If you've looked at any typical college student's Tinder account, it will usually have something about "enjoying going out", or "going downtown", or something similar to that. The typical, average, everyday, college student practices, often religiously, the art of “going out”— which is college speak for getting-drunk-and-grinding-to-a-techno-beat-in-a-dingy-“club”-until-3am.
I’m not a typical college student. I’ve never been a typical anything. Well maybe a typical white person; but developmentally, I’ve never been typical. I’ve always matured on a separate plane than the rest of my peers. Sometimes our planes would meet, and it would be a grand ol’ time; but for the most part, I’ve been steering this private jet (a plane joke, just laugh) in open airspace.
This past Tuesday I reached an important milestone in the life of a “typical” college student. I turned 21. In case you’re, I don’t know, a rock-dwelling person, 21 is the age in the United States that it’s legal for a person to consume alcohol. 21 is not the age that most people do this for the first time, but it’s the first time anyone can publicly acknowledge such acts without fear of legal consequences.
The entirety of Tuesday, people were constantly telling me to take shots, down beers, and drink entire bottles of wine. People asked me why I even came to class; why I wasn’t currently at a bar. “Because it’s 10:30am on a Tuesday, and I’ve got shit to do, that’s why Hank." (Hank is not a real person. All names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this article are fictitious. No identification with actual persons, places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred. No animals were harmed in the making of this article.)
One of the biggest gaps between my plane of development, and that of a typical college student’s is in the "going out" department. I have never felt the desire to "go out" and get drunk and wake up with a hangover, only to do it again the following weekend. I have a deep appreciation for my peers who do; I’m not here to judge their lives, I just don’t find it appealing.
Which is why these interactions Tuesday were particularly frustrating for me. What do you say to someone who insists that you take a shot in front of them while you’re trying to listen to a lecture? (This person was joking by the way.)
But really how do you explain that even though you can now legally go to bars and clubs, you’re not comfortable doing that? Going out and “living” has become such a part of the “college-experience” that when someone comes forward going against the grain, the world might as well be ending. Once again, I must emphasize that I hold absolutely no judgments against my peers who do this. I do get how these things are a part of the experience.
Never again in life will someone be as physically resilient as they are when they’re in their 20's. So use this time now and “have fun.” I get that, I do. My peers will have crazy stories to tell at reunions, and they’ll look back on this time and smile and laugh at how stupid they were. I know that’s a part of the experience of life.
It’s just not one I particularly find enjoyable. That’s not to say that I won’t go out in the future, nor will I hate every bit of it. Honestly, I want to be surprised by how much fun it is. I just don’t want to be asked the second I turn 21 why I’m not heading on the fast track towards alcohol poisoning.
Also, side-note: I wrote this while sipping on some moscato, so I will still enjoy my alcohol I’ll just be doing it on my own terms, thank you very much… Hank.
