Will the author please come forth.

I wish I could claim the following but can't. As one friend who recieved the same email has already stated, "We should build a temple to this beautiful, anonymous writer and all the truths he speaks of." I hope you all enjoy this as much as I did. It does hold lots of truths. Without further ado:


During my five-year college reunion in May, I snuck into my old fraternity house, which at the time was being used as some sort of communityservice dorm. As I wandered about taking pictures, a student approached andasked politely, "Excuse me, who are you?" Instinctively, I turned around andyelled menacingly, "Who the fuck are YOU?" The girl scurried off, but theincident made me introspective.

Here I am, twenty-seven-years old, with a relatively successful career,regular car insurance payments, and pillowcases that match my comforter. Yet at the same time, I can't drink one beer without drinking twenty, I can't converse with a girl withouttrying to take her home, and I can't even step foot in a fraternity housewithout immediately regressing into an asshole. While college is many yearsbehind me, vestiges of the experience remain deeply ingrained inmy personality. Welcome to the world of a recovering frat boy.

-Of course, I'm not the only one. There's an entire faction oftwenty somethings out there who live seemingly mature lives - but only to the naked eye. Take my friend Mike, a successful software developer in NewYork whose downtown apartment has actually been passed down for years tosuccessive generations of graduates from his fraternity like an off-campusparty house. Or my buddy Justin, a writer here in LA who is looking to moveto a new place - but has yet to find one big enough to fit his beer pong table. Unfortunately for him, "Hardwood floor quickly soaks up cheapbeer" is generally not an amenity typically found on craigslist.

-Recovering frat boys aren't required to have ever been Greek. In fact, theydon't even have to be boys. On average, every other Evite I received fromgirls over the past year has been for some sort of elaborate, costume/themeparty that reminds me of sophomore year. If you're a strong, independentwoman in her mid-twenties who is still throwing parties entitled Pimps &Hos, Forties & Hos, or Golf Pros & Tennis Hos, you are mostdefinitely a recovering frat boy. Dressed like a whore.

-To me, the phrase, "Let's grab a drink" is both the rallying cry and secretpassword of the recovering frat boy movement. For some reason, no one usesthat phrase until they've graduated college, and then they use itso frequently it becomes virtually devoid of meaning. If you really thinkabout it, you only actually grab a drink with about 10% of the people you saythat to. Of that 10%, most think you literally want to have a solitarycocktail and exchange pleasantries or discuss current events (thesepeople are often married or lawyers). The remainder - who you quicklyrecognize as kindred spirits - take "grab a drink" to mean "play beer pongand find that party where chicks are dressed as hos."

-Why is it, then, that so many of us, whether subconsciously or not,have adopted this quasi-Peter Pan lifestyle? These days, it's no longer, "Iwon't grow up." It's more like, "OK, I'll grow up, as long as I can stillthrow up once a weekend." I think the answer is simple: because we can. The world is changing. Getting married in your twenties is no longer the norm -in fact, those unfortunate souls who do are now outcasts, scorned andshunned, spit on and kicked to the side of the road by the rest of ussingle folk. And that means we now have more time to live our lives the waywe want to and, most importantly, have evolved the ability to do so whilestill excelling in the adult world. People ask me all the time how long Ican continue calling myself a recovering frat boy. Those people areusually sober and annoying. And my response is always the same: "Who the fuck are you?"



Thank you kind sir, thank you. And as an aside, my own beer pong table is, and has been, in the works. Much more than the Orange plank sited this past summer. It should be ready for Ga Tech next weekend if I get after it following the Temple blowout this week.