[MF] Drinkin’ Thang
I’m on the floor, slumped over in a tiny bathroom in Tokyo. I lower my head into the bowl, lemony, tart bile rocketing from my mouth into the water. My head weighs a ton, its all cloudy. I’m holding onto the toilet but I’m almost positive I might just fall right through it, through the floor, into the earth, into the abyss. My back is slick with sweat, and I can feel my limbs shake as I heave. Are my eyes open? Am I not paying attention? I need to pay attention. I’m alone, no one to check on me, make sure I make it out of this little room. And I spent a lot of money on this shirt, and I’ll be damned if I puke on it. My stomach churns as it releases more Strong Zero, the delicious deceiver of the Suntory company, a delightful citrus drink that hits like a truck. After a few stops and starts, broken up by shaky breaths, I dry heave a final string of ick out before falling back, releasing the bowl and leaning back against the wall, vision doubled yet unfocused. As my eyes hone in, head lolling, focusing again over the course of seconds (Minutes? Hours?) I can see I’m not in my cheap hostel anymore.
I’m back in Athens, Bulldog country. Gently lit, beige walls and clean tile floors are replaced by a dirty, dim bathroom, walls plastered with old newspaper clips, band posters, graffitied signatures and phrases of varying paints and markers, floors coated in grime and dirt. The once tiny, pristine toilet is larger, grimier, now bidet-less. I stand up, taking a few moments as I rise to my feet shakily, rocking and back forth before stumbling to the sink. I can still smell the vomit, a vile constant in a sea of variables. I turn on the sink, warm water weakly pulsating down as I pump a scum-covered soap bottle, pink goo falling into my clammy open palm that somehow feels like it makes my hands dirtier. I look up into the mirror as I scrub my hands together beneath the water. Like every other time, I can recognize myself. Blue eyes, bloodshot and carrying dark circles, dirty blonde hair, red cheeks and beads of sweat on my forehead and cheeks. This time I’m in a gray hoodie with a stylized ‘G’ on it, my favorite hoodie, paired with ratty sneakers and blue jeans. But I don’t recognize myself, don’t know who I really am. All the facts are there in my head; where I am, what I drank, who I came in with…but they’re like distant concepts connected by a thin string.
I had walked into the only gay bar in town with my friends, slamming back vodka cranberries that were too strong and sharing American Spirits with each other and the occasional most beautiful person we’d ever seen, passing the light blue cigarette pack back and forth like none of us wanted to take claim of who was passing out the cancer. I close my eyes, the distant sound of ‘Valerie’ wrapping around me, Amy Winehouse carrying me.. It was an at-home victory, and tonight the streets were filled with life and laughter. I turn off the sink, rubbing my hands dry on my jeans as I walk out the bathroom, passing the line of waiting drunks. Up the stairs, past the ping pong table that is surrounded but unused, out into the back full of open patios and strung up lights. I see my friends, pull out a bent cigarette, and light it with a cheap Bic lighter. Inhale, rub my eyes, and the scene has changed again.
I’m in Boston, and it’s cold. The cigarette between my lips is a lifeline, each drag filling my body and lungs with warmth, fighting against the chill. I enjoy the subtle hum of life coursing through the city, carried by cold winds that ground me through the buzz. After a few minutes, I cough into my fist, snuffing the blazing butt of the cig into an ashtray on a patio table, heading back inside to the warmth. The three of us had just landed in town this morning, but we had missed each other's company, and despite a packed day of plans coming up we had fallen into this night of exploring the town, specifically curious about this little bar along a busy street. Fraternity, patriotism, and wonder enraptured us as we emptied Sam Adams into ourselves, hyping up one another for the inevitable shot none of us wanted but knew we’d take together. We approach the bar, asking the bartender to bring down the ski with shot glass-shaped holes filling it. She pours vodka into the shot glasses, placing them into the carved out holes as we each take a hold of the board, shakily bringing it up as we try to bring it to our lips in one motion. Somehow, we all successfully take the shot, and we drop the ski back to the bartop as the bartender and some locals clap for us, our buffoonery their little moment of amusement to prove the booze and the money is worth it. We close our tabs and walk outside, back into the chill, and I see a bus roll past us, the double-decker’s engine loud as it pulls the hefty tour bus and equally hefty tourists along the road. As the bus drives by, it takes the town with it, reality tearing as the brickwork and modern architecture shifts and warps, the road widening, stretching, the signs along the road becoming ineligible, their letters and words flowing into something I can’t read. Hungarian.
The streets of Budapest are busy, and traffic flows to my left as headlights and taillights stream by. Bone marrow and pálinka attempt to mingle with cheap beer, but the class difference seems too strong. A revolution is coming. It doesn’t matter, the dry summer has taught us to love the swill of Soproni and Gösser. Endless streets criss-cross around, Soviet brutalism, modern minimalism, and medieval stonework all butting heads between each building, each plaza. One building is chic, so stylish it almost cuts the eye once you gaze upon it, yet the building across the street is ancient, somber, carefully carved figures holding up meticulously chiseled and detailed stone. A dog dips between and around my legs as I admire the skyline, trying to herd me down the sidewalk along with my compatriots. She can tell I’m lagging behind the flock and bred nature commands her to guide me back while mischievous thoughts tempt her to trip me or direct me towards the road. Our group’s formal wear seems almost ridiculous when just a few days ago we were on our knees in pits, covered in dirt and sand as we painstakingly scraped and cut away, looking for the past, for history. I look at the grit beneath my nails, and when I look back up I’m in Mississippi.
We were at the shitty hotel in Greenwood, a community that had been drowning in poverty and the blues for so long, you could see it in the faces of every local we drove by. Long, hot days of trekking through dark wetlands, taking turns digging deep shovel tests that were inevitably full of thick roots and the occasional piece of pottery or lithic flake, our prize. When we finally piled back in the trucks and drove home, dehydrated and tanned, we’d throw ourselves into the unimpressive pool with a little grime at the bottom, chilling the ache in our muscles with the aid of cheap beer. It didn’t take much to feel the buzz. Maybe just a sip to wake up.
Just a sip. I’m floating in the lake, holding the Natural Light can to my lips, my dad next to me waiting to see my reaction. Just a sip he tells me. I think he hopes I like it. I don’t. The taste is metallic, bitter, almost acrid on my 11-year old tongue. I make a face as my dad and the rest of the family laughs, and he acts shocked that I don’t like it. Maybe he wasn’t acting. I just know that I want a Mountain Dew, not able to fathom how my dad, barrel chested and sure, can tear through so many in one day on the pontoon. Before I climb back up, I dip my head in the water, sticking out my tongue to let the dark lake water take a swing at getting rid of that awful aftertaste. When my head lifts from the water, all that remains of the moment is the feeling of weightlessness. No more light reflecting off a shimmering surface, no more boat rocking from small waves, no more family. Just a dark room, dim pink lights illuminating hundreds of tiny pieces of paper along the walls, the ceiling, all bearing hand drawn pictures of Abraham Lincoln.
I’m at a bar in Savannah, the last stop of a ghost tour along Georgia’s most haunted city. It’s a bachelorette trip, and I have been chosen to be the sole ‘bridesman’, an honor and a curse. To be there for my best friend, to be considered so close as to be a part of their wedding party, to be able to spend a fun week with my friends in a beautiful city, it’s my pleasure. The constant reminder I stand out, that I am different and not like them, that I did not get the privilege of being born beautiful, that I am tall and broad and stuck, that I won’t, can’t understand certain things, it hurts. But we must have fun. And in the name of fun, we are drawing our own silly, god awful versions of Abe to add to the gimmicky walls of the dive bar while downing cheap spirits.
Dionysus lifts his cup in the corner, and a cheer erupts. I bump shoulders with the broken, the wise. I’m so lonely and so warm.