intrawoven

Deep in the caves, I stood amidst walls of glass and stone. Rows and rows of bottles of wine silently awaited their release, as they would for years to come. Some wines improve with age; some men have passed their prime.

Thirty now, soon thirty-one, then older and older and lesser and lesser. There was time enough for all these things, but time deceives and will betrays. Maybe uncorked too early and undone.

These bottles had much yet to do... the internal struggle of converting bitter essence to an elegant taste. Waging war on themselves, countering the youthful nuances that nature invokes... fermented and emboldened. Eventually, having a worthy story to share, something that's complex to the tongue, and poison to the mind... something that can influence, and even control, telling its tale to the fool who tastes. Declaring the glory of its toil, to please then dull the senses.

Some things instead die on the vine. Never to be told, never to be awakened.

My fiancé then took my hand, and shook me from my thoughts. She looked lovingly into my vacant eyes and squeezed my hand a little tighter. Without words, saying that she was happy to share the moment, whatever it meant to her, and whatever it meant to me.

Falling back in, I wanted to lay my wrath upon the walls. To break every glass - break past the will to contain my rage. Steal the growing wisdom from every bottle before it had a chance to mature, pour their glory down my throat and lungs, and in a drowning gasp attain what I otherwise never would. Bring back the struggle that bore me form, and pour my formless, wasted life onto the bricks of stone beneath my feet.

Failing again, I squeezed her hand back, hoping that there's another way to find both in time. Aging silently, for better or for worse.