Choosing champagne.

BY MEGHAN REEVE

Meg is a 34 yr old iced coffee drinking California girl living in the PNW. She is a tiny human teacher and a cheerleader for the dreams of not only the tiny humans but every human in her life. She strives to show others who they are by trying to be exactly who she is on the daily.

Choosing champagne is a mantra of my life.

No, it does not mean that I am a ritzy human who chooses to drink champagne all the time. It is more so an attitude and a joy to celebrate when it feels like there might be nothing worth celebrating.

It is a moment for me to raise a glass and take a deep breath and move onward to the next.

My little corner of the internet is called “She Writes on Sundays.” It is named that for the simple fact that I take time and space on Sundays to go and sit with my laptop and usually a beverage and write. It’s also tagged as “silent Sundays,” in which someone is more than welcome to come sit with me, but they can’t talk to me; they can read or create or whatever they want, but no talking.

I desperately miss my silent Sundays.

The last seven months or so I either have not been able to physically sit inside somewhere, or I’ve been so emotionally drained that no words can come out, or I’m just tired.

2020 was obviously a year where people found extraordinarily little things to celebrate and little to find hope in. 

Hope feels dangerous.

Hope feels a little like choosing to get in a car that may or may not have brakes.

But, somewhere deep inside me needs hope and needs to choose sparkles and bubbles and champagne.

I’m a tiny human teacher by trade, and I’ve spent the last six to seven months dealing with big emotions and confused bodies and so many other things, but in that we’ve had Free Art Fridays and popsicle parties and taken the speaker to the playground and danced to Moana. Because we need to cultivate joy in our lives when our world feels hazy.

That is why every Sunday morning my roommate and I had a good bottle of champagne to make mimosas with while we watched church. We made it a thing to come to the couch instead of another moment we were sitting on the couch (he has worked from the couch since the end of March). 

Right now, we need to be creative. We need to be creative with our workdays and hanging out with friends and birthdays. We need to be creative with a tired Tuesday and another Friday night of takeout. We need to learn a new way to choose champagne even when it feels like there is not ever a reason to. We need to find places to sing after the musicals we were in got canceled and reasons to dance because Shipoopi might never see the stage.

We need to choose champagne this year more than ever.

We need to choose it so we are capable of fighting the battles that come into our arena and keep moving forward even when it feels as if there is nothing to move forward to. We need to choose champagne because champagne can be for our tears as well. 

We can raise a glass to having lived because we chose to show up for our lives however that may look.