I have the hardest time sitting still. In fact, relaxing makes me anxious. It’s been true my whole life and I guess in the long run it’s worked out just fine. I tend to justify it as “productivity.” But through it all I’ve found that there’s always one place, one situation, one continuing memory that flips my switch. I manage to slow down and breathe deep. And it always includes a 1 liter bottle of Meribeau.
I’m one of the lucky ones to have not only a girlfriend (Em) who finds me tolerable but also to have her family treat me like gold. It’s on the nights we visit where the Meribeau flows and the time starts to slow. We have a ton of fun and laugh until someone can’t breathe. Yet considering all of these nights together, if there’s one memory that stands out above them all, it has to be the first night on the job as “Nurse Ricky.”
A few years back, Em broke her foot in a pretty significant way. Successful major surgery and a few drops of morphine later, she managed to be deal with the pain and the frustration of immobilization better than most are capable. But there was one problem. Our 4th floor walk-up wasn’t exactly conducive to heading home with a sense of normalcy, so we set up for an extended sleepover where the Meribeau was sure to be a crucial part of the recovery. If we continue the analogy further, I wasn’t injured, but I sure took a lot of that medicine.
But it’s the first night in particular I remember with real clarity. After helping build Em a pillow fortress equipped with impressive structural integrity designed for foot elevation and comfort (maybe overselling this a bit), I made my way back upstairs as I was still a bit anxious (shocking) about the last few days and the crappiness of any major injury. But that would be the last night I worried. A few glasses of wine and some time with Em’s mom laughing just as we always had, was all it would take. And while I’m sure much of that had to do with the company, I’m giving at least partial credit to the Meribeau!
Ricky Silver is a craft beer and cocktail obsessive but secretly prefers wine. He’s the founder of The Nobler Experiment, a NYC and Chicago based meet-up group & content-site, celebrating the art and science of quality drinking.
