Everybody remembers the first time they got drunk.
No, not the first sips out of the old man's Labatt 50 stubby. No, not the wedding where your sister's deadbeat date brought you back a drink every third time he went to the bar.
No, the first time you got really, really intoxicated. How good it felt to relinquish control and revel in the ecstasy of the out of body experience that ensued.
Cousine and I had his mother's house to ourselves for a weekend. He had a case of Labatt Blue that a farmer he worked for had paid him with. (Labatt Blue was not only the coin of the realm, but the Pilsener of choice back in the day. Yeah, I know).
Once the Blue was obliterated, we were well on the way to same. Then Cousine pulled out the Smirnoff, and my younger cousin, whom Cousine was 'watching', dug a few cans of frozen orange juice out of the fridge. And then the Event really took off. While we snuffed out the Screwdrivers, we soaked in the sonic swell of Sabbath's "Paranoid" and Judas Priest's "Sad Wings of Destiny". Still at the tender age when we could approach his octaves, we sang along with Rob Halford as he piped out 'Victim of Changes' and 'Dreamer Deceiver'.
Inevitably we went outside. I can remember spinning around in the front yard, vowing that I will never again not feel this way. The sky was blue, and stretched endlessly into the country horizon. Ecstatic in the Dionysian deluge, we saw more than one figure floating 'neath the willow tree. And you gotta believe me, fairies do wear boots. We went Space Truckin' into the ether, and left ourselves behind.
Everyone's got their story.
And while Cousine and I were far too young to sport facial hair, and I don't remember manifesting my inner dork by dressing up as a "Star Wars" character and dueling with a toy light sabre, this video from the mighty Mogwai captures the febrile nature of the first drunk.
First time I got smashed was in the Lee Tavern - I was 15 - and was wearing my High School Basketball jacket. I ahd money so the barkeep was serving.
ReplyDeleteI guess I was 15 or 16. Remember freezing in Larry Monette's front yard. Dead of winter. Too late and too drunk to go inside. Like his parents couldn't hear us jabbering?
ReplyDeleteInteresting vid FE. Think I was about the same age. My friend's Dad had an infinite supply of EX in the basement. It was fun to feel the release of inhibitions. It was also good to have inhibitions to release.
ReplyDeleteI was eleven and had tagged along with my older brother, who was invited to a sleepover at the house of one of his friends. This friend had two cute older sisters, one of whom was ostensibly babysitting the three of us while his parents went to the curling club. The friend had snagged a bottle of bright green creme de menthe from his parents' cabinet. Not knowing how much would be too much, we drank a lot of the minty stuff mixed with a little ginger-ale. As my pubescent head was starting to vitalize, we quietly sneaked over to his sister's room, into which she and her boyfriend had disappeared earlier. Expecting to catch them 'kissing', we peeked in to find them in full flagrante delicto. Later that night, I got pretty sick.
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