I was never a bad kid, but every now and
then I’d do stupid shit. I think we all did. It’s all part of growing up,
testing our limits, and inching towards independence.
I’d been to a few parties, some of them
tame, others not.
The first (lifeguard) staff party I
attended was held on the first night my parents extended my curfew. Be home by
midnight, they said. Prior to this, I had to be home by 10 pm. I get to the
party and I see a draft ball being pumped, and a glass of Northern draft is
pressed into my palm. I inhale the sharp salty brew and take a sip. And before
I know it, another is handed to me. I doubt I drank more than four, but four
was enough. I was hammered. Guy Talbut sat me aside and said, “You’re going to
get yourself in trouble if you don’t know how to drink.” He laid out a few
rules to follow. Don’t drink shooters, he said, they sneak up on you fast, you
can’t regulate your buzz, and they’re puke in a cup. Don’t play drinking games;
you get drunk too fast, and your evening is over in an hour. And don’t buy or
receive rounds; someone always drinks faster than you, and you’re racing to
catch up, or someone drinks for free and leaves before he buys a round. Learn
to drink at your own pace. Don’t get hammered. You’ll never impress a girl if
your blind drunk and spilling your drink on her. Great advice. Good rules. I
think I’ve broken every one of them over the years. Starting with that night.
The booze was free, this being my first ever staff party. And before I knew it,
I’d looked up at the clock and realized that I’d already blown my curfew. By
the time I arrived home, I could barely walk. When I did stagger up to the door,
my parents were waiting. My mother was livid. She gave me no end of Hell, as I
tried to remain upright in my chair. Behind her, my father was shaking his
head, and finally said, “Well, so much for the curfew.”
Sean Light, Sean Quinn and I were hanging
out, when they decided to get a six pack from Northern (Doran’s) Brewery. Apparently,
Quinn had a fake ID. Now, I’d never bought beer before, preferring to lift a
bottle from my father’s beer fridge on occasion, instead. Quinn was served and
we walked to Gilles Lake, where Light and I had keys to. It was quiet, the
shack locked up for the evening, no on about. As we rounded the corner to the
lake, we say a middle-aged woman glaring at us through her picture window. My
heart leapt to my throat, my stomach tied in knots. I felt we should move on,
but both Seans said the old biddy wouldn’t do a thing. So, we unlocked the old
dilapidated old guard shack, and pupped the cap of our first beers. Our last,
it turned out. A cruiser pulled up, the cops strolled down the hill, and
confronted us. Hey boys, what’s your names, how old are you. Scared straight,
we owned up to everything. The cops wrote everything down and watched us pour
our beers out into the sand, every last one of them. Now, I’d never been spoken
to by a cop before. I thought I was in deep shit, that my parents would be
informed, that I would have a RECORD! But we noticed that, as the cops rounded
the top of the hill, that they balled up the papers with our names on them and
tossed them away.
Another party, this time with Jeff
Chevrier and Peter Cassidy. Jeff was drunk, crashed out on the couch. Pete
approached him, inspected him, and fingered Jeff’s nose. Jeff was unmoved. So,
Peter grabbed hold of Jeff by the shirt, forcibly lifted him off the couch, and
yelled into his face, “SLEEPING’S FOR FAGS!”
Words to live by.
