Today as I checked Facebook for the thirty-eighth time this morning, I noticed my good friend's mom (Sue) wishing a happy birthday to her husband, Jimmy, and it brought back a few memories of my reckless childhood.
Jimmy is the step-father of my close friend, Lyn, and I've known him since I was a kid. Lyn's entire family put up with her and me hanging out in their homes and acting like idiots for many years, and I love them all to this day. But I'll never forget ol' Jimmy's thinly-veiled disappointment with how we were living out our teen years.
One Saturday night, probably when we were about fifteen or sixteen, we were hanging out at Sue and Jimmy's house. Jimmy, most likely hoping we would take our two-girl teenage geek party elsewhere, asked us what our plans were for the evening. We shrugged. We just weren't up for our usual activities of thumbing through Tiger Beat, writing plays about the elderly, or purposefully trying on hideous outfits at our local Marshall's. We just wanted to veg out in the center of their home and watch Nick at Nite (if that was okay with them).
Jimmy had had it. It's not that he minded us being there; he was just crestfallen* with how we were choosing to play out the clock on our youth. He took a deep breath and put his hand to his temple. He wasn't sure how to best express himself, so he just came out with it: "Why don't you guys go out and DO something? I mean, when I was your age we used to go drinkin' in the woods!" Sometimes it's hard to tell if you're a loser. But if your friend's parent is virtually begging you to go out and get drunk like any normal teenage American, you can take that to the bank.
Looking back, I now know what painfully squeaky clean kids we were. We would spend many weekend nights hanging out in the fully furnished basement of Lyn's grandparents' lovely home, watching Daria or analyzing if Chris Cornell was indeed hotter than Eddie Vedder. The kicker of this was twofold: not only did Lyn's grandparents trust us unconditionally and never come downstairs, but there was literally a refrigerator of booze in the basement and it never ONCE occurred to us to sneak any. We would simply reach past the beer and wine coolers and procure an IBC rootbeer or Mountain Dew. Then we would stay up past midnight drinking soda and think ourselves loose cannons with no disregard for the laws of caffeinated beverages.
Bigger parties for our posse consisted of going over to our friend, Ben's, house on a Friday night from 7-11pm and breaking out the cheese curls, soda, and RISK BOARD. If we were feeling extra rebellious, we would take our cool kid party outside to the nearby cul-de-sac and hang. Nary an alcoholic beverage was consumed, and I think it goes without saying that illegal substances were also scarce. Some heated philosophical discussions would break out, though, and I think I also remember a few girls sitting on laps (WILD times). Later in high school, our social activities expanded to youth conferences, walks for charity, and weekend Student Council sleepovers in the school library (because what's more fun than spending an entire Saturday night at your school?)
I thought we were most likely a parent's dream come true, but upon further reflection I can't help but wonder if we let our folks down and Jimmy was the only one man enough to come forward and suggest more appropriate activities for us to pursue. Anyhow, Happy Birthday James Brown (yes, that's his real name). In honor of your day, I plan to put my two children to bed and get rip-roaring drunk in our backyard.
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*thesaurus.com
