When I was a kid, especially in college, I did some crazy things. I did things that make me grateful that we didn't have camera phones and the Internet. My friends and I had some grand adventures, did some stupid things, drank a little too much, played a little to hard. We were in college and we acted like it.
But we took care of each other. We never allowed someone to do something that they might regret in the morning, if we could help it. We knew each others limits and we had no problem dragging someone away from a party when they went too far, physically if necessary.
It was a lesson I learned well my freshman year when I went visiting some high school friends at their University. It's a night that I still can't remember, and I don't know what happened, not really. I can guess, but I'll never know. It was so very out of character for me, but hey, I was in college, right?
When I returned to my own school, to the family I found in college, I realized that they, that we, would never let that happen to each other. Without ever having to say a word. We had a tacit understanding that we would protect each other, and we still do. My New York family as well. My tribe will always have my back, just as I have theirs.
What I witnessed happening around me this weekend after a wedding left me reeling, not only because it was so outrageous, but because it happened on my lap.
The wedding party had been shuttled around all day in a party bus, complete with disco lights, loud music with a great sub-woofer, and lots of beer. It was a hoot and I thought, "This is a great idea!" I could only imagine my tribe and I rolling around in one of those.
Our bus had rails along the ceiling to keep people from falling over while dancing as the bus was moving, but it looked really similar to this picture.
After the reception the party bus was used to transport the last of the revelers back to the hotel. Some of the wedding party was on the party bus, but most of the occupants were simply guests at the wedding. Most of them were friends of the bride and groom, all in their late twenties.
And they were drunk.
Very.
I was seated directly across from my friends, her sister and sister-in-law seated very nearby. We were crowded in there with no place to go, a stranger on my right and a couple on my left. She was sitting on his lap due to a lack of space, or so I thought.
I hadn't been paying much attention to the couple on my left, though I did notice her leaning on me quite a bit. I just thought it was lack of space and too much alcohol, so I didn't think much at the time.
Then I saw my friend's face.
His mouth agape, eyes the size of dinner plates, he was staring at the couple on my left. So was his wife. So was everyone else on that side of the bus.
I finally glanced over only to see the couple making out. No big deal, right? Then I noticed that her skirt, which when standing was barely covering her cookie, was up around her waist and his hand was down her dress. It was a bit much.
Suddenly she came up for air, handed her phone to a guy standing near, and said, "Take my picture!" before diving back into her make-out session.
Incredulous, the guy said, "You want me to take a picture of this?"
We were flabbergasted.
Next thing we know she is giving this man, who she apparently didn't know, a lap dance on a professional level. Everyone's jaw was on the floor, eyes wide, looking at each other like, "Is this actually happening?"
At this point the two of them are making out again, and he actually began to lay her out across my lap. I moved away a bit, but they kept on coming. The music was so loud, the sub-woofer going like gangbusters, we could barely hear ourselves think let alone hear each other. But, there they were, splayed across me going to town.
All I could do was laugh.
No one on our end of the bus seemed to know who this girl was, or who her people were. She was just putting on a show for the crowd.
They finally removed themselves from my lap, but only because she was back to lap dancing again.
"I'm old!" came from someone at the front of the bus. We were just so dazed by this display all we could do was nod in agreement.
This girl was totally out of control.
She eventually moved away to dance in the middle of the bus, her erstwhile lap dancing partner forgotten for the moment. He followed soon after, though.
As we emerged from the debauchery of the party bus we tried to find out who this girl was. It turns out that she was a friend of the bride who, and I quote, "Is a really nice person usually, she just gets out of control when she's drunk."
Really? Then why does anyone let her drink?
She faced a lot of ridicule that night, and was the subject of much discussion the next morning at breakfast, but all I could think about was her people. Where were they? Why did no one that knew her, that knew she gets this crazy when drunk, why didn't they keep an eye on her?
Where was her tribe?
Had that ever been me, my people would have snatched me right out of there, plopped me in the corner, and force fed me water and crackers until I sobered up enough to get into my room. Alone.
Her people just sort of aw-shucks and that's-just-her and what-are-you-gonna-do-about-it responded.
Which made me feel old.
No one her age seemed to give a rats ass that she was that out of control, giving Elizabeth-Berkley-In-The-Pool lap dances to a guy on a party bus filled with strangers.
I was, and continue to be, completely baffled by the whole thing.
Some guilt drifted in the next day as well, though, as I thought about that girl and that party bus. Knowing how I feel about the night that I can't remember, perhaps I should have done something. Perhaps I should have stepped in and stopped it.
Then again, as drunk as she was, there probably wasn't much I could have done not being one of her people, not knowing her at all.
I still feel guilty, though. And old.
And I feel a little sorry for her that she doesn't have people like mine, a tribe that would never let that happen to each other.
Mostly, though, I feel old.
So, to the drunk people on the bus after the wedding... I hope you find a tribe someday. I hope you never have a night that you can't remember, a night that haunts you. I hope that you don't regret what you did this weekend, and I'm sorry that I didn't help you. And mostly, I hope that other people your age aren't as crazy as you were on that bus or the future is in some trouble.
Also, I think I might be old.
