Jordan Montero

The Good Wine is not just about good wine — it is the savoring of decadence and long baths. It is slow dancing at a wedding, cinnamon rolls and the warmth of the sun. It is bliss, it is pleasure — it is that “Champagne Shit” as Janelle Monáe has recently put it. My Good Wine is as simple as your craft beer, your aperol spritz, your various kinds of martini or your French 75. 

I dream of a bittersweet symbolic and literal end, one that releases me from the silly trivialities of life. I want to be old and nagging, receiving movie theater and bus discounts for the suffering I have endured in my very human experience. 

I fear the people around me may become disillusioned with the girl they got to know and fell in love with. You may one day be studying my face and see my grotesque image that stares back at me when I catch my own reflection.

I play the part of being seen, my eyes light up with the imaginary spotlight of me being watched by strangers and acquaintances and embodying what they want from me. 

I became obsessed with societal boxes in hopes that I could ever fit into one. As much as society parades around saying to be different, it differs when you are integrally and irrevocably “unique.” 

When they are young, parents often pull away and rebel in the pursuit of this goal. And yet, when they become parents, they will inevitably follow the path of what they attempted to escape from. 

Through this telescopic separation, and a voyeuristic existence, I express my love for life. This expression is my camera roll filled with no less than 50,000 photos, as I experience this life from the outside looking in.

I try not to mourn the time I cannot control. I try not to obsess over and over again about the inevitable. So, as much as I tried, I watched my birthday cake rot in my fridge for a year, until it was all over.