I call her "Lady Bourbon" because she is the other half of what makes me whole. I do not like to call her "My wife" because it sounds possessive. A mutual friend only refers to his spouse as "My wife" in conversation and that drives me fucking insane. She's not property, man... she's your partner. Lady Bourbon is a force of nature and she chooses to be with me, and I with her. We are partners in life. Have been ALMOST since we met... She's been a model, muse, lover, wife, and, most important, a friend... and I would never want it any other way...
In February of 2004 I returned from my final tour in Iraq... In June of 2004 I moved back to my apartment on campus and returned to school for the summer session in hopes of getting "reacclimatized" to civilian life before the rush of Freshmen in the fall... I thought it would be good for me to be there with LESS people.
I was right... and wrong.
Being there with less people was nice, but it also meant I spent a lot of time at the bar drinking to forget my final tour in Iraq... or spending a lot of time on my couch with a bottle of something doing the same thing for less and with greater quantities. And drank I did.
When I was at a low point during the following winter I started to keep an online journal. I tried to reach out into the void of the internet and see if anyone was there who felt the same way about life. That's when I stumbled upon the future Lady Bourbon.