Spirit in Life!!!

Cocktails and Mocktails are my favourite - they are quite my life. I guess you are starting to get the wrong picture, I’m not the drunkard living at the corner of your street – I’m the guy who gets him to his high. I am just a bar-tender, a complete teetotaler, who gets his amusement in life, mixing flavours he has never let his lips touch, yet is a genius at it.



I own a modest bar… it is not one of those shady corners where the youth hang around, the ones who hang around here are into serious business. There are primarily two genres of people coming here - either their lives are a mockery, which is why they cork it up with a cocktail, or all they have done is fight around like a cock and choose to smoothen the effect with a mocktail. This is no joke, I tell you… it is serious stuff. And I am not bragging away to glory… you shall soon realize.



My customers stick to me like super-glue. Once they are at my place, there’s nowhere else for them to go. Walking out every night, two buddies would sing ecstatically, “You can check out anytime that you like, but you can never leave!” I thought it was a compliment…of course it was…. If I deserved a song such as this… I was something!



Let me tell you about these two contrasting cronies. If you’d see them you’d wonder what kept them together… Not that they were Laurel and Hardy incarnates… but in a more abstract sense, yes. Two totally different characters, different ideologies, yet a common thread stringing through. While one was high strung in life, very serious about everything he said and did, the other was the most easy-going lad I had ever seen. Let’s call them Rob and Will, shall we?? I have seen them sit at that very corner of the bar every day, until last week.



While Rob was the mocktail guy, I knew his choice perfectly. Smooth, shaken and the flavour being even all over… So were the things he worked around with. Will, of course, being the cocktail fan chose a different one every night, the high he hit every time, was new, so much so that he’d at times start believing that he could fly, and more so, make others, including me, believe, that he really could.



So every evening, they both would walk in a few minutes apart, Rob being late, always. Busy, efficiency, competency were part of his reason for the delay… but the moment he’d take his seat, he’d take charge and order his – “same one!” He was a modest chap… hardworking and impeccably dressed. I never knew about his folks. I don’t indulge in their private lives you see, but I could make out, his life was pretty smooth.



Will, the early one, would come in as soon as I would pull my shutters up…. Greet me politely, enquire my whereabouts and order his prompt- “something to snazz up please!” He’d get drunk quite often…. He’d call himself Icarus then. Promptly, the next day he would return, to apologize for the previous night and to enjoy another evening. He in his drunken state had muttered out quite a few secrets, that may seem of real interest to you but I’d be better off keeping you away from those.



Such was the scene everyday, for the last thirty years. I have seen these boys grow into men, absolutely contended, perfectly happy. They were quite my pals, like every one else coming in…. yet the only true appreciators of my genius…. Every time I’d serve a new creation, they’d be the first to try, comment and liven up the place.



Boy, am I going to miss them…. I never thought such a day would come. I have not seen those lads for quite a while now, the true epitome of how cocktails and mocktails should blend…. go hand in hand.



If you are wondering why I haven’t seen them around for the last week or so… well, I’m just getting around that corner. Little did I know about their work, private lives… too bad for me. Last week, they barged into my apartment, and I was pretty delighted. A little later did I realize, that these were not the Rob and Will I was so gladly entertaining, my regulars, as I referred to them, but I was just entertaining trouble. I am old you see, getting forgetful each passing day…. Little did I realize that my license to the bar had expired and that I hadn’t paid my taxes. That is when I discovered that these two were there to take possession of the only genius I possessed…. Throwing me into a huge bowl of steaming broth.


So, as my day passes, I wonder what my next venture shall be…. I am not keen to go back into business…. I’ve had enough for now. While the mocktails and cocktails have worn away their effect on me, I intend no longer to continue. All I wish is I can get out of the soup I am in, as soon as I can…. So much so, for this teetotaler.