Being Grown Up

There are times when it is a good thing to remind yourself you are an adult. Not the times when you have to, like when you need to shame yourself into paying a bit extra on some bills instead of going out and splurging on something you want. Not when you make yourself buckle down and go to work, instead of taking one of a dozen sick days you have banked, just because it is one of the most beautiful days you have seen in awhile. And not when you go with the more conservative outfit because you will need to wear it to work, even though you know deep down you look a hella lot better in the really cute top and skirt.

Specifically, I am talking about those of us (okay, ME) who for years never really drank anything at all unless it was out at a club. For me, I haven't been out in ages, and when I was, it would be with the "you need to stay sober because you are driving" Sword of the CHP hanging over my head. For the last five or six nights I have indulged in wine after dinner. Well, and a bit during the day as well, but nothing to affect me much then. I've finished a bottle of Zinfandel, and have started on a bottle of Pinot Noir this evening, with another bottle of Merlot waiting to see if I get bored.

I feel good. I feel wonderfully relaxed and smiling. And what's more, I feel like my own person right now... like the person who puts blue and coral together even though the saleslady stares at me in horror at the thought --- and gets away with it. I feel like the woman who just got a smashing new job, and learned it was actually she who impressed the committee, and that they were indeed impressed. (Oh, wait... that really did just happen!) I feel beautiful and carefree and just like I thought I would as an adult when I was still a child.

Maybe it is that part of me that will always be a child blossoming through once again, breaking through the hard, cold sod of "acceptable adulthood" which always felt more like dirt on my coffin than anything else.

I look at the half-filled glass of crimson-ruby-carnelian and I smile, because I feel good.

All of us should.