The young woman with dark black hair and a joker's smile kept looking across the bar at me as I nursed my wine. 'How can she be looking at me?' I kept asking myself, as this gorgeous lady had to be 25 years younger. I tried to not look over, afraid of what I'd see in her eyes, but I couldn't resist. Snagged, connection made, but it is a foolish one.
Forcing my gaze away I look down at my wedding ring twisted listlessly to the side, a byproduct of my renewed interest in the gym creating a band too loose or was it the shakiness of the oath owing my fidelity? The ups and downs throughout my 25 year marriage had been navigated successfully but the wife's dead sex drive, already always less than my own, or her loss of desire for me, has taken its toll. A life outside my marriage seemingly resides over my every thought, every movement.
Suddenly a glass of wine is placed in front of me by the bartender. "The lady in the black leather coat says hello," he says and the walks away. I have a decision to make here. As I stare at that wine glass, I know that to pick it up means an acceptance of what might come, an end of how I used to be; to leave it untouched on the bar safely preserving the story of who I am. Not taking it will snuff out the spark that was lit when that beautiful woman made me feel seen, attractive, wanted.
Like a stranger to my own self, I see my hand reach out for the glass - gently, so gently, picking it up by the stem and slowly bringing it to my lips. Without looking at my ring, I raise that wine to my lips, swallow slowly, and look over at the woman I will soon meet. Did I mean to do that?