This weekend, an eight year old girl opened her conversation to me with, “Do you know how it is that most of us are probably going to die eventually?”
“Well, probably, I guess so.”
She went on to say she’d like to go by a manta ray encounter, Steve Irwin style.
I’d like to go out like Chopin – “Forget the oxygen, get the champagne!”
And I’d like my memorial plaque to read the last line of Ruggero Leoncavallo’s “Pagliacci” – “La commedia e finite.”
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I have about a week left of being a recovering alcoholic and I’m thinking of going the whole hog – extending it to the full 40 days and 40 nights. I don’t miss all that poison, but I do miss the reckless self-destruction. I survived another party this weekend, this one at a bar – no big deal. The tough one will be tomorrow when I fly 16 hours to New York. Sitting with nothing to do, while beautiful girls bring me food and wine.
My biggest problem, though, is that I’m becoming quite svelte – all lean and slinky. The cruel fat brought on by the gradual decaying of my aging body is slipping away. My clothes somehow look cooler and my gait wilder.
Maybe I need to stop drinking altogether … and start drugs.
