The first guy I ever dated in Sacramento was a solid faceplant into a bad relationship a couple years after moving up north. Thankfully, it was brief and full of memory gaps.
I was still living at home, and was desperately looking for something to escape to while said home life was on fire. My parents were going through a very contentious divorce. Full of hard feelings, massively tense situations and a whole case of the “fuck it’s, when it came to boundaries (one parent exercised them, the other did not). One of my fathers girlfriends kept calling the house to talk to ME about their relationship while he was still living with us- for starters. Between that and a veritable cornucopia of other situations that I would calmly, and detachedly bring up during therapy years later- I tried to peace out as much as I could. When my sister wasn’t available, I leaned on the boyfriend.
He was an emotional hot mess and we worked together. He was also quite older than me, and would be my first and last foray dating someone 14+ years my senior. Which was already doomed at the start with a late Gen X/Xennial, versus a late Boomer. Of course I ignored that generational gap, red flag immediately. Because he had his own house and seemed fun.
For all the negativity and unreal amount of drama this guy manufactured, he loved San Francisco and Napa and took me there all the time for mini-day trips. They both were only an hour away and 1000% worth it during summer for the drastic temperature differences in the bay area. This was the only truly positive part. The honorable mention was that he owned a California King, Tempur-Pedic bed that I would crash out on, often blissfully alone. Most of the time spent in that house involved sleeping off the stress of my family situation.
Our age generation gap relationship was just terrible and absolutely infused with booze. Every aspect of it was filled with drinking, going to drink and drinking around one another. Neither one of us seemed like true alcoholics at the time, but it became quite clear that we needed alcohol to tolerate one another. I was constantly upsetting him with my personality, and I was too distracted by my intense home life to see just how controlling this guy was getting right off the bat. Again, why was this not a red flag? It totally was, I just didn’t have the mental capacity to care about anything other than escape. He was a solid provider of mini-excursions.
Our first actual SF day trip had us stopping in Berkley, where I was introduced to one of the Sake factories. I remember four things: It was ridiculously affordable, practically empty, I got absolutely trashed immediately on an empty stomach, and I greatly disappointed him. This was the theme of the relationship. Plans, drinks and disappointment. At least that time I was not violently ill.
If we are ever in San Francisco together I can take you on a very niche, unique “Avant Garde” tour of establishments where I ran outside to vomit. I can call it the “Sarah’s Niche Elimination of her Gastric Contents Tour 1998-2003”. Usually bars, but there are a couple music venues: The Independent (formerly known as the Justice League) and the famous Fillmore. Legend has it The Stinking Rose restaurant had a pink stain on the sidewalk for about a year thanks to me and a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon.
Why did I get so completely wasted at a famous Italian restaurant you might be asking. I will tell you. The train wreck I was dating kept ordering us bottles of wine and pouring me glasses and then pulling the usual of “scolding me for being too drunk”. Plying me with booze to make me more palatable to his taste. That particular day I was completely done with his shit, after an argument on Haight street because he didn’t want me to go inside the bondage shop. So, I made sure to get as drunk as possible so I could mentally handle the drive home where I would be lectured about my attitude, age, and any other flaw that was shining through at 23 years old.
After that raw display in front of the restaurant, you can all take heart that he had to pull over TWICE for me to throw up out the window. The second time I did not projectile vomit hard enough, and it landed over the side of the car. I just rolled up the window, closed my eyes and let the dulcet sounds of his irate voice lull me to sleep, as we cruised over the Bay Bridge and then onto the 50, back to Sacramento. Clumps of vomit gently blowing off the car door. I think it was a Toyota?
Our first Napa trip went by without incident. At least I think it did, I don’t remember a whole lot. The 2nd trip was for Thanksgiving with my family at their winery and I remember feeling weird and uneasy having him around everyone. The 3rd trip I remember well, as it featured a fight that went down in my books as “most hilarious public fight ever” and was also quite the catalyst.
Picture Napa in Fall. Some leaves are turned, it’s warm but pleasant. Maybe low 70’s/low 20’s. You and your significant other are enjoying red wine flights at Sterling winery on the hillside deep in Calistoga. You are sitting at a table together and discussing the wine, ,maybe an upcoming event and you glance over to see a miserable, sullen woman at the table next to you with thick curly hair and a scowl. Her date hastily gets up from his chair, clearly irritated because of something that was said. You watch him walk off into the distance and glance at the woman, who is swirling the wine in the glass with an eyebrow raised, alone on a patio full of happy people. So you invite her over to your table to finish her flight.
This is exactly what happened. I’m sure I was sarcastic and said something immature and challenging, so he stormed off, and then I was invited to sit at the table next to us. So I brought my wine, sat down, we clinked glasses and talked about where we were from, respectively. This was a couple from Oakland/ Martinez but they all had cousins in Los Angeles so we bonded instantly. It was just a gorgeous afternoon and those two saved it from being a disaster. We had an animated discussion and I was just on the verge of being invited to a huge Hispanic catholic wedding in San Jose when bad news bears decided to grace us with his presence.
Boyfriend was incensed and aghast that I was enjoying myself without him, and told me we were leaving. I chugged the rest of my flights, wished the couple well and agreed with them that I needed to “dump his ass when I got back to Sac” and then followed him to the exit. Part of Sterling’s charm is the little gondolas that go up and down the hillside, for an aerial experience and easy access to the winery. It’s super fun, and was my favorite part of the whole thing and I watched in amusement as he got into own gondola, and shut the door so I couldn’t get in with him. He rode in his own little gondola, absolutely fuming. So I had to follow him, alone in mine and by this point I was completely drunk and enjoyed the downward descent to the extreme, watching the sunset. I clearly remember through my wine soaked haze that it was a beautiful evening, and that I did not give any amount of fucks over what this guy thought of me at the moment.
Que another long drive on the 80 back to Sacramento where I was given a laundry list of complaints attacking my character, the core of my being, my soul and my lack of dedication and seriousness to our incredibly stupid relationship. Maybe I slept again, I don’t remember. I do remember not caring remotely. The apathy was solid and I was in a state of uncaring bliss, like Peter from Office space.
The break-up followed fairly quickly after, and it was brutal in the fact that he told me “No” at first and said I would “learn to love him”. More than a little alarmed I stood firm and would not back down, and just repeated that I was out. He lost the PLOT and became an inconsolable, emotional mess so much that I just left him there in his car in tears and walk back up to my house because he couldn’t function or drive, and was incapable of any further conversation. I looked out the window about 5 minutes in and he was still out there.
Naturally there were some phone calls to what was only a house line at that time, that were fielded by family (sorry mom) but they stopped short, because he went into the place we mutually worked together the NEXT DAY and quit on the spot. Citing ME as the reason why he was terminating himself, immediately. I was mortified, as news travels fast. All eyes were on me as I did the walk of shame to the timeclock at Borders books the next day of my shift. I do believe I was hauled into the managers office who had called me to give me the news, but no action was taken. That manager and I were good work-friends and we talked a bit in his office that day about the situation, and he was the only person at work who asked me how I was coping.
I was right as rain, but did feel a little bad (and very confused) about having such an profound effect on someone who clearly disliked the core of my personality as well as my age, and who I only dated for 7-8 months in total from start to finish. We did not truly know each other, which shined a spotlight on the already glaring fact that WE HAD TO BE DRUNK ALL THE TIME. Where was this teen angst coming from as a man in his late 30’s? The drama was unprecedented. I was the one without the fully formed frontal lobe, not this dude.
The score at 23 years of age: Sarah the Heartless 3, Emotionally Unstable Men who lose their minds with a breakup; 0. I had netted a hat-trick with “bitch craft” that fully displayed my inexperience with spotting the red flags of mental instability. That particular relationship did sprinkle in some awareness that managed to take hold in my brain, and I honed better navigation skills when it came to dating at that age. Fast forward 25 years later to present day and my tolerance limit is much, much, much shorter. For bullshit and alcohol.
I think we should all go back to Stirling and ride the gondolas again. I’ll bring better wine buddies and maybe we will finally get that invite to a random wedding or a quinceanera, or better yet maybe we will be the ones inviting an exasperated someone over to drink with us, mid-fight with their significant other. I’d have a thing or three to say to them in that situation.
*Actual footage of me with Sterling Cabernet Sauvignon circa July 2023.
The Devious Scribe 