A Story from My Fourteenth Year

[Angela]

In 1972, the legal drunking age in my state was eighteen, and a well developed young girl could get away with a lot.

So, one sweet evening as the sun was slipping down, I entered a 7/11 like I knew what I was doing – went straight to the beer cooler like I had been there a thousand times, bent to the bottom shelf and casually grabbed the neck of a bottle of Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill.

Went to the register, greeted the cashier, put the bottle on the counter, paid with steady hands, said thanks, exited, and found that outside the temperature was chillier than I remembered.

When I met him in the empty lot next to the store, he took it from me, swept me up, and we landed on the grass, where we rolled around like puppies and popped the cap - and what I swallowed tasted exciting, like love.

After we drank it, we climbed the fence behind the drive-in theatre, and hung around the concession stand for a while, but the fucker never even bought me a hot dog.

Thirty-seven years and a lot of other stories later, when I relapsed, what I craved was Boone’s Farm - no shit.

[Angela]

Thanks, my fellow storytellers.  I'm glad to have shared this with you.  Seems my experience was not so unique, and I was expecting to hear that from some of you, at least. I knew I wasn't alone.  Lol. ;)

[Giovanni Mendoza]

YES

[Robert Crisman]

If he'd have bought you that hot dog, you'd have still been thinking about that Boone's Farm--no shit. Very nicely told. When I was 15 all I could do was hope and pray that some old lag would come by and go into the store and come out with my loganberry. I'd pay him a buck...

[Mike Handley]

It tasted good, didn't it? I still remember. Oh ... You voiced the bravado of an underage purchaser so very well!

[bolton carley]

everything about this makes me adore you more.  oh, i see that girl with her confidence and her clarity of task much like the clarity of your brilliant writing.  line 4 reminded me of a gary soto short story with love and details.  line 5 made me smile that you're still damn bitter about that hot dog, and line 6 reminds me that it's a hard fought battle to win on the page and in life.  not one to be taken lightly, nor are you. 

[Stephen Torelli]

Not even a hot dog? I remember those days but would have spent every nickel and then back to work. Great story!

[Jeanette Cheezum]

HAHA Love that last line. I drank Boones Farm Strawbery Hill with Seven Up. I found out that my high would last longer if I mixed it. :) If I didn't I would have a lapse of memory for hours.

[Jamie Hogan]

This was music, and the last line was that deep E, about the third ivory from the left. "like I knew what I was doing" is so very good. You might have said "shoulders back, chin up, blah blah..." and tried to hand it all to us on a plate. But you took 7 words and gave us everything we needed to see you walking in that store. Masterful.

[Gita]

Amazing how something can be the touchstone to a whole other lifetime. You told it perfectly.

[Joey Delgado]

Damn, that last sentence hits you like a ton of bricks--no shit. Angela, you have this way of connecting memories with your current life that is extraordinary. Please keep these sixes coming. Your writing reminds me of Alice Munro for some reason.

 

P.S.--My first swig of alcohol was also from a Boone's Farm bottle. Boome's Farm must be a place where their main crop is sobriety chips.