A timeline leading up to my Purdue University College of Liberal Arts Distinguished Alumna award.
Five Months Ago - Me? They want to honor me? But they know I flunked out, right? No, really? Me? Huh. Cool. Guess I have to write a speech.
Four Months Ago - I should get a head start on that speech.
Three Months Ago -Maybe I should jot a few thoughts down before it's April and I'm slammed with pre-pub deadlines.
Two Months Ago - Ooh, snow! I'm not going to write a speech. Instead, I'm going to watch SO MUCH TELEVISION!
One Month Ago - I should think about that speech.
One Week Ago - I should work on that speech, but my desk is so messy and I have all these dog pictures to post...
10:30 AM, Thursday, Day Before the Award Ceremony - Well, shit.
Time to write this damn thing. Since I'm not the only one getting this award, I Google the other recipients in order to mention them, because the night is about US and not just me.
So, there's me... there's a Sociology Professor/Department Chair who's devoted his life to the social justice surrounding capital punishment... there's an Ambassador... and there's the Pulitzer Prize winning Washington Bureau Chief for the New York Times.
Hmm. I wonder if any of them read my most recent think-piece on Card Sharks.
Panic ensues, but I get my speech done due to the burst of failure-based adrenaline. It's not bad.
2:00 PM - Manicure and pedicure, essential for all the important hands I'll be shaking.
3:00 PM - Palm Beach Tanning Co. Earlier, noticed a bunch of NASA guys are getting the same award in the engineering department. Wonder if any astronauts are getting ready for the big day with a spray tan.
7:00 PM - Pack neatly and efficiently. If anyone were to give me an award, this is where I deserve it. When it comes to traveling, I'm a Viking. Unless I don't get my upgrade and then I'm kind of very much an asshole. But we're driving, so it's no problem. Fletch packs his bags but doesn't put his suit in because he thinks it will get wrinkled. He says he'll remember to grab it in the morning. I insist he put it in the car NOW NOW NOW because I'm not about to receive my major award with him in a Donkey Punch t-shirt.
11:00 AM, Friday -Incident-free trip down to West Lafayette. Fletch breaks his cardinal rule of no food in the car because I was so busy not writing my speech that I didn't go to the grocery store and we had nothing to eat in the house. We stop at Arby's! Oh, forbidden potato cakes, you're the sweetest potato cakes of all.
4:30 PM -I arrive at the fancy pre-banquet reception in a pretty dress with a snappy Burberry scarf. I do not mention to anyone that this what I call my "good eatin' scarf" which I wear all the time less as a fashion accessory and more as kind of a bib. (Seriously! Have saved hundreds in not ruining shirts with salad dressing and mayo and scarf rinses easily!)
Meet all the VIPs behind my getting the award and I apologize about my lack of Pulitzer Prize. They seem to be okay with this. But my next column is about TLC's Extreme Couponing, so the dream remains alive!
I may or may not suggest to the other award recipients that we pose in a human pyramid when we get our photos taken, but I'm pretty sure they know I'm joking. (But if I weren't, I'd be a base. Am very sturdy.)
At no point do I swear, stammer, or sweat Chardonnay.
#WINNING!
6:30 PM - I give my keynote address and it is well-received. People laugh in the right places, everyone smiles, and the applause seems real. What a fine, fine way to cap off an eleven year academic career!
7:00 PM - Other honorees give their speeches and the emcee lists all their other awards and community projects before they speak. Their achievements and community involvement is daunting. My only involvement is being a Charter Member of the Official Barbies Collectors Club. (I have a membership card and everything!)
8:45 PM - The ceremony ends and I get to chat with Brian Lamb who thinks my Bitter Congressshhh story is hilarious.
And I told him not to worry, even though I didn't get the C-SPAN internship, everything worked out.
A great end to a spectacular evening.
This is where I wish the story ended.
It doesn't.
9:00 PM - We change into regular clothes and run across the street to Harry's, the scene of so many of my college crimes. We're with my freshman roommate Joanna and her husband. Joanna and I make a beeline for the back to see if our names are still carved in the side of a table. There they are, twenty years later!! Harry's world famous Long Islands for everyone!
9:15 PM -More Long Islands for everyone! And how is it possible that this bar hasn't changed one song on the jukebox since 1993? I thought we'd hear nothing but Ke$sha and Pink, but instead it's all Billy Joel, Journey, and Jimmy Buffet. Woo!
9:30 PM - What time is it? Why, it's Long Island time!
9:45 PM -Pace myself? You want me to pace myself because I rarely drink and when I do, it's two glasses of wine? Pfft! I'm fine! No, I'm more than fine! I'm DISTINGUISHED.
10:00 PM - It's Mom's weekend at Purdue and I'm a tad dismayed to realize that all those ladies who look like me are there with their kids.
10:30 PM - Hey, I don't look like one of those moms. I look young! Ask me about my Botox! I bet those kids thinks I go here! Yes! Drinks for me and all my undergrad friends!
11:30 PM - JUST A SMALL TOWN BOY, BORN AND RAISED IN SOUTH DETROOOOOOOOIT!
11:45 PM - Why did I punch you? Becaushe that's the game! STEEEEEEVE PERRRY! Now get me another drink! Itsch my birthday! Oh. Well then it FEEEEEELS like my birschday!
12:00 AM - Mike Alstott walks by. He's in town with a whole bunch of NFL dudes who've been standing next to us all night. I introduce myself, figuring he would like to know that I'm the distingui distinggush dtring I won a major award! Then I tell him he made out with my friend. He can't recall. "Oh, itsch all right," I assure him. "She made out with a lot of people."
12:30 AM -HOLD ON TO THAT FEEEEEEEEEELIIIIIIN'
1:00 AM -Letsch throw gang symbhols so everyone will thinksh we're tough!
"Lake Forest Represent!! Our colors are pink and spray tan!"
1:30 AM -STREEEEEET LIGHTS! PEEEEEOPLE! OOOOOOOOOOOH!
2:00 AM - Thus begins the random Hugging of the Strangers.
2:15 AM - And the Handing out of the Business Cards while instructing recipients to "move to Lakesh Forry 'cuase we don't know anybody."
2:30 AM - Form a human toll bridge and stop all undergrads trying to leave to explain what makes me a distinguished alumni. They are less "impressed" and more "fucking terrified."
2:35 AM -DON'T STOP BEEEEEEEEEELIVIN'!!
2:40 AM - Fletch notices I'm eating stray pieces of popcorn off the table and bench and decides it's time to wrestle me back to where we're staying at the Union. Joanna decides we both must smuggle out beer pitchers to commemorate this momentous night. As we both carry Mom-purses, this proves very, very easy.
2:45 AM -I leave, but not before announcing to the population at large that I'm returning to my sorority house where I totally live because I'm only 21! WOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! STEEEEVE PERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRY!
* * *
I wake up to discover that I am not, in fact, 21 and neither is my liver.
As we have things to do at home, there's no time for a hangover-curing biscuits and gravy breakfast at the Triple X. On the way to get the car, I pass the Pulitzer Prize winner and note that she does not smell like a fraternity party.
I do not distinguish myself in a parking garage trash can. But it was touch and go there for a minute.
Now THAT is the true and fitting end to my illustrious college career.
And if I suddenly feel queasy the next time I hear a Journey song, this is why.