In anticipation for the holidays

In a life of inconsistencies, let me describe to you something real.

You're with family and friends and your face feels flushed. The light is low and yellow and the sky outside is a beautiful dark colour and if you looked outside too long you would find yourself aching for the sight of stars. The city is buzzing, pulsing like a separate living entity, vitality seeping out at the edges like a ripe fruit - but all that has been stifled to a feeble lull. The city still exists as it is - but you have forgotten this. You don't care what your hair looks like, how frizzy or out of place it is or how wide and toothy your smile happens to be and every person is warm while everything else is cold. Things feel so genuine that nothing else could possibly matter. Of course, your family has flaws. They have conflicts and discrepancies that soil the underside of the cushioned seats where they were so expertly shoved. You don't have a lot of money. There are people out there who, if given the chance, would trip you as you passed by and as you pick tiny gravel rocks out of the imprints in your cheek this person would already be gone. Whatever these outside things may be, they have completely dissolved. This is family. This is raw. This has allowed you to forget.

"Absorption" isn't the right word, but it's the first that comes to mind. 

           
Sometimes it isn't even an occasion. Sometimes it's just a gathering in the simplest sense and people are drinking soft liquor and spewing profoundly funny things and through your whole body passes a warm shiver. You can cut through this feeling like soft cheese, a feeling paired best with wine. Yet as you hang onto this misty, ambiguous feeling until your fingertips turn white, it slips through your fingers like running water. 

But as you very well know, the water will trickle into your palm soon enough, in one way or another.