Dear Al~[cohol],

It’s been a while since I’ve wanted you, but I think about you all of the time.  You were the love of my life.  I hated you.  You were an abscess on my self-confidence.  You were always there for me.

Try as I did [pretend to] I couldn’t seem to get rid of you.  You just kept me in your glass; I was a pointless grain of sand being flipped over and over in your time.

But you knew me, Al.  You seemed to love me.  The good, the bad, and the ugly as they say…you preferred ugly.

It was a red flag I ignored when I started waking up to incomprehensible lipstick poetry written on the vanity mirrors, which I would frantically wash off before the boyfriend saw it.

I should have known you were trouble when you sent me on a  2 year whiskey kick believing I was a pool shark.  Remember that, Al?  Remember when I shit-talked a couple of Mexican bar flies and handed them their asses in pool, until I could barely walk and they had to graciously help me onto the 49 bus line to Van Ness, where I passed out until the bus driver shook me awake and told me the line is done for the night?

Oooh, Al! I would hate you more if I could remember all the embarrassing reasons why I should.  You were so boring!  What was I thinking?  I’d spend all that money on you and we rarely ever had sex.  I felt so unattractive and worthless with you.  But who would want me?  You, Al.  Always you.

You got really nervous when I told you about a little voice I heard; a little angelic whisper which seemed to be coming from deep inside, from a place of creation, a place of birth which sung out to me like a jingle:

“You get one life.  You get one life.  You get one liiiiiiife!!”

Well ain’t that the truth?  Oh God! The truth.  The truth is, I can’t live a life with you, Al.  I can’t live an honest, attentive, loving, and generous life if you’re in it.  You really had to go.

It’s been 2 years since I said goodbye.  I see you around town everywhere I go.  We share a lot of mutual friends and even family.  You are always going to be there for me, and I thank you for it.  I owe you an apology, Al.  I really do.  I used you and abused you and then projectile vomited you to the curb, quite literally.  You were only doing what you were supposed to be doing.  I blamed you for all my character flaws, even now I find myself doing it.

It’s not your fault, Al.  It’s not your fault that I never learned to believe in myself, or that I’ve been on survival mode for so long that I didn’t know how to reach out for help, or a hug.  So I reached for you, and you were there for me.   And now I get your message, Al.

You needed me to get over you so I could gain my worth back.  Leaving you made me believe in myself.  It was you or me and I chose me.  You have become the thing that I am most proud of…So Touché, Al, Touché.  And while you will always leave a lasting flavor in my mouth, I hope I never taste you again.

Yours in vain,

Sakura