Consolation Prize

Somewhere between the retching and the biting cold my innate instinct for shelter is still intact. I am out in the suburbs of Chicago, out in some little street where I know is a warm couch waiting for me nearby, but this horrid red bile keeps spewing from my mouth, a mixture of smoked ribs and vodka tonic, both of which will be quite distasteful to my palette for the next few weeks.

And only upon waking will it dawn on me what has transgressed in the previous nights blunder, with a mixture of both shame and reverie. Sometimes I think I might just be a tad to old for all this mess, but that's rather debatable. Dreams and realities have become so intermingled that it has been a little difficult to find out exactly where this little transition will take me, often referred to as the quarter-life crisis.

During recent talks with my parents, they have started to give me flack about my seemingly interminable single status. I can understand my mother's probable desire for some nice, fat grandkids that she can coo over. I really doubt that that would really be the solution to any of my problems.

I don't want a consolation prize life. I want it all. But that's only the ego talking. Not all people were meant to do anything outside of the herd. I don't know how willing I am to accept that just quite yet.