New Years. It’s a time when people understand and appreciate the year as a whole. And this is done through massive social gatherings and lots of alcohol. I’ve learned this as I hit my 20’s. It’s just known that this holiday spirit is linked with ending it magnificently. It doesn’t always end up that way, but for some reason this night is always special.

My 2015 transitioning to 2016 New Years was actually quite interesting so I’ll just start off by telling you the quick and funny story.

It all started as I woke up around 3 pm. Yeah, it’s a bad habit, I know. As I woke up, I looked at my phone with eagerness to see how the day was already starting. Once again, this day is just a pretty big day to me, I don’t know why. I enjoy the whole “cleansing” concept of starting a new year. I returned a message from a buddy and 20 minutes later, after I had showered and gotten some apparel on--you really have to look good on this day, that is the key to success ESPECIALLY on this day--he picked me up.

We create ourselves in his basement in which we play an intense amount of Zombies while consuming absurd amounts of sandwich via water pipes, rolling papers, and water pipes. It’s like 5 now and I’m like, “Yo dude, what’s the plan because I wanna go to Chicago.” And he’s all like, “Yeah man, let’s go to Chicago.”

Well that was an easy conversation. We actually both laughed for a really long time.

Just imagine that scene of us laughing and going straight to me and my buddy sitting miserably on a train for an hour and a half, while children are screaming in the background with their parents and a man with a business call that apparently seemed as if his whole job depended on it, needed to solve that in this very moment as well.

Chicago. Cold. My god, it was so f*cking cold.

We meet up with some friends I have from Minnesota. These friends were actually friends I had made way back when I was in second grade. I moved to the Chicago area when I was 12. It was actually really cool these guys made it out to Chicago. They drove 7 hours.

Anyway, they wanna go to a club or a bar or something. I don’t know. It was weird. So we go and everywhere we go, the entry fee is 50 dollars. And the Minnesota guys don’t want to pay that much without knowing what their getting themselves into. Completely understandable. We end up at a night club called “Graffiti”, cost us 50 each, and it was completely filled with dudes. But they were divided almost into little parties throughout this bullsh*t night club. And no one seemed as if they were confident enough to intermingle. There was a table with the world’s sh*ttiest food, honestly, like I don’t even understand why they even put the food out because it was god awful. They, at this point have already taken 50 dollars from me, why do they need to add salt to the wound with 45 cent macaroni and like four pigs in a blanket. The best part wasn’t even the miniscule choice, it was the fact that they had a whole bin full of uncooked broccoli. It was just cold broccoli. Unreal. My Minnesota friend texted me asking how it was. I responded, “It’s lit”. They end up coming up. We stay for 5 more minutes. One of them pays 100 dollars for 6 shots of watered down Patron. We leave, thereafter.

We catch wind of the giant star rise that is happening in Chicago. I feel stupid because I am thinking about how that wasted money could have went to a New Year’s show. Skrillex was playing on tonight. F*ck.

There are literally thousands of people crowded together. I have no space between random strangers ranging from children all the way to people who looked to be in their 80’s. I pull out a pre rolled sandwich. As the countdown begins, me and my buddy light up the sandwich and pass it to each other. A person standing next to me asks for a bite, and low and behold, it’s a person I’ve met back at the University of Iowa. Crazy. He takes a bit and then we finish and start the year cheering as fireworks explode. So much beauty. So much color.

We walk away from the crowds of people. We get lost. I actually got lost and created a domino effect in which the rest of my group gets lost. I end up with the buddy I started the night with. We walk and as we do, a group of girls approaches us. Two break away and tap me on the shoulder. They are cute. One of them is blonde, the other brunette. She asks me if I have a cigarette. I pull two out and ask her if I do. She reaches for them and I pull my hand back. I then begin to shout quite loudly. “IF YOU WANT THESE CIGARETTES, YOU GOTTA EARN THEM!” I sh*t you not. And the blonde chick really did, she lunged. A lot. And jumped onto me. As we are walking down the streets of downtown Chicago. People are filming through their phones so I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a video of me screaming at these girls to earn these cigarettes like a drill sergeant. It was hilarious. They chased me for like a full block. They begin to talk about their boobs, but I decide to take a right at the street and they continue walking. As we depart from each other, one of them grabs my face. She blows a kiss at me. Another one calls me Ling Ling, I retaliate and say, “It’s the 21st century, c’mon now. My name’s Sam.”

We’re now in an Uber Pool heading to another friend’s place, who happens to live in Logan Square. The pool is with two other people; a couple. The wife is a pretty blonde chick and she sits up front while the man joins me and my buddy. He’s 32 and she’s 27. I get to know them quite well for some reason. Maybe it’s the alcohol and sandwich I’ve consumed. He tells me he is a software engineer. I tell him I’m a writer and that I like writing fiction. This creates a spark because he then tells me about a website he has created. Everythingsbinding.com. He says that it’s an interactive story telling machine and that it was on its early stages. We really did connect. As the Uber arrives at our destination, he says, “Hey man, I live down the street. I have some pretty good sandwich, if you guys wanna eat some.” I respond with a “f*ck yeah, as long as you aren’t the cops.” And then he hits me with a, “F*ck no, I’m just going to bring my wife to bed then.”

10 sandwiches later, everyone is slumped on the couch as really good jazz plays in the background.

What a special night, I think to myself.

It always is.