The names in the post have been changed to protect the potentially not-so-innocent.

I met my friend Alison at her work and we made plans to grab some dinner and then head over to an art gallery showing type thing.

From what I can tell, the opening was similar to something that was held in my apartment building in Seattle called “artwalk”, which is where a bunch of artists open the doors to their homes and/or studios and show off their goods in conjunction with the large studios allowing you in free of charge. The main appeal of artwalk in Seattle, from what I’ve always been told, was free wine and “hot art chicks”. Artwalk pissed off me and my roommate because we aren’t artists.

Unless you call playing xbox an artform, which really, you should, because he and I would spend hours playing Halo trying to get the Warthog into places that were damn near impossible and then taking photos and sending them to friends.

But I digress.

In Seattle, people would randomly open our closed door which did not bear a sign reading “Please open this door because there is art inside” like all of the other lofts did. These people would occasionally stumble into our apartment and wonder if the darklit room was an art exhibit in and of itself and would soon learn the “artform” of us “artfully” throwing them out of our apartment and onto the “artistic” carpet outside our door.

Needless to say, I wasn’t exactly thrilled about the second part of our plan. But this whole month is supposed to be about trying new things, so I’ll bite.

On the ride to get food, Alison and I discussed alcohol and the role it plays in relationships. She says that she’s pretty sure that all of her douche bag boyfriends were drunks. The quote of the evening came from her:

“No relationship was ever improved with alcohol.”

I wonder idly if “relationship” should be replaced with “scenario”.

Alison selected a place whose name escapes me and we ordered food from their pretty sparse menu. She got a drink, but I was driving to the art-thing so I opted to stick with water. About 20 minutes after ordering Alison’s friend Stacy showed up. She had apparently had a pretty terrible day, and said as much before going inside to order food while I waited outside with Alison who was finishing her cigarette.

Alison and I talked about my month so far and what I’d done. She concluded that I haven’t had nearly enough to drink. I was inclined to agree with her, but the tone of her voice suggested that all that would change by the end of the night so I just nervously chuckled and silently crossed myself. I am not a religious man.

Inside, the drinks hadn’t appeared yet and I began to wonder where the hell our food was. Stacy quickly took a dislike to the waitress. I can’t say that I blame her as our waitress was not exactly what I’d call “efficient” but she seemed nice enough. I tend to feel bad for being mean or disliking people who haven’t actually stabbed me in the face with a fork, but once the stabbing happens I’m quick to mention it or be stingy with the tip.

That’s my form of revenge. Did you just stab me? In the face? Well, shit, I’m only giving you 5%, then!

Alison decided that Stacy’s bangs were a bit too long and needed to be trimmed, so they went off into the ladies room to trim her hair. This seemed completely normal to me at the time but when I went back and read my notes today to write this up it seems extremely strange. I guess it’s up to you, the reader, to judge for yourself. Maybe the lesson here is that girls take care of each other and guys would tell each other to fuck off?

My notes on this night are spotty, so bear with me.

We eventually got our food and drinks well after we ordered them. My guess is maybe an hour after we showed up. Alison’s friend Megan showed up and now I’m seated at a table with three attractive women. The rest of the bar is clearly envious. They show this envy by completely ignoring us.

We eat our food and somehow the conversation comes around to where I’m from and it turns out that Stacy knows a bunch of people I went to High School with. I only vaguely remember some of the names she throws out because that was over 10 years ago and I never really cared much for High School. When she picks up the phone to call someone I recognized to tell them that she’s at dinner with me, I excuse myself and hide in the restroom for however long I think it’ll take for them to get sick of waiting for me and hang up the phone.

While in the bathroom I send a message to James, which says something to the effect of “One of the girls here knows people I went to High School with. AWESOME.”

To which he replies in three messages, in rapid succession:

“Ha”

“Haha”

“Hahahaha”

Thanks, James. I knew I could count on you for support.

I head back to the table and the discussion has moved on to ex-boyfriends and who knows what else while I was gone. We are dangerously close to missing the art-thing, which closes in 15 minutes, due to the waitress taking forever. Stacy points out that our waitress is a “Giant bitch” (and other words that I can’t bring myself to type at the moment), occasionally within earshot of said waitress, and after what seems like a fucking DECADE she makes change and we finally get out of there.

Estimated time for three people to eat food that takes roughly ten minutes to make and three drinks (water, margarita, beer): roughly two hours.

Needless to say I won’t be going back there.

We head towards the car and Stacy wants to stop at the convenience store. Megan goes with while I throw stuff in my trunk so that everyone will fit. I spot Stacy doing … something, and we go over to investigate. Turns out she bought a can of whipped cream and is now doing whippets on the street in the fading daylight in the South End of Boston. I’m not really sure how I feel about that, so I wander back to my car because everyone knows that the best answer to something fucked up going on is to ignore it.

I start to laugh to myself because I realize how bizarre the night has already been and it’s not even 9:00 yet.

We zoom off to the art-thing and while in the car Stacy loudly proclaims (unprompted):

“I can’t stand people who don’t drink!”

Alison, Megan, and I burst out laughing because Stacy missed the whole Christian-never-drank-before-a-few-days-ago thing. We explain it to her and she is floored that I’ve never had a drink ever before a week or so ago. She says that I’m not that bad and she takes back what she said.

The art-thing is much more interesting that the Seattle artwalk, but we walk in about three minutes before it’s slated to close. We managed to only catch a few galleries before everyone shuts their doors. Stacy suggests that we go to Megan’s house so we head back to the car and pass by a mutual friend of mine and Alison’s on the way. They just left the art-thing and want to get some food. Alison suggests the place we were just add, but I warn him that it took forever to get food. He replies that he simply wants a drink and will be easily satisfied, so we wish him good luck and part ways.

On the way to Megan’s we stop at a liquor store and I wait outside with Alison while Megan and Stacy go into the store to procure who-knows-what. I half expect Stacy to come outside with some other household item that she’s figured out a way to freebase, but they just have a bag like everyone else and we pile back in the car and head to Megan’s.

Megan apparently lives four houses away from Stacy, who just moved, and neither of them knew this. This resulted in much screaming of joy.

Inside Megan’s house, we plant ourselves on the couches and Megan puts on “I Love You, Man” in the background to keep us entertained.

Alison pours me a pretty heavy handed Jameson and … something that’s in the fridge. I think it was echinacea green tea or something. It was weird, but I drank it like a good boy.

The girls immediately start talking about things that girls rarely discuss around guys - like what’s involved in giving an adept performance when you’re on bottom, proper techniques for going down on a girl, and so forth. I had about three of Alison’s heavy-on-the-Jameson magic tea drinks, so I forgot most of the topics. It was fascinating. I should have taken notes. At the very least I would have left the house a more informed lover.

The movie ended and we all got up to part ways. The night was still fairly young so Alison and I decided to walk back to her place which was about 10 minutes away from Megan’s. I left my car at Megan’s because I was, at this point, extremely tipsy. We strolled through the city and I enjoyed the various sights and people we passed while we chatted about relationships, Alison’s crazy friends, people we knew, and all sorts of other things.

We stop at a bar on the way to her house and having to scale the three steps seems like a major feat. I feel like everyone turns to look at me as I walk in and conclude that I’m drunk. I don’t know if drunk is the word, because I think “drunk” means “ready to throw up” and/or “complete loss of motor skills”. I’m not quite there yet but I definitely feel dizzy and walking takes considerable effort.

My eyelids feel heavy and as I slide onto the barstool I try to compose myself to look casual. The bartender asks me what I want, and I order an Old Fashioned. I had decided earlier in the week that I wanted to try an Old Fashioned because it’s arguably the original “cocktail” and it’s more manly than the strawberry and pineapple juice flavored stuff I’ve been drinking and getting a lot of grief over for being too girly. I’m still not sure how killing yourself slowly with rum or whiskey or vodka is “girly”, but there’s apparently some Alcohol Man Code I’m violating here.

The Old Fashioned is about what I imagined. It’s actually quite good, and rather strong. Alison recognizes a friend further down the bar so we move down to talk with him. I can’t recall his name or what he looks like.

I start to feel very intoxicated so do what any smart person does - I get off my barstool and try to find the bathroom. I feel like I’m walking through molasses at some points, and in a vacuum in others. Very bizarre. No headache this time but the feeling of just getting off a boat that was in very rough seas is definitely there. I talk to myself in the bathroom mirror a little bit and while it’s mostly nonsense I seem okay. The other guy in the bathroom looks at me like I’m an idiot.

I make it back to the bar and the bartender announces last call. I finish my drink and I watch him fix his own drink, which has a bunch of thinly sliced cucumbers lining the outside of the glass. I ask him what it is and he says Hendricks Gin, cucumber slices, a few ice cubes and a dash of tonic water. He offers me to try a sip and I comply. It’s actually quite good. The word “Smooth” came instantly to mind. I could taste that it was gin for sure but I didn’t feel like I was hit in the face with a shovel like I do when I taste a sip of whiskey, or the straight Stoli vodka I poured myself a few days before.

I thank the bartender and we head out. Alison states that she wants to get me drunk. She says I don’t even seem tipsy. This is amazing to me as I feel so tipsy that I should be packaged and sold on playground to entertain children.

We stop at yet another bar and I order another Old Fashioned. This one is made poorly and does not taste good at all. Alison orders a shot of something - maybe whiskey? - and only has a small sip before she puts it down and looks at me soberly and says:

“If I drink any more, I’m going to be sick.”

I down the rest of my terrible Old Fashioned and we leave her nearly full whiskey shot on the bar and head off to a convenience store around the corner from her house to buy some stuff to eat.

On the way, I have to help Alison walk a bit. Too much in too short a time, I think. She is slightly miffed that she set out to get me drunk and instead got herself drunk and that I was fine. I definitely wasn’t fine but I could walk unassisted. Although we definitely weren’t walking in a straight line.

At Alison’s house, we made food and talked with her roommate - another friend of mine - and I tried to count the drinks I’d had. Most of them were heavy handed. I wondered what it would equate to in normal drink portions. Seven? The food was needed, but I didn’t feel like I was going to throw up.

At around 3AM I thanked Alison for a lovely evening and left to walk back to my car.

I had no idea where my car was.

I pulled out my phone and looked down at it, as if to blame it for not knowing where my car was. I should have used the GPS in my phone to mark where my car was, or at least got Megan’s address. I knew the vague direction it was in, so I set off in search of my car.

As I wandered around the neighborhood I thought about what took place tonight. Alison’s friends were fun and the experience was definitely entertaining. I had good conversation with the bartender who made me the good Old Fashioned and offered me some of his gin. We talked about my hometown and drinking and various other things. It was a very social evening. Socially, it was a giant success. I learned some of the nuances of women when it comes to relationships and sex and I lost my car. Wandering around Boston at 3AM does a good job of sobering you up. I had eaten and taken a few hours for the drinks to wear off.

It was a bit after 4AM by the time I finally found my car. I was actually kind of surprised that I even found it, but only for a minute. I wonder if I would have done better if I hadn’t been three drinks in when I left it there.

I took the back roads home to avoid construction on the highway and I ended up on the same route that I took one time about six months ago when I got a flat tire. My car has locking wheel bolts so people don’t steal the wheels and after changing the flat in the pouring rain at 5:00 in the morning I somehow managed to lose the key for the locking lugnuts. I didn’t realize it until a few hours later when I woke up and was at home retelling the story to my roommate Jimmy. He immediately insisted that we get in the car and go look for it. I drove back to where I got the flat and we walked up and down the road for several hours trying to retrace my route and look for the lock. We never found it.

Now I was driving down this same road and I had this sudden feeling of what friendship was. That day reaffirmed my belief that what really matters in life are our friends. Those who will walk up and down the busy roads with us looking for a tiny piece of metal and not complain about it or even think twice. The people for whom we would lay down in traffic.

Do right by them and the rest will take care of itself. Screw them over and things will get messy and complicated. If you wonder why you’re unfulfilled, take a look at your life and select the friends you have that will selflessly sacrifice themselves for you. If you have wronged them perhaps you should correct that. These are the people that matter. They’re the reason I keep going forward when shit goes south.

If there’s anything that this experiment has taught me it’s that my friends continue to surprise me. Sure, some of them want me to throw up all over the place so they can laugh, but most of them want to see me succeed in whatever I set out to do. Whether that’s never drink a thing, drink for 30 days, or become an avid whiskey lover until my dying days. True friends just want you to be happy and they love to facilitate that. I’m thankful to have a lot of those friends around the world. Otherwise I’d just be a guy sitting in an empty house drinking by myself for 30 days, and what’s the fun in that?