Adele, Finding Meaning in "I Drink Wine"

Every song speaks to us in a unique way. Sometimes it carries the exact message the artist intended, and other times, it morphs into something completely different. A single verse can take on entirely new meanings depending on where we are in our lives and the specific twists and turns of our own personal journeys.

There’s no doubt that Adele is an incredible artist. She has a powerful voice and an undeniable talent for writing award winning hits. Yet, for whatever reason, I never really paid close attention to her career. To me, she was just that artist whose songs played nonstop on almost every radio station.

But in 2022, everything changed with the release of her music video for “I Drink Wine.” I know the track actually dropped a year earlier on her album “30”, but since I wasn’t following her closely, I had never heard it until the video came out.

At that exact moment in my life, Blanca had recently come out. My world was in a state of beautiful, terrifying transition, and the lyrics to this song spoke straight to my heart. I immediately fell in love with it and downloaded it to my phone.

Then, one morning, the perfect emotional storm formed. My very first order of feminine underwear had finally arrived in the mail. Slipping into them brought forward a wave of amazing emotions that I had never been allowed to experience freely, feelings I had hidden and suppressed my whole life because "boys aren't supposed to feel or express like that."

It was truly amazing, but also incredibly overwhelming. I was driving to work, out in the real world, underdressing for the very first time. I felt fulfilled and finally authentic, even if it was only partially, hidden beneath my regular male clothes. Then I hit shuffle on my playlist, and on came Adele.

The moment the melody started, I bursted into tears, and for the first time in my life, I just let them flow for the entire drive to the office. I was done suppressing my emotions.

As the track played, every stanza felt like a mirror holding up my own reflection:

“How can one become so bounded

By choices that somebody else makes?

How come we've both become a version

Of a person we don't even like?”

Indeed, how? How do we let ourselves become so confined? How do we accept living a restricted life, hiding our true selves, all because of the decisions, ideologies, and expectations of society? Why should I be forced to wear only what someone else decided I should wear?

“We're in love with the world

But the world just wants to bring us down

By putting ideas in our heads

That corrupt our hearts somehow”

We want to enjoy this life in a way that makes sense to us. We want to do the things that actually make us love being alive. But the world so often tries to drag us back down, telling us that what we feel is wrong, that we are freaks, or that we need to be "cured." Those toxic ideas work their way into our heads, making us doubt ourselves, making us wonder if we even deserve to pursue our own femininity.

“When I was a child

Every single thing could blow my mind

Soaking it all up for fun

But now I only soak up wine”

Childhood is a magical time when you truly believe dreams can come true. You’re amazed by the simplest things, and nothing feels impossible. But before you know it you are an adult in your 40s or 50s, life has flown by, and a whole bunch of those childhood dreams never materialized. You didn’t become the woman you always wanted to be, and you find yourself left trying to drown the sorrow of lost time.

“They say to play hard, you work hard

Find balance in the sacrifice

Yet I don't know anybody

Who's truly satisfied”

We are fed that line our entire lives, Work hard, sacrifice, and you’ll have it all. And sure, on paper, we might achieve it. We get the good job, the nice house, the decent car. But are we truly satisfied? You can build a wonderful, successful life, but if you're still forced to hide half of who you are, that success always feels hollow.

“You better believe I'm trying (trying, trying)

To keep climbing (climbing, climbing)

But the higher we climb

Feels like we're both none the wiser”

We try so hard to just exist as ourselves, and our community fights for basic validation. Yet, the higher we climb, the more fragile the foundation feels. It’s like a game of Jenga, the more you stack up the more fragile the base gets and it only takes one wrong move from the world around you to send the whole thing crashing down.

“So I hope I learn to get over myself

Stop trying to be somebody else

So we can love each other for free

Everybody wants something

You just want me”

I hope to finally overcome the internalized fear and external obstacles blocking my path. I want to stop playing a character, stop trying to be the person everyone else expects me to be, and just accept Blanca unconditionally.

“Why am I obsessing

About the things I can't control?

Why am I seeking approval

From people I don't even know?”

Seriously, why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we waste precious years trying to convince strangers to understand us? We spend so much energy trying to justify our gender identity to a world that doesn't care. We can't control what people think, and the vast majority of them will never play a meaningful role in our lives anyway. So why do we let their approval dictate our happiness?

“In these crazy times I hope to find 

Something I can cling on to

'Cause I need some substance in my life

Something real, something that feels true”

For me, that "something real" is my feminine self. That is what I need to cling to, because Blanca is what feels undeniably true. Escaping into her gives my life the substance it was missing for decades. Even doing something as mundane as doing laundry feels entirely different when I'm allowed to just be me. Without that outlet, the weight of the world would be too much to bear.

The song felt like an intimate dialogue between my two halves. On one side, there was the desperate struggle from Blanca to finally be free, to step into the light and enjoy life authentically. On the other side was my male half, also deeply struggling, trying to learn how to let go of the rigid limitations imposed by others and, by myself. It was an interesting conflict between the man I have been pretending to be and the woman I feel I'm meant to be, both of them just trying to figure out how to coexist.

Obviously, the song continues, and obviously, Adele didn’t sit down to write an anthem about the life of a trans woman. She wrote it about her own life and struggles, but that’s the beautiful irony of art.

In that exact, chaotic moment of my life, sitting in traffic with tears streaming down my face that song fit my soul perfectly. Adele may have been singing about something else, but I was relating it to my newly acquired freedom. And for that, it will hold a sacred place in my heart forever.