Every year on Dec. 31, we huddle around the TV and count down to midnight and the start of the New Year. We start drinking hours before midnight, have huge parties or go out to clubs we can’t afford, all for the sake of flipping the calendar.
Like every holiday, though, nothing really happens when the clock strikes. We go through all this trouble to celebrate the start of the New Year, but really, does anything change at midnight? You don’t suddenly lose a ton of weight, and your room doesn’t instantly clean itself.
All holidays are inherently like this.
Via: NY Post
There is one holiday where everything changes at exactly midnight. The holiday is more American than the Fourth of July and Thanksgiving combined.
No, it’s not Leif Erikson Day, but the rite of passage known as the 21st birthday. (Fun Fact: My birthday is Leif Erikson day. Knowledge!)
Throughout college, I never had a fake ID. Going out has never been difficult, but its evolved as I’ve gotten older. My freshman year was defined by sketchy house parties where I knew no one, and my sophomore year was defined by long-sleeved adventures through Midtown at the places that allow patrons 18 and older.
Via: The Alley
The first half of my junior year was defined by non-sketchy house parties (age-appropriate this time) and just not going out because I didn’t need to risk of getting an MIP so close to the day I never have to worry about that ever again.
At 11:53 on a Wednesday night, I walked into a chill bar downtown (avoiding the Lady’s Night bouncers on my birthday, jafeel?) and I shout at the bartender, “DO NOT SERVE ME FOR SEVEN MINUTES.”
I waited until exactly midnight to order my first legal drink, a Delirium Tremens. Bougie shit. And, at that moment, my life became infinitely easier.
I agree with most of us that the drinking age desperately needs to be lowered, but right now, turning 21 just feels so damn good. It feels like you have undeserved power over your younger friends. While they’re still trying to figure out which places takes what quality of fakes or who just straight-up doesn’t card, I’m done worrying about all that noise. I don’t want all these high school seniors and college freshmen to have that. I feel special, dammit, though I did absolutely nothing to deserve it except not die. Let me keep this one joy in life!
Freshman Summer B (and my past few Passover experiences) is proof enough that you don’t need to be 21 to get absolutely sloshed. The hype surrounding 21 has more to do with the adult privilege of being 21 in respectable public places. I can order wine with dinner at a restaurant. I can keep pumpkin ales in my fridge because I’m basic. I can tour breweries. I can find out what the distinctions of scotch and whiskey for myself.
Via: Great Pumpkin Beer Review
Celebrate being 21, whenever your clock strikes midnight, or even if it already has. It’s a privilege you get that a huge proportion of college students don’t just because their parents waited longer than yours to call the stork. (That’s how it works. Knowledge!)
Happy 21st. Drink up. Cheers. Salud. L’chaim.
Featured photo courtesy of: Cosmos Magazine
