THE NARRATIVE ARC
I Acted Like a Colossal Drunken Tool and Still Feel Bad About It Years Later
In my defense, I was an idiot
Back in the aughts, when I was younger but still not objectively young, my social climber friend Declan and I used to drink at a restaurant called Sassafraz. It was cool, fancy, and theoretically frequented by Hollywood celebrities, especially at Toronto International Film Festival time.
Unfortunately, the only luminary we ever saw was Eddie Griffin, a poor man’s Chris Tucker who was moderately famous back before all the excitable Black guy roles got hoovered up by Kevin Hart (I also thought Russell Crowe was singing at the piano one night but my buddy assures me it was just a chubby bearded drunk). Nevertheless, it was exciting to think that Rob Schneider or Tara Reid could walk in the door any minute.
Sassafraz was too expensive for me, but it felt good to splurge and get hammered on overpriced plonk. I also believed that my unpressed Costco dress shirts would make people think I was a rich dude who just didn’t care, a nonsensical idea but we all tell pleasing lies to ourselves.
Anyhow, Declan and I were pretending to debate our next glass of cabernet, knowing we’d get the second-cheapest thing on the wine list, when something caught…
