Wishful Drinking

by Carrie Fisher

I decided to ride the lightning instead of extinguishing the light of life that had once shone out of my eyes.

I used to have this fantasy that in some distant Star Wars sequel, we’d finally stop all the shooting and screaming at each other and would go to a shopping-and-beauty planet, where the stormtroopers would have to get facials, and Chewbacca would have to get pedicures and bikini and eyebrow waxes.

And I’m afraid that I’ll be taken / Abandoned and forsaken / In her cold coffee eyes . . . Yup, I’m a bitch.

One of my dozens of psychiatrists once told me that it’s important to be able to distinguish the difference between a problem and an inconvenience.

But no matter what the dictionary says, in my opinion, a problem derails your life and an inconvenience is not being able to get a nice seat on the un-derailed train.

Right after I got sober (the first time), an interviewer asked me if I was happy, and I said, “Among other things.” Happy is one of the many things I’m likely to be over the course of a day and certainly over the course of a lifetime. But I think if you have the expectation that you’re going to be happy throughout your life—more to the point, if you have a need to be comfortable all the time—well, among other things, you have the makings of a classic drug addict or alcoholic.

“You know, dear, we’ve had every sort of man in our family—we’ve had horse thieves and alcoholics and one-man bands—but this is our first homosexual!”

“Well, baby—if you want to be a comic, you have to be a writer. But don’t worry, you have tons of material. Your mother is a manic-depressive drug addict, your father is gay, your grandmother tap-dances, and your grandfather shot speed!”

“Resentment is like drinking a poison and waiting for the other person to die.”