one tequila, two tequila ... oh god, where am I?

I went to high school with a guy who had an absolutely adorable full head of blonde, curly hair. I always really liked him as a person and knew that years down the road, when I got to talking about the glory days of high school, I would most likely wind up asking, "hey, remember him? I wonder whatever happened to him and that gorgeous friggin' hair?" His hairstyle is different now but I still remember him as Cute, Curly-Haired Blonde Guy.

Okay, I told you that tidbit of a story in order to tell you this one.

There were many nights in college that involved a ridiculous amount of drinking at a local watering hole but one during my Junior year of college has always stood out. A group of us gals went out gallivanting in big ol' Olean, New York and wound up at a bar whose name I have long forgotten but could probably give you if I were to drive by it today.  It was like most other nights and involved sitting around a table while talking, throwing some darts, doing some mingling, and drinking many, many bottles of Labatt Blue. While making one of my trips to the bar to get the next round, I found myself standing next to some guy who was cozied up to said bar and I immediately noticed his hair; nearly identical to the gorgeous curly gold locks that belonged to the guy from high school.

Oh my god, I'm so totally close to shitfaced right now that I have no problem telling you how much I love your hair and immediately running my fingers through it as if we're the best of pals and I'm not a completely random, pretty-close-to-drunk-girl getting all up in your 'do.

We must have struck up conversation because the next thing I knew, I was telling him I'd never had tequila before and in a flash, there are two shot glasses in front of us. And then there are two more. And I believe another two. This was, of course, after having had several Labatt Blues to start off the night.

Now, plenty of times, I've managed to drink so much that I've spent the evening getting sick. I can't mix things for shit. Beer, wine, liquor ... I can drink those tasty beverages if I drink only one of those tasty beverages. But the minute I start combining them, it is not a sight you want to see, I assure you. For reasons that still baffle me, I didn't get sick that night but like most things in life, it was a trade-off. I swapped my ability to hold my booze for my ability to remember what immediately followed that last shot of tequila.

I bet you're thinking events of a questionable nature transpired with Random Blonde Curly-Haired Tequila Provider, aren't you?

They did not.

Somewhere in the midst of the tequila shots, my memory up and left me and I don't remember anything that happened between the last shot and walking into Shay-Loughlen Hall (not my dorm) with the bartender from the bar. I was told the next day that we took a cab back to campus but I have absolutely no recollection of getting from Point Drunk to Point You Stupid, Stupid Girl. Oddly enough, once we got back to the dorms, I remember the rest of the night as clear as day. I kissed said bartender once we got to his dorm room, I remember Titanic was on the television in the background, I remember lying on the floor in blankets, and I remember ... stuff. Many times, I've thanked whatever higher power may or may not be out there that I also clearly remember that what did not happen was *the* full-on drunken mistake that easily could have happened.

I no longer drink tequila unless it's in a margarita and even then, I will only have two. I no longer can watch Kate Winslett and Leonardo DiCaprio join forces in any cinematic endeavour without giggling. I still hate Celine Dion (although that may be because she's simply annoying as fuck). And I most certainly no longer make out with strangers when I'm drunk.

So, let this be a cautionary tale. A ginormous passenger steamship may take two hours and forty minutes to sink but I assure you, sinking one's memory may only require a cute boy and a few shots of tequila.

finally, a chance to use the Buffy cookie dough analogy!

My father asked me once what I think are the best choices I've made for myself so far in life. It didn't take me a minute to answer him: 1. going to St. Bonaventure, 2. moving to Chicago, 3. my trip to Portland / Seattle.

Until this past weekend, I hadn't been back to Bonaventure since the day my parents and I packed up my little Ford Escort and their cars and moved me back to Penn Yan. I've always wanted to go back but not for an alumni function or anything, just...for me.

I haven't kept in touch with my college friends much until finding them all on Facebook. Even now, it's a Facebook type of friendship where we have a little interaction on there and that's it. But there are very few things about my four years there that I look back on with anything less than supreme fondness.

For a girl whose family has always meant the world to her, moving to school was a bitch for me. In a lot of ways, it was harder than moving 12 hours away and here to Chicago. Like a lot of people headed off to college, it was the first time I lived away from my family and my closest friends. My friend Catie and I had breakfast the morning before we were headed off and I remember standing at our cars afterward, hugging and crying and my telling her she was the one I really didn't want to leave.

It was the first time I lived up close and personal with complete strangers. I met people and we had a blast and we went to classes (for the most part) and we grew into the people most of us probably thought we'd never become. I remember little things about my time at school; the time we got into trouble for drinking in our dorm room the first night of our sophomore year, the time we took booze and my friend wore my green bathrobe to class for St. Patrick's Day, the time we almost started a fire in the lounge, the first time we got high with the Hot R.A. But when I think about the years spent there collectively, I remember the person I felt I was when I got there and the person I knew I was the morning I left. And I'm still amazed.

Our visit last weekend affected me more than I had prepared myself for and I think it's because it was really time for me to go back. Until recently, I've felt like someone completely other than who I know myself to be and I was ready for a reminder of just how far I've come since I hugged my parents and they told me they're just a phone call and two hours away.

For me, college really was the beginning of figuring out who I am. It was the first time I realized I could truly make it on my own (as much as one is on their own when their parents are helping pay for school and helping pay for me to live while there). For maybe the first time, I felt like someone other than a daughter and a sister and a niece. After changing majors three times, it was the first time I realized all I really want to do is read and write good stuff. The first time I considered myself to be a feminist. The first time I really had to study and work hard in order to meet my own standards. I don't know at what moment but at some point in those four years, I knew I was going to eventually move away from New York.

A lot of people put a lot of stock into a college degree but I've got to say that I couldn't care less that I walked away with a piece of paper telling me I have a B.A. in English. I walked away from college having learned just what possibility means. And I walked away having started to truly grow up and into the person I hope to be. The one I'd like to be. The one I will be, really.



After having taken the last of my photos this past weekend, I laid back on the grass next to the "E" on the beautiful central New York afternoon it was and thought about my time there. And my time since then. And the time I haven't yet experienced. I wasn't then but as I write this (and having just mentioned it and its everlasting relevance in conversation), I'm reminded of one of my favourite Buffy moments.

"...I'm cookie dough. I'm not done baking. I'm not finished becoming whoever the hell it is I'm going to turn out to be. I make it through this and the next thing and the next thing and maybe one day I turn around and realize I'm ready. I'm cookies. And then, you know, if I want someone to eat me...or enjoy warm, delicious cookie-me, then that's fine. That'll be then. When I'm done."