We all sat quietly at our desks, captivated, listening intently
as the two tattered middle-aged men took turns telling us unbelievable stories
about the wild party days of their youths. They both seemed to be intensely focused
on digging through their respective murky, faded memories to recall their most
extreme personal experiences in an attempt to exceed each other's depravity. Prior
to this experience, most of us were unaware of how much fun could be had under
the influence of excessive amounts of alcohol. Many of us drew the misinformed conclusion
that having over-the-top alcohol stories may be necessary later in life for possible
pissing contests with others in the adult world.
The intended purpose of these men's visit to our elementary
school was to educate us about the horrors of alcohol abuse. The first phase of
the lesson was apparently to provide examples of the awesome destructive power
of alcohol, and the second phase was to show us a real-life example of the possibilities
of a life of sobriety. Needless to say,
things grew even more entertaining during the second phase of their program. When
the men were finally satisfied with their storytelling performances, they led
us out of the classroom to the parking lot in front of our school.
The lowest intelligence quartile of the class was immediately
awestruck, in speechless disbelief, at
the sight of an enormous monster truck illegally parked halfway up on the curb
in the passenger loading zone. None of us thought to ask who parked the truck there,
seeing as how the only two presenters for the alcohol training program were in
our classroom for the past hour. They must have parked it there earlier, insensitively
blocking traffic; possibly preventing disabled children from easily boarding their
parents' vehicles via the loading ramp located in the passenger zone. I can
only imagine that these guys were too blinded by their newly found righteousness
to concern themselves with those whom they considered to be less-awesome (kids,
parents, teachers, pedestrians, anyone).
We stood a safe distance away, patiently waiting for
something cool to happen. One of the men carefully scaled a gigantic 6-foot-tall
tire, and leapt into the driver's seat. The other man stood between the crowd
of children and the truck, and spouted off some forgettable closing statements
about how sobriety made their dreams come true; apparently, their shared dream
was to drive a shared monster truck. Eventually, the man on the ground realized
that his words of wisdom were being completely ignored, and finally trailed off
mid-sentence and stopped talking. No one noticed. After a few moments of breathless
silence, something childishly cool finally happened.
"Yeeeaaaaahhhh!" The man on the ground shrieked as
the thunderous roar of the monster truck engine unexpectedly shook our 11-year
old souls. The man in the drivers' seat revved up the engine, and it screamed even louder. In reasonable fear of an explosion, as a result
of their possible insobriety, we collectively took a step backward. They
continued to run the engine for several minutes, until their wine turned into
the vinegar of bored children waiting for a nonexistent follow-up act.
The last thing I remember about their educational program
was that the man on the ground yelled over the booming engine sounds to inform us
that the monster truck engine [also] ran on alcohol. So in sum, in all its
glory, alcohol makes for very entertaining stories about extreme partying and/or
regret, and it powers monster trucks. Yeeeaaaaahhhh!
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