I am sure there are people out there who will read this column and have absolutely no idea what I'm describing. I envy these people with all of my soul because these are the individuals that can go from drunkenly passing out to soberly functioning without suffering through the extended period of backlash commonly known as a "hangover," but which I like to call "my daily personal death sentence."
I don't know who came up with the phrase "hangover," but he was right on, as after I drink I often end up "hanging over" the edge of my bed with my face in a trash can or having some creepy individual that I brought home in a fit of drunken genius "hanging over" at my place too long. Seriously dude, the sun is up. Time to roll out.
Those who suffer from the same kind of head-pounding, bone-aching, stomach lining-eating hangovers that I do will recognize that a true hangover is comprised of a number of stages, each distinctly terrifying in its own horrible way. I will proceed to explain these stages in an effort to (A) show others who endure this ritual of pain that they are not alone and (B) explain away my hungover behavior so that perhaps I will receive fewer judgmental stares in my 11 a.m. classes.
Stage one, the evaluation stage, is actually quite short. This stage consists of waking up and trying to determine the events of the night before by looking at the clues surrounding you. These hints may be found by examining how many objects in your room are still in one piece, looking at what you are currently wearing and rolling over and determining the identity of the creeper in your bed. Helpful questions to ask yourself can include "Where am I?" "How might I have gotten here?" and "Why am I wearing a cowboy hat?" Sometimes, the evaluation stage is less than helpful, because you are often still too drunk to process your surroundings. After 10 disorienting minutes of trying to piece together your night, chugging lukewarm bathroom water (no way are you making it to the kitchen) and maybe calling a friend to do nothing but groan into your cell, you pass back out in hopes that you will wake up cured.
But you don't wake up cured. You wake up in stage two, or the "mandatory event" stage. The mandatory event stage begins with the frightening realization that there is some place you must be. Personal hygiene is the least of your concerns at this juncture, as you are already 15 minutes late, so you ignore your smoke-filled hair and unbrushed teeth and throw on the most comfortable outfit available to you, which is always a monochromatic gray sweat suit. Don't ask me why, but the most comfortable things in your closet are always gray and even though you will inevitably show up in class looking like a middle schooler headed to gym class, you wear your gray hues without concern.
The mandatory event always involves sitting upright, but your body does not want to cooperate, leaving you to do what can only be called the uncomfortable-in-my-own-body bob. The bob is a series of contortions in which you are a puppet in a world where the puppeteers' sole purpose in life is to torture you. This strange hangover dance, which looks sort of like a slow-motion alcohol exorcism, results because though you desperately desire to keep your head still to control the crushing waves of nausea, your body is in so much discomfort that it subconsciously tries to shake loose of the awful feeling that surrounds it. One of the defining characteristics of the UCIMOB bob is that you have no idea that you are doing it. You think you are being completely still and are unaware that your body has chosen to engage in a socially alienating jig. At this stage, do not be surprised if people begin to move away from you.
Stage three is the stage of realization. You realize that if things continue to worsen, you would rather die than face another torturous minute. The UCIMOB bob has stopped, and in its place is a complete stillness of body, which is only broken when/if you have a realization flashback from the night before, causing your hands to fly to your face in panic. You realize that your monochromatic gray sweat suit is being slowly covered in the vodka-fueled sweat that is emanating from your every pore and that you have been moaning audibly for the last hour. An attempt to barter then commences, in which you tell the powers that be that if you can just be restored to your original state of health you will go to Africa and help sick children, be nicer to your parents, take out the trash more often and even donate a kidney. No price is too great.
Mercifully, the hangover begins to dissipate, bringing you to stage four, the rehash stage. The rehash stage involves consuming mass quantities of food with your rehash squad to replace what you (probably) threw up during stage two or three. In accordance with the previous night's activities, you assign the identities of Crier, Sketchball, Poor Sick Bastard and Seducer to each person in the rehash squad. Blanks are filled in for each person's narrative, because while nobody can ever remember what each person did the night before, they can always recall the jackass moves of everyone else. Everyone feels better during the rehash stage, choosing to focus on the fun of the night rather than the all-consuming hangovers that just recently ended. The rehash stage almost always involves making plans to drink again that night and, sometimes, a trip to the ABC store.
I know this looks like a column about hangovers, but it really isn't. It's a column about overcoming the odds, self-discovery, friendship and, most importantly, tolerance. It's easy when you yourself do not have a hangover to callously disregard the pain of those who do, but there are things you can do to help these poor souls, should you have a class with one of them. Always give them the aisle seat so they don't freak out when they have to leap up to throw up. Ask the professor if you can turn up the air-conditioning so the hot flashes they are experiencing won't be so bad. And for God's sake, if someone begins doing the bob, give them space and try not to laugh. Trust me, you'd want people to do the same for you.
Erin's column runs bi-weekly on Mondays. She can be reached at gaetz@cavalierdaily.com.
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