Mom away from home

Every group of girlfriends has a mother-figure. For my group of college friends, it's always been Cindy.

Cindy dutifully put us in cabs, intervened when we entertained notions of going home with boys who would later end up in the "What was I thinking?" file, held our hair when we puked, ran interference with security when trying to get us home drunk and made sure we didn't forget to eat. In addition to her big brain and hilarious sense of humor, it's why I love her.

Years later, she's still very much my Mom. She called me today to let me know she booked both of our flights for Peg's May wedding in Huntsville, Alabama. We're not even flying home together and she booked me a flight. Also booked is our hotel room and car, which she will be the only one driving. I LOVE that girl.

Because I'm a big fan of tangents, I'm going to go off on one about the "What was I thinking?" file. There was an actual file. It was a notebook with a few pages for all of us. We had to catalog who we hooked up with, how much we had to drink prior, what we actually did with them (there were codes for all the different possibilities), how they enticed us and a description of what exactly was so horrible about the whole experience. Anyway, toward the end of the year we all noticed we had Henry somewhere in our pages. Henry was a gorgeous fucked-up alcoholic who managed to woo nearly all of us during the course of two semesters. Sample WWITF entry:

JESS
Hooked up with: Henry ??? (What's his last name?)
Drank: 4 shots of Jaeger @ Nightcap, 2 vodka and cranberry earlier @ Rennies
Enticed by: Leaned over @ Nightcap and said, "Hey Jess, wanna get out of here?"
Acts performed: TB, TC, SIB
Notes: Ow. Wouldn't leave the next morning.

Marist College had a horrible tradition for the senior class called the River Awards. (Hudson River, get it?) The senior girls would go to one bar and the senior guys would go to the other. We would make up categories like, "Came in hot, left not" and "Most likely to be a child molester" and then all meet up in a third bar and present the awards. Really brutal stuff. The morning of the River Awards, Henry's friend Andy came over to hang out. He grabbed the WWITF and despite our protests, read some of it. Then he said, "You guys are assholes." Pour quoi? "Henry bet me 50 bucks at the beginning of the year that he was going to hook up with all of you girls by the end."

Guess which senior boy got the "Worst Hookup" award? Revenge is sweet.

Although I did not win anything, the boys told me my name was tossed out for "Biggest Frat Groupie". I so wasn't. I slept with exactly one frat boy during my four years at Marist. Maybe I kissed 30 or 40, but that hardly makes me a groupie.