003

College, what a time. I went to a Big **** school, that means a lot of sports, a lot of school pride, and a lot of Hamm’s Special Light.

My freshman year was an interesting one socially. I spent much of the first semester hanging out with people I knew from High School. Something like ten percent of my graduating class wound up at Michigan. I missed the boat a little when it came to getting to know the kids in my hall — partly due to that — and partly to a great social faux pas. 6th ****, **** Quad. Co-Ed Honors Housing. I wasn’t even Honors, but that’s where they put me. Arguably the best place to be on campus. Forty percent of freshmen wind up on North Campus, a sentence that brings bus rides back and forth for class, for football games, for parties, everything. I however, was in the prime location, walking distance from everything.

Welcome Week, ahh yes, the blood transfusion of fresh life into the school, where students new and old all have cause for celebration. Every house, every student organization, every club, every fraternity and sorority all organizing their parties to kick off another round in ****.

I did exactly what you think that week, in the words of freshman favorite Asher Roth — “pass out at three, wake up at ten, go out to eat, then do it again”. Somewhere around day three or four, I heard about someone on our floor having got an MIP — that’s Minor In Possession — the misdemeanor crime in Michigan of underage drinking. Which in ****, at that time, you had to be some sort of supreme idiot — stumbling around with an open container, passed out in public type stuff. Parties didn’t get busted, kids weren’t targeted, you had to try.

And so one day a lot of us from the hall were in one kid’s room. He was one of the two “cool boys” in the hall. I was definitely not the other one, and everyone else in Honors Housing weren’t exactly Regina George either. But as we were in that dorm room, six or seven of us, talking about the parties and frats and the weekend, I said “Yeah, I heard somebody on the floor got an MIP? During Welcome Week? Someone told me he was walking down the street with a half-gallon of vodka, and was so drunk that when they asked him to pour it out, he refused”.

I didn’t notice the change in everyone’s body language, so I kept going: “what kind of idiot does that? Yeah I remember my first beer, but come on”. I was losing the room and doubled-down. I’m a comedian at heart, and went on a several-minute rant — trying to wring just one laugh out of someone — but only silence continued. When I finished my verbal vomiting, the stillness so palpable, the kid whose room we were in cleared his throat and said “I’m the one who got the MIP”.

Fuck. We’ve all been there. The stammering attempts at apology, “I-I didn’t mean it, it could happen t-to anyone. I’m just joking...” only to find no ally and retreat. “Oh, that time already? I have to uh...go do laundry”. Even though it’s Sunday and you’ve only been at school for four days. Luckily I was on the far end of the hall from him, and rarely had to walk past his door. I don’t think I ever made eye contact with him the rest of that year out of pure shame.

After that, I took on a bit of a self-imposed ostracization, going up to North Campus to see people from my High School at their dorms, becoming friends with their roommates, going to tailgates and parties with them. That was the tune of my first semester, and I really failed to strike while the iron was hot with the people in **** Quad. It’s so important to put yourself out there early, to make those friends and get lost in that new, unexplored world. But I fucked that up, and in my insecurity, fell back on my High School. The one place I tried to get away from for so long, I clung to in this vast unknown. Most Kids in my hall were out-of-state, the sole representative of their high school, completely alone, having to go it alone and make those new friends, sink or swim. I couldn’t push  myself to do that at first, after my big mouth got me where it did less than a week in. So I did the easy, comfortable thing that was ultimately unfulfilling.

Second semester changed things, though. With football season over, and the snow having arrived, my North Campus friends had little reason to come down to see me, and I little desire to make that cold walk to the bus stop to go and see them. ****’s basketball team was on fire, a run that in the end would lead them to the championship game. It cooled down outside, but began heating up in **** Quad. We’d watch the games together, grab food in the cafeteria, bullshit in the lounge — **** was finding his way in the world. But I had a lot of ground to cover and was always a step behind. People would make plans, and I wouldn’t hear them first-hand; it would only be when my neighbor Sam asked me if I was going...to events I hadn’t even been invited to. I still went, but there was always that feeling. Like a person in the back row of a group photo who always winds up half-covered by the people beside and in front of him, failing to squeeze into frame.

My high school friends had their little social groups too, who I felt like I was always orbiting. That somehow, everyone but me had fast friends, and that I was always trying to break into preformed circles. Always the new guy, always the introduction. That I was always coming in thirty minutes late to the movie, spending the last hour trying to enjoy the film while also completing the plot’s missing parts and exposition. That makes you drift, and just like High School, I was drifting again. Going into summer break, going into a new chapter. Everyone else seemed ready for part two, and I still didn't know the main characters’ names. My roommate and I got along fine, but I wouldn’t say we were were great friends. We respected each other’s space, kept the room clean, and didn’t do anything crazy or have any fights. He was a sophomore, studying business and sports management, a pretty grueling double-major program that takes up a lot of class hours. He didn’t party or drink, was pretty introverted, but loved sports. My love of sports had waned, but I still had pride in ****’s sports, so we talked about that mostly. He had a few friends he made during his Freshman year who were also in Honors Housing, and they’d come over now and again, and I liked them too.

But when all was said and done, I left Freshman year not too far from where I started, socially. I had some friends, some people I could hang out with, but missing that kind of spark. Feeling like I was drifting form place to place, looking for a tight fit I could never find.