BEFORE TURNING THIRTY

Before turning thirty, I made sure to become a wino. Cabs were my game—playing the easy red; an often tart ritual at $9 a bottle. Makes you feel heavy, wine does, like your drunk is standing on your shoulders or finding purchase in the pockets under your eyes, controlling you like a lazy eddy tugging on reluctant pond scum. You tilt helically, following weather patterns beyond your slowed perception. I became a wino before I turned thirty and made my bed each night in the eye of a storm.

Before I turn 30

Before I turned 30, I learned to slow time. I did this by doing. From a long stale stiffness, I creaked into motion, oiling my rusty joints with new landscape, new language. I cracked open the vacuum seal and let new air and spores flood in. I rusted and oxidised, fermented, grew mould, weathered. I reimagined the thrills I had dreamed for myself and gifted myself new ones. I put my body in the world and my heart on the line. I gave myself a work out. I ran on empty. I refuelled. I played go fetch with my curiosities. I stopped hiding and played seek. I breathed and bred patience. I trudged, I shrugged. I stopped trying to cohere and made elastic my identity. I had thought I'd have to be my own anchor. I discovered that I was in fact my own sea.