Liquid Logic

by Patty Clark

I was raised on the old saying “Waste not, want not.” My parents meant leftovers, electricity, and wrapping paper that was recycled for eighteen Christmases. Sweet nurturing wisdom I suppose, which is why I rinse out used Ziplock bags as if I’m preparing plastics for their second tours of duty. But I am embracing a much broader interpretation. After my dinner parties, I combine abandoned vinos into one carefully funneled House Red like some Depression-era bartender. Cabs meet Merlots and Pinots with the reckless confidence of a vineyard owner who flunked chemistry. Consider it a rescue mission. If it still swirls, it still serves.

While bad day sufferers go for doomscrolling, crystal balls, and other forms of divination, I go for that Zen-ish glass of wine. God drops down daily to perform celestial miracles by restocking Costco with bottle after glorious bottle of fermented optimism that harnesses daily discontent - those curious concoctions of emergency preparedness, just in case civilization collapses. Who am I to question divine intervention? I’d like it even more if they had buy one, get a hundred free. I prefer to think of myself as participating in a highly efficient inventory rotation system. If I don’t drink it now, it could evaporate, and I’ll be risking emotional dehydration later. Making me either lethal, or a lovebug. Someone constantly equipped for quantum entanglements - or apologizing to an apple for peeling it.

Everyone has times that go sideways. My spectacular disasters have never been so severe that I’ve gone to my fridge declaring, “This calls for sour cream.” I have taken great delight in reassuring myself that moisture management for baked potatoes isn’t the same as alcohol management for the mind. Instead, I usually go straight for my libation library - the wine rack. My ten-year-old granddaughter on the other hand, goes straight for the stress ball. Because, as she says, “My life is so demanding.”

She thinks her life is traumatic, during one of my dinner gatherings, my girlfriend brought a salad. And while dressing her salad, she spilled olive oil and balsamic all over my countertop. Without hesitation, she spun off several of my paper towels saying, “Sorry for taking so many!” She took twelve of them. Twelve. Her panic turned into my panic. I was equal parts welcoming hostess and conservation goblin, trying to remain gracious while internally calculating the current market value of Bounty. Another few feet and I was prepared to offer her a repayment plan. I reassured her, “It’s fine, really.” But my voice had the strained tone of someone watching her retirement account slip away square by square. That’s when she made me a cooling colada cocktail to help cure my fearfulness. And it did.

I’ll also narrate my most recent development with drinking during my cross-country trek to California through angry clouds over Colorado. Feeling utterly distraught at the prospect of dive- bombing during turbulence, I breached compact seating decorum by turning into a hysterical hominid octopus, suddenly clutching onto the arm of the teen next to me. Sort of like a bear hug with suction cups. He said, “Why don’t you get a cocktail to calm you down?” Not my idea. His. My in-flight emotional support buddy. I would never have thought about guzzling before noon.

After expelling coffee in the teensy loo, I staggered back to the same compartment and expelled two martinis…like a pretzel of panic.

Make no mistake, I’m less of a professional chugger and more of a cork and cap whisperer. My friends know I’m a lightweight. It doesn’t stop some of them from ribbing me. I do regular restaurant dinners with a fellow writer and humorist, who inevitably tells every waitress who takes my order, “Bring her a keg of cosmos!”

It would be nice to have a libation named after me. I feel I’ve certainly met the qualifications. Where I once paired them with cheese, I now pair them with electrolytes and an alarm reminding me to take my magnesium.