This is a story of one of the funniest things that has ever happened to me.
It was the first time I went up to Ann Arbor to visit my brother.
He started attending the University of Michigan while I was in Ithaca.
It was always my favorite time of year in college when I got to take the pilgrimage up to Ann Arbor.
We would get fucking crazy, see a football game, and get fucking crazier.
By the end of college, it had become much more than just getting wasted,
I had created good relationships with many of his friends, which still exist today.
Anyways, I was eighteen when this story occurred.
Skinny black jeans, oversized t-shirts with pin-up girls on them,
piercings, a couple of terrible tattoos, and about fifteen pounds of hair on my head.
I was such a shit-head back then… I am a shit-head now.
I had just arrived in Ann Arbor for the first time and that night we hit it hard.
I don't remember what they drank as their “cheap beer” but Rolling Rock keeps coming to mind, so I will continue because it is completely irrelevant.
The night progressed and we set a course for the following day, GAME DAY.
We would start at a party in the backyard of a frat house,
continue up the row, then two more houses, and then make our way to the Big House.
A few more rounds of Fifa and we passed out.
The next thing I remember is my brother’s roommate, who at this point I do not know, in his briefs, tossing full beers at my brother and me, as all three of us proceed to shotgun a cold one in our briefs in the living room of his house.
Then another, and probably another, now we were ready to go.
We leave the house, now upwards of six of us in the group, heading to this first backyard party.
As we approach the backyard, my brother tells me, “you know Jake”, and I ask, “I do?”
and he nodded his head and repeated, “you know Jake”.
I presumed he was just drunk as fuck, but as we get to the entrance of the backyard a six-foot-four blonde dude asked me, “who do you know here?”
I replied, “I know Jake” and he said, “cool”, directing me through the gate and into the party. That was the first of many times we would use that trick to get into random parties. Eventually, you were bound to guess a correct name.
I take a look around and this party is the craziest thing I had seen up to that point.
Dj on the roof, people jumping off tables, guys in tank tops, and girls in booty shorts and it could not have been more than forty degrees. It was a fucking riot.
I crushed the beer that I had come in with, and I turn to my brother to tell him
that I was going to run to take a piss in the alley but I would be right back.
As I left the group, I am totally lost, swarmed, but I was never concerned,
it was just a new situation for me.
Then, I look right in front of me and there is a girl saying something that I had
not caught the first time.
I yelled, “WHAT?”
and she replied, “YOUR TATTOOS ARE AWESOME!”
and I yelled back, “AWESOME?”
and she shook her head and screamed back very clearly, “NO, AWFUL!”
That, to this day, may very well be one of the funniest experiences of my life.
The balls someone must have to be five feet tall, under a hundred pounds,
and be shitting all over people.
I could tell she hadn't been to the big city yet, cause if she talked like that
in real life, she wouldn't have any more teeth, but in this setting, it was
particularly humorous.
I went and pissed a swastika into the side of someone’s fence, my go-to move,
and when I returned, my brother and all his friends were huddled all together
so I walked back to them and told them what just happened.
To my surprise, they were the ones who were upset by it, asking me if I “did”
something after that. What would I do exactly? grab a hand full of her hair and just start dragging her around? haha, I am not trying to get jumped by a hundred frat bros.
Plus, we had much more drinking to do and a football game to get to.
The only thing, besides the story, that sticks with me today, is sometimes I
wonder what happened to that chick. I have three countering thoughts and I think they are all reasonable guesses.
First, I can easily assume that she is always that aggressive, in which case, I picture her fist-fighting her current boyfriend somewhere in Northern Michigan, and then the boyfriend takes her head and throws it into the wall, right under where she hangs her college diploma.
Or, I can just as easily see her dead, because maybe, even later that day, she said that exact same thing to someone who doesn't find it charming to be a small white girl. I know townies, let's just say, they aren't thrilled to be abused all year by college kids.
My final assumption, again, totally possible, is just that she's a dyke. Nothing crazy, just see’s dudes and says, “fuck that”. I graduated from CU Boulder and I now know the type.
Wherever she is, I thank her for providing an amusing memory for me.
It's bitter-sweet when I think about this story, bitter- because she is obviously a cunt, but sweet- because she has solidified yet another reason why I will always love that time in my life.
I love you, brother
I love you, Ann Arbor
