A Rite of Passage

He's a short, Mexican man in a gimme hat sitting the end of the bar in The Buffet on Ninth Street.

He said it's his second home.

I had to take a rain check, because I was already a long way down the road.

It was Thursday night, July 3.

My twenty-first birthday.

Turning 21 in a college town is like getting out of jail. I imagine. Finally, I am free to go out in public and do those things that only the privileged few have seen. Wow, nothing like being totally juvenile in place more populated than my living room.

Carl, Steph and I were at The Buffet at 11:30 p.m., for a rite of passage. A rite of Carl's people. Something called a Buffalo Sweat. I've heard this drink described with several different ingredients, but the key, the kicker is the liquid contents of the bar rag wrung into the glass. Every other person I know advised me against the endeavor, but I was doing this for the sake of journalism, and in case you missed it, it was 11:30 p.m. on the night I turned 21. I wasn't in a position to resist much.

I was saved, however. Or rather the rite was waived, because of what happened at The Buffet.

What happened was I drank more.

See, this hole in the wall - just a pool table and a juke box and Coors on tap - has about the best birthday deal on the planet.

As a new 21-year-old, I was given one free shot and half a yard, or about 48 ounces, of beer. Coors.

After the shot I was on the ropes. Wobbling, but like Ali, I stayed in the ring. I wanted some more punishment. I would not go down.

You take the beer from a glass that looks an awful lot like the doomsday machine from the old Star Trek. It's open like a funnel at one end, then thins before widening into a bulb at the bottom. It took me a few minutes, but I did it, and I did not fall d own.

I guess I'd been drinking for about 12 hours.

Started with an early lunch beer at Gentle Ben's.

Then at quitting time, 5 p.m., it was back to Ben's to begin in earnest.

Being at GB's was like being in my apartment. The same people, the same lewd conversation, the same cigarette bumming. Rob and Mark and Susan. We went through a couple of pitchers before we realized it was happy hour and cheaper to buy pints. We had hot w ings. This proved to be an important decision - and a bad one.

Then a brief respite to shower and eat a little birthday cake. The birthday cake was another bad decision. The day was something like a triathlon - except all the events were the same, but each one took just a little longer.

We were off to Third Stone at 9:30 p.m., then to Maloney's.

This was something I've never seen before.

"They're all here for the same reason you are," Carl said. Girls, that is.

John Brown, of Police Beat fame, bought me a beer. Then I had a bourbon and coke.

And at Third Stone, I had a Kamikaze and a shooter that tasted like a gin Creamsicle.

I had a little of everything.

Now, back to Maloney's.

"There were definitely some hot girls there," Mark said. He's got a fiance. But it was crowded and there was no place to sit. There's were too many guys in Tommy Hilfiger outfits. They did play some of my favorite hits from the 80's. I think.

And I did see a lot of women. I didn't talk to any of them. I'm not sure what one is supposed to say in a bar to a woman. Or in class. Or anywhere else for that matter.

Next to The Buffet and then to Club Congress and 80s night.

At Congress, they actually had to keep track of how many people were inside. Patrons were released into the club like sugar into a supersaturated solution. Too much and the particles fall out of suspension.

I had a Zima and a gin and tonic.

Here my memory is hazy. I danced to "Whip It" and that song that goes "I might like you better if we slept together." I successfully used the restroom, but I couldn't really see my feet anymore. I made some people huddle up and do the rallying cry of my s ister's high school, Seton Catholic, in Chandler. It was the spirit of the moment.

"Elizabeth Ann Seton, pray for us."

And then the bar closed.

It was July Fourth.

I was sick.

Hot wings and birthday cake and gin and beer and vodka and bourbon and Zima do not a happy stomach make. They all taste the same on the way up.

I imagine you're asking yourself, "Why didn't he have a Tom Collins?"

Well, I'll tell you.

It's because I'm a good son. I told my mom I'd wait to have one with her. And I did. And I didn't much like it. The drink, I mean...I love my mother.

On the Fourth of July, I was Thomas again, lunching with my parents and sister and nothing was very much different.

But that night, having a drink with them, that was the thing. Because it wasn't different. The same conversation would have or could have happened and I don't even remember what it was we talked about. It is when we see those who have seen us pass our mil estones recognize we're another furlong down the road, that we recognize and synthesize.

If you go looking on a weekend, I think you might find me and Armando down at The Buffet. Or maybe I'm there right now.