Take It From Me: You're Not Getting That Forty

Freshman orientation was when my mom lost her phone for a week, swearing she had left it in her shoe, and then eventually found it in a half-full peanut butter jar.

But that wasn’t really at orientation, because my mom wasn’t with me at orientation. She was at the hotel looking for her phone. The point is, orientation is both excruciatingly painful and hilariously painful. Pain and hilarity often go hand in hand. Meaning they show up at parties together with one bottle of wine and jointly sign birthday cards? No. If you’ve ever broken a bone and been screaming in pain in the back seat while your mom misses the exit for the hospital, the tears only make it funnier.

But it’s subtler during orientation week.

Now if you’re like me, and you always think partying looks more fun than it is, don’t worry if you’d rather stay home and watch the television in your teletubbie jammies and tweety bird slippers, like I did.
The night will start out with you jus’ chillin with some kids on your hall (“Yeah they’re kind of freaks but I’ll find cooler people soon,” you might say. Hint: You won’t. These are, and always will be, your best buds, so don’t be a dick). Then you’ll meet up with some other kids who you all don’t really know but kinda sorta went to high school near each other and exchanged numbers earlier on your cell phones that my mom will probably steal from you and misplace. You’ll join up in a big rowdy group of largely sober, pretending-to-be-happy-and-friends-with-each-other strangers and realize that some scary kid in the back of the cluster has a forty in his hand and a spare in his pants. Then everyone will try to get the kid to give them the forty by acting all buddy-buddy with him (“Yo! Alexander! Can I bum that forty? Is your name not Alexander?”). You’re not getting that forty. He’ll drink both of those plus the one hidden under each armpit and then throw up on the sofa and some hot chick at Psi U.

The moral of the story is, don’t go to orientation. And if you do, don’t leave your dorm room. And if you do, don’t leave your hall. And if you do, make sure you have forties hidden in your pants. And hey, while you’re down there, can you check if my mom’s phone is in your peanut butter?