Come to life and fade away.
What care I how time advances;
I am drinking ale today.

I like funky cocktails, with their smoke and their little drops of stuff. I like trying them, searching for my favorite one. I like pretending they say more about me than they actually do, like my zodiac signs or my favorite books.

I like all booze parafernalia. Shakers and glasses, long spoons and droppers, infused this, simmered that, I like the use of garnishes and little stainless steel utensils. I like those cool ass bars downtown where they don't use blenders and you can listen to jazz. 

I like thinking about these feelings and living them all over again.
I think I just might get drunk tonight.