My life changed dramatically after I turned 21 last week. Having never tasted alcohol before I became legal, my first few sips hit me like a ton of bricks. Smooth, delicious bricks.
Toward the end of my birthday celebration, I decided to cap off the evening's festivities with some good old-fashioned drunk driving. About a half-mile down Ivy Road I saw the sirens flashing in my rear-view mirror.
"Relax," I assured the 17 or so underage passengers in the back of the bus. "I'm 21. The law can't touch me anymore."
As I soon discovered, drunk driving is not one of the things that becomes legal when you turn 21. In fact, drunk driving never becomes legal. Can you believe that? I could have been arrested! Good thing the county sheriff and I are in the same secret society.
When I got home that night, I decided some serious life changes were in order. I immediately threw away my "What Would Paris Hilton Do?" bracelet. Then I played the waiting game. What was I waiting for exactly? That's what I was waiting to find out.
I was quite distraught after my birthday experience, but the next few days showed me there is plenty more to being 21 than just purchasing and consuming alcohol all the time. I was invited, for example, to play in a 21-and-over polo league. Our first match hit a minor snag when we realized we needed a plot of land flatter and grassier than the Chemistry Building auditorium. On top of that, our team captain informed us that because of an unlikely mix-up, the horses we had ordered had been replaced with pony kegs.
If you thought drinking and driving were a bad combination, imagine how drinking and mallet-swinging went. Needless to say, when I woke up during the next day's midmorning econ lecture, I found it difficult to explain what I was doing perched atop the 50-foot projector screen.
Hoping to take my mind off drinking once and for all, I decided to join a fraternity. Unfortunately, the traditional "all-frat-guys-do-is-study" stereotype turned out not to be true. On the night I arrived at the house the brothers were throwing their annual "First Day of Classes" party. "OK," I thought, "I guess I can make an exception for such a rare occasion." The cheap beer flowed like even cheaper beer that night.
Unfortunately, my brethren did not see the evening as such a rare occasion. By Friday, when the frat was setting up for its annual "Fourth Day of Classes" party, I had had enough. I rescinded my pledge of allegiance to the fraternity. Though it was hard to part ways with my new friends, I knew at least I would always have the memories -- and also the mark that had been forcibly branded on my right buttock. Actually, since I was blacked out literally my entire time at the frat, there weren't any memories. So really I would just have the mark.
If I learned one thing from the "Grounds for Discussion" orientation skits, it's "different, different roomates." But that's not really relevant to this situation. The second thing I learned from "Grounds for Discussion" is that drinking can affect many aspects of one's life. This definitely held true in my case. I started going to bed at 3 a.m. and not getting up until 2:15 p.m. That's 15 precious minutes later than I used to get up. In addition, I stopped going to class altogether for a couple of days. Sure, those days happened to be Saturday and Sunday, so I got lucky. But still, it was pretty scary.
The most embarrassing thing I did as an alcoholic was streak the lawn. See, plenty of us have streaked the Lawn, but I, in my stupor, streaked the lawn -- lowercase "l" -- on Carr's Hill. Thanks to another miracle of fortunate timing, when President John T. Casteen, III came out of his house to chastise me, I was able to convince him I had just been hypnotized by Tom DeLuca.
Reaching 21 years of age sent me into a long, five-day battle with alcoholism that I finally managed to overcome. Some people have said I was never an alcoholic, that I was in fact engaged in an extended drinking binge and that I really needed to get my act together. Maybe they're right, or maybe they're wrong, but one thing's for sure: They're right. Also for sure: different, different roomates.
Dan is a Cavalier Daily Life columnist. His column runs biweekly on Tuesday. He can be reached at mcnally@cavalierdaily.com.
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