A Cautionary Tale

By Kevin Parkman | Thursday, September 27, 2007

One claim that really irks me is that freshman year is the best year “ever.” Personally my freshman year was a nightmare. Sure, freshman year was a lot of fun, but hell I am still feeling the hurt from my first year at Dartmouth. The bottom line is: If you are having fun then you are doing it wrong. Freshman year is about paying your dues, getting some exposure, and letting your liver know that it actually has a function. Freshman year should be more of a pilgrimage than a vacation, and the most common pilgrimage at Dartmouth is the journey to Parkhurst. This special trip can be accomplished through a number of ways, however all are not equal. Throughout my career at Dartmouth I have been labeled many things; the most memorable being a sexual harasser, a thief, and lastly a “whiskyholic.”

I will begin to recount to you some of my more memorable freshmen year escapades. The following is all fact and I assure you none of the following tales have been embellished.

My first night as a freshman was actually quite enjoyable. To say I was naive would be an understatement. I wasted no time I acquiring four thirty-packs of Keystone Light from the only twenty-one-year-old I knew on campus. This acquisition proved a goldmine in providing me with both entertainment and instant popularity. I distinctly remember grabbing ahold of two of the large racks of beer from the back of the purveyor’s vehicle and conspicuously strolling into the Choates. This would not be my last display of disregard for the College’s alcohol policy and the thugs who enforce it. After entertaining a ’shmob of newly acquired friends, we proceeded to Psi U for porchcrawlers. Unaware of the drink’s potency, I parked myself in front of the trough from which it was served and began to down one after another. With my stomach filled with a gallon or so of yet unprocessed alcohol, I returned to my room. As soon as I set foot in my room, I felt as if a F40PH diesel electric train had hit me. Not quite knowing what to do, I retreated to the bathroom where I assumed the fetal position in the shower stall and began vomiting for about 5 minutes in regular intervals. After having expunged all the liquid I began moaning, only to be discovered by my UGA. When I realized I had an audience, I quickly informed my UGA that I was “dying.” This is quite possibly the stupidest thing I might have said. If you are spilling your guts out all over the bathroom and decide to tell your UGA that you are “dying” there is a 99% chance you are going to be sent to DHMC in an ambulance. Here I was extremely fortunate that my advisor pitied me and simply told me to go to bed.

Fortunately my first term at Dartmouth provided me with little contact with Parkhurst. This was primarily due to uncanny luck and the fact that I was drowning in schoolwork most of the time. Most of my misery was rooted in my academics. I made several mistakes. Like most Dartmouth students I was quite accomplished in high school. I fancied myself as a scholar and decided to enroll in Math 11 and Physics 13. To say the least these classes were not quite compatible with my collegiate lifestyle. After learning my lesson in Math 11, I decided to enroll in much easier classes the following winter. At last free of any major academic obligations I pursued a degree in partying, as there is little to do in Hanover besides studying and drinking. Partying so hard came with a terrible price: numerous visits to Parkhurst. As the frequency and intensity of my drinking increased my luck soon began to run out.

There was the one time when my friends and I decided to make short work of a box of Franzia through the use of a funnel. It was actually quite enjoyable until I realized that the “drinking device” had not been cleaned in over a month. After “pre-gaming” in such an aggressive manner, I found myself wandering the campus as I am often wont to do after thoroughly impairing myself. I seemed to lose track of time, and the next thing I knew I was being pulled out of a snow bank by a fellow freshman. The chap dusted me off, inquired about my state and then invited me to come mooch some pizza from a group of girls he knew were about to receive a delivery. Later, in a dormitory unfamiliar to me, pizza was served, and opinions were exchanged. Being the somewhat crass person I am, I shared a few unsavory opinions of some mutual acquaintances that were allegedly very good friends with the females in the group. To my dismay I was then ordered to leave and shown an overwhelming amount of what we will call “girl power.” I did end up leaving the room under my own power but first decided to empty a barrel’s worth of garbage in front of the group’s door. I felt it would be a suiting parting gift for them to discover in the morning.

Dorm antics are always fun. Those who worked in Parkhurst knew my hall as “the worst hall on campus.” We were notorious for our encounters with S&S and the general havoc we wreaked within our cluster. One of our favorite activities in the dorm was dressing up in some yellow jumpsuits that we had come across and then getting into full-scale rumbles that would spill from floor to floor, often involving reckless endangerment and damaged property. On one occasion one such brawl ended up spilling into the women’s lavatory. Needless to say, the females on that floor were not pleased and because of this they reported us to the authorities in charge of the gendered spaces of bathrooms. For my involvement I was issued my first residential warning and an introduction to the bureaucratic bloat that the college is now famous for.

I cringe looking back of the ignorance of my freshman year. Whenever I would enter a fraternity my objective was to consume and/or conceal as many alcoholic beverages as possible before EBAs stopped taking orders at 2:15 a.m. I can still clearly remember the night my luck finally ran out. It was the middle of winter term, and I had just finished playing a game of malt liquor pong. I remember believing that I was Snoop Dog as I began singing along to “Drop It Like It’s Hot,” using a hockey stick as an imaginary microphone. I soon realized that I was far too intoxicated. On my way back to my dormitory a Safety and Security vehicle drove up behind me. For some crazy reason I decided to run away from the van, completely losing my composure and blowing my cover. I was remarkably successful in this needless escape. So successful in fact that in my drunken stupor I managed to forget about the whole incident just a few minutes after it was over. As I walked towards Baker Tower, I heard a van come to a screeching halt. The vehicle’s door swung open and a squat, masculine female security officer stepped out of the van. She yelled “Stop!” and inquired “Why were you running from me?” I replied, “I was not running from you, sir,” honestly believing that this woman was a man. She then replied, “I am not a sir; I am a ma’am. You are obviously drunk. Get in the van; You are coming with me.” At this point I was so drunk and tired that the idea of a ride somewhere in a heated vehicle did not seem that bad of a deal. If I had known of the bureaucratic bullshit to follow I would have certainly resisted a little harder.

You should pain yourself to find innovative ways to intoxicate yourself in an accelerated manner. Do not worry about being picked up by S&S. You are freshmen and, honestly, for some people, including myself, it is just plain unavoidable. What I am trying to say is go out and have a few beers with your friends. Play some pong. I am not, however, saying to take a BB gun up to Zete’s roof. Seriously. Do not do that.

A Cautionary Tale

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