Drugs make you drunk

This morning I happily watched my students converse with each other after two weeks apart on vacation. They were actually adorable, and like tiny adults-- There was happy chatter and banter amongst them. You could see that they were genuinely happy to be back in school together. Hearing bits and pieces of conversation I overheard Jason say to Sam... " ya know drugs make you drunk." Hmm? While Jason may have had his facts slightly confused, my mind began to wander back to my college days. After all, today is 4/20, an actual holiday celebrated on college campuses across the nation. If not for Jason's comment about drugs, I probably would not have even realized the date...but, there I was... lost in thought...thinking about life in a simpler time. A time when waking up at one pm on a Tuesday was perfectly acceptable and I would survive for weeks at a time with nothing but a mini fridge and a bag of tostitos...ahh yes, those were the days...and in those days brings about a story that has come to be mildly infamous amongst my friends, and I'd like to share this story with all of you. Allow me to set the stage...

(Galzbabi--this one goes out to you). It was the fall of 2002, my freshman year of college. I had adjusted quickly to college life and loved my freshman year floor. Despite sharing a hallway with a boy named "TANK,"(who would often shit on our floor), and sharing a room with a 300 pound African American woman who shouted racial slurs at me when I walked through the door--I felt oddly right at home. I think part of the reason for my quick adjustment to college life was due in part to the two boys that I met who lived right down the hall from me. Enter: Matt and Greg. (Mo+Ktkiwi--you guys too). But, Matt and Greg were sophomores. They took me under their wing as a young, impressionable freshman girl. I felt so cool when I hung out with them. (In hindsight, I think they enjoyed arriving to parties with eight drunk and moderately slutty freshman girls.) I was an appendage at their cool sophomore parties. Matt even had a car on campus--jackpot! Matt used to play the guitar in his boxer briefs, and I would swoon. That was pretty much Matt's standard outfit: Underwear and a guitar. Greg used to sit in front of his computer, giggling for hours on end. The two of them made a great pair, and it was friendship (and love) at first sight. It was destiny. Of course, I had communicated all of this to my mom. Naturally, she could not wait to meet the boys who she was convinced that I would marry. (That's right--both of them).

My parents, older brother and younger sister came to visit me at my first Parents Visiting Weekend. (The kind of thing that is completely reserved for the parents of freshman, but my parents would continue to come on this weekend every year for the next four). Upon my family's arrival into my dorm room, my mom started wandering down the hall-- eager to meet Matt and Greg. I called their room. (That's right, I had a room phone, and a list taped to my wall of every one's four digit campus phone number). Love ya 2002! The boys answered the phone and came right over.

My mom was overjoyed to meet the boys who had made her little girl feel so safe and welcome at this big school. After a lovely conversation, Matt and Greg politely said their goodbyes and began to walk out the door to go back to their room. That's... when... it... happened. The frantic mother's plea heard 'round the world. Almost as in slow motion, my mom lunged out my door...only to frantically shout these horrifying seven words at my new friends, " Thank you for being friends with Lauren." Mortified and shocked...hey--I think I'm pretty likeable, I could hear Matt and Greg dissolve into laughter. My mom tried to take back her words, tried to explain that she was just grateful that I had made such wonderful friends, not that she was grateful that I had actually made friends. Do you see the difference? Yeah, I didn't think so.