So last night I went out with two of my friends from elementary school (look at the longevity there). We went to a Rockies game, which is always a good time, and then stopped by a bar to see another friend’s band play. Various events in the night got me slightly freaked out about this whole being-an-adult thing (that is, if you consider living at home, temping as a receptionist, and still making bad decisions with alarming frequency being an adult). For starters, at the baseball game we sat in front of these obnoxious kids (including boys who were wearing strangely short shorts) who felt the need to comment on every aspect of the game, and loudly say things like “Should we take the shooters now?” I was blissfully happy eating my burrito, drinking my Coors Light, and staring at the mountains, so I was more entertained than annoyed by these strangers, but from an objective perspective, I could see that they were irritating as hell. My friends and I joked about this and laughed at the antics of these young hooligans, and then I realized…that was me. And I’m not talking that was me like waaay back in college a month ago, but that was me approximately a week ago, at a different Rockies game. People like that aren’t exactly loved by the rest of the population. How long can I get away with shit like this?
After it was clear that the Rockies were going to win (take THAT, Cleveland), we went to the bar to watch my friend’s band play. The band turned out to be awesome, and it was generally a great time. One of the highlights of this little concert was watching the hammered parents of the band members acting like college students, which means they were dancing on tables and making out in corners. This seems to answer the earlier question with a resounding “You can get away with shit like this for a long time! You can get blacked out on a Tuesday and grind up on strangers even when you have children of your own!” And even though I assume, if I’m being honest with myself, that I probably will be one of those parents one day, it still doesn’t seem quite right.
So after watching these drunk adults for a few hours, my elementary school friends left and I decided against my better judgement to stay for a while. After dancing like a hippie to the next band, whose lead singer had one of the greatest Jewfros I’ve ever seen, I started thinking I should go home, and I called a cab. Because my other friends didn’t have important things like filing invoices and answering phones to do the next day, they decided to stay. Which means I had to take a cab home alone. Now, I’m not the type of person who necessarily hates being alone, but I felt self-conscious and pathetic hopping into that yellow sedan all by my lonesome. I knowww that adults do that sometimes — I’ve seen it in the movies — but I didn’t like it.
As much I want to end this bit of rambling with a Carrie Bradshaw-esque conclusion that ties this all together with a neat analogy and an “I couldn’t help but wonder,” (i.e., “And I couldn’t help but wonder…was my fear of being alone in the cab indicative of a larger fear of being alone…forever?), I really don’t know where I’m going with this. I think part of me is still devastated that a night out is no longer a trip to a campus bar where everybody knows your name, you can pay for beer on your meal plan, and you can walk home in five minutes. I’m also not entirely sure what I can do with this borderline-alcoholism that we all pick up in college now that I’m (GASP) not in college. On the weekends, when my drink of choice is still a whiskey coke in shady water bottle form, it’s easier to pretend that nothing’s changed. But this whole “work” thing, this whole “growing up” thing, is really cramping my style. Thank god for grad school.
[Posted by Mallory]
six words to change the world. 