Below is a slightly condensed version of what I read that night. For those of you who did not participate in my twenty first birthday celebration oh so many years ago, here is what you missed. For those of you who did participate, please feel free to set the record straight. My memory on the subject is a little hazy. And for those of you who have read "Wild" by Chery Strayed, well, I wish this story was anything like that.
Walking Twenty One
A Heroic Coming of Age Walking Journey Into Adulthood
Man has always walked.
Putting one foot in front of the other has always been our primary means
of transportation. We celebrate and
memorialize in video and pictures when our children take their first
steps. In ancient times, we had no
choice. There were no cars, no CTA, no
bicycles, no scooters, none of those shoes with the wheels in the heels. To get from one place to another, we
walked. To this day, we still walk,
although most of us do it less than ever before.
I myself have been a walker. My grade school was not far enough away for a
bus, but too close for my mother to drive me.
My high school was the same story.
Often I would just go for walks because, hey, what else did I have to
do. When I moved into the city for
college we walked everywhere all the time.
We’d walk the lakefront path because we were close. We’d walk from Lincoln Park to downtown
because we could. We’d walk up to Wrigley field because we were
cheap. Every once in a while a walk
could turn epic. One lakefront walk on a
warm February day produced the iconic picture from my time in college: six of
us freshman staring through a six foot high melting pile of snow on the beach,
wearing shorts and t-shirts. Where we
went we walked.
Speaking of college, I was one of the last among my
college friends to turn twenty-one, and for months I masqueraded as Kyle S.
Bright, using a terrible, expired fake ID that looked like me only in that we
were both males. It worked at only the
lowliest of the Lincoln Park dives, places where the bouncers were our
classmates, never mind that I could never remember Kyle’s social security
number or address. I wanted to use my
own ID, my own face, my own name, to get into a bar. I
wanted to be Mike Smolarek: twenty one year old party guy.
 |
| Mmm, Baywatch |
Finally, my twenty-first birthday arrived. Sadly, so did the mid-term from my
Multivariable Calculus class. More
sadly, it was a night class. So, at
midnight, the moment I turned twenty-one, I stopped studying, cracked open a
can of Busch Light, better known as the “nectar of the Gods” among my
roommates, and watched the Baywatch girls run in slow motion on the beach for
an hour. So far, this was no different
than many other nights that year. (By
the way, did you ever realize that if they took all of the slow motion montage
scenes from a Baywatch episode and played them at normal speed it would only be
a half-hour show?).
 |
| My high school Calc book |
The day dragged on and the Calculus test seemed to be the
longest test we’d had all year. By the
time I’d finished, the Mike Smolarek twenty first birthday crowd had assembled
and was waiting for me. I put on my nice
jeans, the pair without the holes in the knees and the one nice button-up shirt
I had. I also took all the money out of
my wallet thinking it was my birthday and there was no way I was going to pay
for anything. Then I slipped a twenty
dollar bill back in, just in case.
 |
| It lost a B before it could be found everywhere |
The first place I wanted to go was BW-3, a bar I would later live above, a bar
that has since been renamed Buffalo Wild Wings, is now family friendly and
ubiquitous. Back then it was my favorite
place and it was Wednesday, trivia night, dollar twenty-five twenty three ounce
Rolling Rock night. Sadly, it was also hockey
playoff season and the Chicago Blackhawks were playing and there was a line outside
the bar. I have one rule when it comes
to bars: no bar is worth waiting in line for.
We headed next door to the Gin Mill.
My friends let me lead the way, Dale, Pat, Marty, Kristin and her
brother Ken, Christa and a few others. I
handed my ID to the bouncer. He gave it
the once over, then said “Happy Birthday.
Head to the bar for a shot.”
There were a few shots, a beer or two, normal stuff for someone
turning twenty one. After an hour, I wanted
to smoke a cigar, something you could still do in a bar back them. (You kids out there have no idea what you
missed. Coming home covered in smoke,
the smell clinging to your clothes. You
could almost feel the smoke wash down your body in the shower the next morning.) We crossed Lincoln and Halsted and went to
The Everleigh Club. A cheap cigar, a few
more beers, a couple of shots and we moved on.
I was feeling good. But this is
where things start getting hazy.
 |
| Don't drink these. Ever. Really. |
First of all, I was no longer in charge of this mess. I would
have said agreed to anything. I was a
certified yes man. I was in it for the
long haul. Secondly, the two people who
were most likely to make sure I got home, Kristen and Ken, sweet, rational,
caring Kristen and Ken, had gone home.
Now Dale was calling the shots.
And when we got to the next bar, he called a lot of shots. A whole tray of them, whiskey, I think. Our
numbers had dwindled. Who was going to
drink all of these shots? It turns out
it was me.
That is the last thing I recall without straining my
cerebral cortex. It was around midnight,
although I wasn’t wearing a watch so I couldn’t be sure. We’d been out for just over three
hours. From this point on until much, much
later in the evening, I mean, morning, I cannot accurately gauge the reality or
timing of any events.
During the rest of the night, the following ten things
may or may not have happened.
1)
I attempted to kiss a girl in the bar.
2)
I told Christa something so un-polite she
stopped speaking to me. For a year.
3)
I played basketball in Oz Park.
4)
I ditched Marty, telling him over and over again
I knew where I was going, “One Hundred Percent.”
5)
I was stopped by Chicago Police officers in a
paddy wagon.
6)
I slept on a park bench
7)
I got rained on.
8)
I hooked up with a girl
9)
I yelled at a taxi driver while in the cab
10)
I threw up
Let’s address these one at a time. The ones for which I have confirmation, I
have listed the source.
1)
Kissing the girl at the bar- Yes, I did attempt
this, although I have no recollection of this.
In fact, I was not told this happened by anyone until my twenty second
birthday when Dale, again calling the shots, told me he almost got into a fight with the
guy who was with the girl while apologizing for me.
2)
Christa -I must have said something terrible to
Christa because she didn’t speak to me again until halfway into our senior
year. I have never asked her what I said
and no one else has told me. By now she
must have forgiven me because she is my Facebook friend and people never lie on
Facebook.
3)
Basketball in Oz Park. I woke up with giants scrapes on my forehead
and nose from my game of air basketball in the park. Marty told me the next day about my full
court run towards the basket, my magnificent leap towards the rim, and the
ugly, face first landing as gravity took over from drunken weightlessness. It took him a long time to tell me the story because
he was laughing. A lot.
4)
Ditching Marty – True. After Oz Park I took off south down the red
line tracks, insisting I knew where I was going. Mary tried to keep up with me but
couldn’t. In his defense, he was drunk
too, and well, I was sort of a drunk walking pro.
5)
The Police -
While I cannot prove that I stopped and talked to a paddy wagon, I recall a conversation with Chicago’s finest
where I explained it was my 21st birthday (true), that my friends
ditched me (false) and that I lived in that building right there (false). They told me to get home safe, I walked to
the building, opened the door to the lobby, pretended to open the inside door
with my keys, then, after the paddy wagon pulled away, ran as fast as I could the opposite direction. Again, no actual proof of this exists and all
requests for interviews with the Chicago Police Department were laughed at.
6)
The Park Bench- I recall lying down on a park
bench because I was so tired and my legs.
Not confirmed by an outside, sober source, but most likely true.
7)
The rain - I recall getting up from the park
bench because I felt rain drops and I feared waking up in the park in the
morning with both my wallet and my pants missing. Not sure why I was so worried about someone
stealing my pants. It seemed rational at
the time. this is confirmed because I woke up at home still wearing the wet
clothes.
8)
Hooking up with a girl? Not a chance.
9)
The taxi cab –At some point, after sleeping, or
not, on a park bench and after blocks of blocks of the addresses going up
instead of down among streets names that did not look familiar, my brain
cleared up enough to realize I needed a cab home. A few minutes into the ride, I yelled at the
cabbie because I thought he was going the wrong way. He insisted he was taking me the fastest
way. But I was drunk, and clearly right,
and so damn sure I was right, that I keep yelling at him. Eventually, we got to Fullerton, he pointed
at the street sign and I relented. The
cab fare ended up being about eleven dollars.
That’s 1996 dollars! That’s like
a hundred today. I gave the cabby a twenty,
asked for no change and hung my head in shame as I exited in front of my dorm. It’s a good thing I put that twenty back in
my wallet.
10)
Puking - I did not throw up that night. Not
that night.
The red numbers of my alarm
clock read 4:30 when I fell into bed without changing clothes. I woke up at nine a.m., drank some water,
puked, drank more water, changed into clean, not-wet, non-muddy, non-smoky
clothes, then went back to sleep. I woke
up again at one p.m, puked, showered, and tried to eat. Not only was my head pounding and my stomach
churning but my legs ached. I was sore
like I had gone for a ten mile hike. I
felt unsteady in any position and couldn’t even focus on the TV, so I went back
to sleep until five o’clock. I finally listened
to my messages. Everyone called,
wondering if I had made it home, the first message from Marty at 12:45 a.m.
As I replayed the night back in
my head trying to figure out what happened in those four hours. It turned out I did something that was
habitual for me: I started walking.
Post-drinking walking was not
new to me. Often when we took cabs or
the L to a party, I would walk home instead.
Sometimes I didn’t want to spend the six or eight dollars on cab. Sometimes I left when I was mad and used the
time to cool off. Sometimes I used it as
a way to sober up a little before going home.
Most times I just walked because I liked to walk.
Only this time I was unable to
chart a proper course. I tried to trace
my path but it was before GPS phones so it was impossible. I could only remember certain things. I’m
sure I followed the red line L track south starting at Webster, but who knows
where I went next. I remember hopping a
fence to cross a busy street I now thing was Lake Shore Drive but even looking
at a map, I can pick out the place. The
spot where I talked to the cops seemed nice and had some mid-rises: was that
the near north side. I remember address in the 3100s right after I pulled
myself up from the park bench. I
thought they were north, but, based on the cab ride they had to be west, making
Humboldt Park the only park that would make sense. With these few details, by my best
calculations, I walked at least six miles that night. But I don’t like to think of it as a drunken
stumble. I call it a heroic coming of
age walking journey into adulthood. I
set out on my own, by ditching my friends.
I overcame adversity, being drunk, and I made it home alive with stories
to tell, thanks to help from others, my cab driver.
Which brings me be back to the
beginning. Man was always walking. At some point, homo-sapiens walked out of
Africa, up through Europe, across Asia, into North America before settling here
in Chicago. Moses and his followers wandered the desert
for forty years (clearly, men were in charge and were afraid to ask
directions). Were the drinking? It seems likely.
And who’s to say that back in
ancient Egypt, at the cradle of the Nile, after they learned fermented fruit
made a good drink, one that made you smarter, better looking and more sure of
yourself, there wasn’t a guy out there like me, celebrating his birthday, at
whatever the drinking age was in ancient Egypt, who had one, or ten, too many, uch,
ditched his friends and wandered through the desert for a few hours.
I learned my lesson,
though. The next night, as my roommates laughed, my
head still pounding, I insisted that I would never drink again. And I kept that promise, for two whole days.
Thanks for reading.
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