It started with a twinge of a memory. Perhaps something I saw on TV, on Facebook or a snippet of a flashback of my life. Subtle at first, like a swell of soft emotion beginning to wage its war inside my brain. But then, like a fury fast and strong it slowly yet swiftly overtook my every waking moment.

The feel of a long satisfying drawl of a sip of a delicate red wine slithering its way down my throat into my bloodstream was all I could think about. It overtook me that quickly, with that much force.

Apparently, I forgot. The wreckage such an interaction had on my life only months prior.

The life I had forgotten to live, the complete and total hell my life had become because of that very feeling I was craving now. The indulgence that I had given in to that nearly destroyed me and took me far far away. From all that I loved and all that ever loved me.

I found myself only remembering the fun I had with my so called “friend.” The escape from the rigors of life and the glory I mistook it for.

I couldn’t stop the pounding of my brain and the fight that was being waged against me. All the strength I had mustered over the past 102 days was lost, gone and impossible to find. All I wanted was one glass.

One warm satiating seamless glass of red potion to call my own.

I punished myself wondering how I let my drinking get so out of control to begin with. I mean, dang, I am a strong girl. Always have been. I’ve never been one for defeat, so where did it begin? Did I take Caleb going to college that hard? Or was it the culmination of a hard life lived, fought, and finally letting it defeat me? Why couldn’t I have risen above it all and never found myself at the bottom of the bottle. Ending in being admitted to Rogers Memorial Hospital that warm June evening months ago? How did it become this? Where I can’t even have that one glass of red wine that calls my name inside my brain like a dripping faucet I can’t shut off.

Drip, drip, drip.

Drink, drink, drink.

I seem to have forgotten how it overtook every aspect of my life. My ability to laugh with friends, enjoy serving my church as much as I do, and writing away my days without the aid of alcohol. I must have misplaced my memory of the wrecking ball of ethanol making me an emotional mess unable to complete a sentence without tears. The feeling of waking up in a pool of sweat at three am because the poison was fighting its way out of my blood like a fury that had to find a way out.

Drip, drip, drip.

Drink, drink, drink.

My memory must have faded out the part where I had to quit my life just to find my way back again, where I had to sweep myself up into the majesty of staring completely and utterly over. Three months of rediscovering what it was like to take it all in with a clear and beautiful mind. I may have lost my gift of writing words during that time, but I regained all that God has intended for me to be.

I saw the bottom of a glass of wine tonight, I lost the wage, but won the perspective I needed to gain. Why did I forget? Apparently I needed to be reminded of all the risks that go with giving in to such.

Clarity. Stumbling gave me this. As crystal as the sea as crisp as the fall air. I want to love, live and see the pride in all of your eyes as you take in the brilliance of my clear eyes as I tell you I’m sober.

I never want to lose that, even when I lose at winning.

So this is where I beg God to sweep me up into His living and forgiving arms. Where I ask Him to give me the courage to once again overcome the most impossible of odds.

I c

hose to begin tomorrow at the top of 103 days not at the feet of my demons that call me back to the bottle. For one slip never made us invisible in God’s eyes before why should it now? That is what the bottle of red wine would want me to believe, that I’m lost again and I should stay that way. I know that isn’t so, and in that I grasp Grace’s hand and dust myself off and know my fortune is in my God not lost in the fall.