Inspired by Roger Miller’s Chug-a-Lug.

*

No, only one is for me. The one on the left. The other is for Rebecca.

It’s five o’clock.

No Chug-a-Lug. No hi-de-ho.

My tummy will burn, but that’s our bean soup for lunch.

These stories are about my 19-year-old self in 1968.

I’ll bet you remember 19.

So you know they won’t be pretty.

But they will explain why my Gin and Tonic is small, ice-full, and the only one.

Screwdriver in a seedy apartment

It was an early summer Friday night. Jerry picked me up. We had just finished our first year of college. He worked at a gas station, and I managed the snack bar at the country club.

Jerry was an experienced drinker. I was still a virgin.

The party was in a second-floor apartment in a rundown house a few blocks north of Sacred Heart Cathedral and School, where I had been an altar boy and attended grade school.

We walked up rickety outdoor steps, through a half-opened door, and into a dimly lit living room with a couch and a few chairs. Jerry went into the kitchen to put his illegal six-pack into the refrigerator. Three people were standing around: two men and a woman. I didn’t know them, and they seemed older.

Sitting on the kitchen counter was a glass pitcher full of what looked like orange juice, surrounded by paper picnic cups.

“Try a screwdriver,” said Jerry, “vodka and orange juice.”

I don’t remember how many I had, but my head spun. And my tongue loosened for slurred words.

Jerry helped me down the steps and dropped me off at home.

Where I walked up the 21 front yard steps I shoveled in the winter and through the front door.

I never used the front door. No one in our family of five ever did except for guests.

Who now filled the living, dining, and family room, sitting around card tables my mom had borrowed for my parents’ Friday night Bridge Duplicate.

I offered three hellos, and Crab walked the 13 steps to my bedroom, which I shared with my brother Peter.

As soon as my head hit the pillow, the nausea hit.

The following day, I felt like I wanted to die. My head throbbed. But the snack bar couldn’t run itself. Before I opened, I went to see Ronnie, the bartender. He looked at me and said, “You need a bloody Mary.”

One Beer and a broken table

Later that summer, on August 28, 1968, Screwdriver Jerry picked me up again for a party at my other friend Jerry’s house. Why do I remember the date?

It’s the Thursday night of the Democratic Party’s Presidential Convention in Chicago — the night of the clash between the Chicago police and those demonstrating against, well, almost everything going wrong in America.

The two Jerry’s, me and, I think, host Jerry’s sister, were in the basement watching all of this on TV. Jerry’s dad would occasionally come down the basement steps to rail against the kids on the street. But he didn’t mind the beers we were drinking.

The one I had was too many.

My two Jerry friends were rooting for the Chicago police. So, I stood up too fast to make a counter-point. And fell over and broke Jerry’s mom’s new end table.

On the way home, Screwdriver Jerry, always with my best interest in mind, dropped me off in front of Sharon’s house. Sharon was my first girlfriend, with whom I had broken up the summer before.

A couple of days later, Jerry would tell me I peed on her front lawn.

Three beers and Gina at Danceland

Thankfully, for you and me, this 3rd story is short.

In the fall of 1968, my college sponsored dances every Friday night at Danceland. Usually, I would go with a few friends.

On this Friday, Mike went along.

Danceland served cheap beer in plastic cups. Before too long, I downed three.

Chug-a-lugs.

Gina was pretty and sitting by herself.

My defenses down and courage up, I went over and asked if I could join her.

We talked for a while; I leaned over and kissed her lightly out of nowhere.

And she kissed me back.

That’s all.

*

Three days later, during a pool game, while we were cutting class, Mike said to me:

You know Gina is the girlfriend of the star forward on the basketball team.

And then he said something only a true friend would say.

Paul, you’re an idiot when you drink.

A message this self-respecting 19-year-old needed only to hear once.

Hi-de-ho.