salud!

i have loved beer since the first time i started drinking it (i must have been 14).
for someone who loves beer so much, i still pretty much agree that it's not the sweetest beverage there is. it could taste downright foul sometimes. and there would even be times when you start asking yourself, "Why the hell am I still drinking this?"
but like true love, you learn to forgive and forget.
and you learn to accept it into your life all over again.
bitter, foamy and sobriety-breaking.

people have vices. and i have, in my own way, taken some pride in the truth that i have come to be more accepting and be less judgmental. this is one of those things you learn to do and you become when you're constantly around people who may like the things you don't, and don't like the things you do, but whom you find interesting nonetheless.

vices can be as varied as the genetic makeup that comprises the whole of humanity. some people fall in love with the wrong people. some procrastinate. some keep falling in love with the wrong people even when they know they shouldn't, or no matter how they say they haven't. some do drugs. some smoke weed. some smoke cigarettes instead because it's legal. some procrastinate. some hurt other people. some hurt themselves. some don't want to hurt other people, so they hurt themselves instead. some crave sex. some think they don't need sex. some judge. some are judged. some tell the truth. some lie. some make love to booty music (i couldn't resist).

i could be one of those people i mentioned. in fact, i am one of those people i mentioned. but my biggest vice, or atleast what i acknowledge to be my biggest vice, is drinking. i actually, have accepted that i might in the future become alcoholic and this would cause a great disruption in my social functioning, would prove to be detrimental to my health and would ruin my relationships. i have accepted that i could become alcoholic, in the same way that i have accepted that nobody can ever be perfect and flawless.

i still ask myself sometimes, why i love drinking so much. i guess it could be that feeling you get when you start losing your balance, or when you start slurring your speech and yet you still talk to people and actually make really serious and heartfelt conversations (which unfortunately, you might not remember the next day), or when you begin noticing that the people around you have stripped themselves off any inhibitions and are baring their very soul.

but i do think one thing is for certain. i love drinking, because of how it seems to strengthen any connections i might have. this might sound pretty pathetic considering that some people do pretty well without getting drunk. but in my case, have discovered that drinking pulls me just a bit closer to the people i care for.

whenever my folks and i drink, i talk more. i tell them about school, about how i'm doing, about my plans for the future (or the lack thereof), about my thoughts, my feelings. i tell them things that i would normally not tell under ordinary circumstances (i.e. phone calls) because i think that there are things you shouldn't discuss with your parents, or because i think they won't understand. but whenever we drink together, i realize that i'm wrong, and that they understand everything. and even more.

whenever i drink with my older brothers and sister, i remember. i remember how we used to be. how we had so much fun growing up together. how we fought. how we made up. how we hated each other. how we became friends. how we protected each other. i sometimes think like they have changed. they already have their jobs and school. they have their girlfriends. we no longer have the same set of friends. but when we drink, i realize that they may have changed, but they're still the same. they're still the same people i grow up with. they still have my back. they still think i'm the funniest and the weirdest person on earth. they still treat me like a kid. whenever we drink, i realize that they still remember who we were, how we were back then and how we could still be the same in the future.

whenever i drink with my friends, i discover. i discover that we may have been apart, but we still very much know each other. i discover that internship and growing up may have screwed us over, but we're still pretty much the same. i discover that we may have kept some things from each other and may not have been entirely truthful, but we've had our reasons. i discover, when we drink, that we do depend on each other. that we find and draw strength from being together. that we combat problems with our solidarity. i discover that i can be accepting and respectful of my friends' decisions, and that they can be accepting and respectful of mine. i discover that we do not have to be alike to be friends. and i discover that when we drink, some of us could in fact be conveying messages of pain, of anger, of exhaustion, of wanting to cry out loud, of wanting to scream out something, of wanting to unwind, of wanting to do something different, of wanting to talk about love, of wanting to talk about love lost, of joy and sometimes, of simply being grateful that we are together. whenever we drink, i re-discover what it is like to be a friend, and to have one.

and whenever i drink by myself, i think about all these. i think about vices, family, friendship, school (and why i have to keep on going to school when it is the last thing i want to do), about passion, and about love. and i think about why i love beer.

and why i love it enough to not care that my beer belly will just get bigger and bigger until the day it finally bursts and is no more.

i love beer.
and like true love, i am willing to take some risks and sacrifice my liver cells.

Una cerveza, por favor.