I used to think I was pretty hardcore...or at least immune to the inevitable "slowing down" that plagues former frat stars when they reach their mid 20's. However as I write to you currently, I have one eye halfway sealed shut, and I can't type a full sentence without the scabs on my hands bursting open in a bloody pusy mess. The conclusion is that I'm done, well not done but I'm at least on my way down. The 72 hours that consisted of my last weekend were magical. Between a triumphant return to Chicago and a 8th consecutive Little 500, I couldn't have asked for a better party, but the aftermath is becoming a little too much to handle.
In former years, the moral hangover that was little 5 would consist of rationalizing why I cheated on a girlfriend, that drugs are a victimless crime and I could at least sleep for 48 hours before showing up to class on Wednesday and high-fiving some like minded frat stars who had obviously just come out of their hangover hibernation. Back then it was all fun and games, but it's not so much fun when you have to wake up after bleeding yourself to sleep, drive 300 miles to O'Hare and then fly 1800 more to Los Angeles in a middle non-reclining seat on Spirit Air.
When I was 18, I dove into Geist Reservoir and hit my head on a rock. I was drunk as fuck so my blood would not coagulate. My face somewhat resembled that waterfall in Jurassic Park 2 that showed all the blood coming down it. We all laughed it off and went to Bella Vita and ordered pizzas and kept drinking. That summer I was working at Fry's Electronics as a glorified cashier. I probably talked to 300 customers a day and every single one of them asked "what the fuck is wrong with your face?" Back then it was a fun game, I made up the craziest stories to entertain myself. Bar fights, motorcycle crash, attacked by a wild bear. Looking back on that whole story, I probably should have snapped my neck and died, or at least become paralyzed. I went to a benefit for spinal cord injuries and more often than not that's how it happens. "We were partying by a pool, I fell in and couldn't feel my legs." I survived with a summer of embarrassment and a couple small scars.
Seven years later and I look even worse. I'm in sales so I talk to people. Fortunately for me, my current injuries look exactly like I had a bad surfing fall and hit my face on the sand bar. So I roll with that and actually it has been endearing me moreso to business owners because surfing is bad ass. What really happened you ask? I don't know, the story I'm rolling with is their were a couple unruly geeds that pushed me to the ground Saturday night as I was stumbling home from Kilroy's Saturday night. But I don't even know if that's true, I wouldn't be surprised if I got hit by a car, tried to steal a bike and wrecked it, or just genuinely fell on my face. See the glory of the black out is you can write your own story and as a fiction writer it's fun to fill in the blanks with some creative license. I can't separate my dreams from reality anymore, or what actually did go down this weekend. For example I'm fairly certain the following happened this weekend: someone in my hotel room got arrested, someone started bleeding from their pores due to an allergic reaction to alcohol and someone had a threeway in our hotel's hot tub. But looking back, I'm not sure if any of that is true, I remember my first 7 or 8 shots at Kilroy's and then it fades.
As I browse the pictures, bits and pieces come back to me. Oh yah, the frat was awesome! Jesus Alpha Phi is hot. Where do I get one of those race day tanks? The 3 story beer bong! Oh my god, the Country Roads beer shower was epic! That person was there? Oh fuck, I went THERE late night? I think my general consensus of the weekend is that going to Little 5 is similar to going on a Vegas Trip. Sure there are epic stories, wild transgressions against the laws of common decency, but when remembered nothing seems to resonate. Perhaps it's because looking back on it we feel a little guilty about the choices that were made, and to an outsider it will never sound as wild and crazy as described. So maybe we should take a play out of the Nevada tourism board's playbook and just not talk about it. Remember that we all went and had a good time, post a few of the more harmless pictures and call it a day.
It's Tuesday now, I'm hoping by Thursday my urine will return to a respectable color and I will stop picking orange and blue boogers. I'll probably never go back to Bloomington for a bender like I just went on, but I will always look back on these memories (and lack thereof) with fondness. Bloomington will always represent a chapter of my life that I am proud of. Not proud of the hearts, laws and records I broke, but because it shaped who I am today and that dude is pretty fucking cool. I could jaw about how I probably consumed 200 alcoholic beverages in 48 hours or that I slept for 4 hours but that would be lame (and those would be lies.) I would much rather tell you that despite the condition I currently find myself in, the trip was a fucking blast, and I wouldn't have changed a thing. Except I should have worn a helmet out Saturday night...whatever at least I don't have to put Ron Chapman on retainer again.
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