My simple life

We all carry baggage with us and we all have our vices. I'm learning the dramatic divide between those with serious issues and those who just deal with every-day life.

I count my baggage as two failed marriages. That means I suck at picking guys. Some might consider my cat as baggage, but she's just a cute little carry on. The glass or two of red wine I like to have every evening might be a vice. Sometimes I feel like I should cut back, but I enjoy my wine. Another vice is how defensive I get when anyone tries in any way to control me. That's a deal breaker. It stems from mommy issues and exes. So is that a vice or baggage?

Either way, I'm likely my own worst critic, but my little section of bags and vices seem insignificant compared with what I saw just last night in the neighborhood pub. My friend and I grabbed a late sushi dinner then I had a glass of wine while she sipped water at the pub. We've both gotten to the point where we pick where we sit - or if we go in at all - based on the number of strange people inside. Last night we probably should have just gone home.

We already saw the neighborhood drunk on the patio. There's nothing new to say about her. She pours wine down, slurs useless words and lands in guys' laps or in the middle of conversations where she wasn't invited. Then she drives home. The bar should cut her off before she kills someone.

Our next clue was the woman trying to open the glass door to leave. She couldn't figure out how to open it. Push, darlin'. Then the guy behind her cradled a bulldog puppy. Later our friend told us she already had a collection of DUIs and the next one would put her in prison. Someone was always there to rescue her. Then our friend got a call from the drunk woman's neighbor. She was running up and down the hallways in her bra and panties saying she had lost her dog. Then she would disappear again.

The guy who carried her dog home came back to the bar rolling his eyes at the drunk girl he had to walk home. Then he was all over the neighborhood drunk woman - hands in her crotch and kissing her - all in clear view. And what was so wrong with walking the drunk women home?

And our friend who was concerned about the drunk women who lost her dog told us about the cruise she and her boyfriend just took. They had a blast but she said they had abused their livers for two solid weeks. They did some snorkeling too. She explained that she always wears a life vest because she's typically wasted or on lots of pills while she's in the water. She's a smart, attractive women who also expressed amazement about how she can go to work in the morning, still wasted, and people think she's doing great work.

Then another guy who looks like he's stuck in a 1988 time warp came in. He's a slender guy with his hair pulled back into a tiny ponytail. He didn't have the bongos he usually carries with him, but he was equally as strange. He sat on the patio puffing his cigarette and sipping wine. He watched the cigarette come closer to his mouth then took a drag on it like it's the last smoke on the planet. Then he'd move his mouth into odd shapes while he watched the smoke disperse. He looked like he was having a peaceful acid trip. I've never talked to him and know nothing about what's made him the way he is.

Everyone has their story, but what I saw makes me not even want to take aspirin. It also makes me appreciate my simple, sober life with my red wine, fun friends and Lucy.

Love to the single girls,
Addison