Screwdriver

I was 14-years-old the first time I got drunk. At a bar mitzvah party in Agoura Hills. The son of family friends. What I remember: approaching the bar, telling the bartender, “Screwdriver, please.”

It was 1979. The bartender was probably drunk, too.

I had more than one. Three is what I’m remembering, but who knows? Maybe it was 2 or, God forbid, 4.

The world went wild, spun out all around. There were Christmas lights strung up in festive style. The party was outside, at a summer camp in the dry hills west of L.A. The air smelled of sage and Jean Naté perfume, the favored scent of San Fernando Valley Jewish women in 1979.

Did I mention I was 14?

No memory what I wore that night. I had two go-to bat mitzvah dresses in those days, both pastelly sateen, one powder blue the other peach. I wore them with the Garolini pumps my mother bought me. Stiletto heeled big-girl shoes. I loved them, but they were impossible to dance in because I danced like a madwoman and took my dancing seriously. In 1979 I spent hours after school at the dance studio. Most days I took two RTD buses to get there from my high school. Forty-five minutes each way, but so what? It was worth it for 3 hours of class.

Did I dance whilst drunk?

Maybe. Mostly, I made out. “Made out” as in 1979 “made out.” With boys.

Under the spell of vodka and orange juice, I lost all inhibition. In 1979 I was all about inhibition.

“Hi,” I said to one boy. He was tall and skinny with dark curls and a kind face. Actually, I don’t remember what he looked like. Maybe he was blond. What I remember is that I invited him to me and he accepted. The kissing went on for a while, and then I moved on to someone else. Other lips.

I may be amalgamating memories here. It happens, you know. You start down one road, then realize the flora and fawna don’t belong here at all. Not that it matters. When I tell you the road is THIS road, does it matter to either of us? Both of us are following the curves and edges here. Writer and reader, we’re building the road together. Right now.

I wasn’t wearing one of those sateen dresses that night. I was wearing an outfit I borrowed from my mother. A white skirt and blouse with matching vest. On my feet? Probably sandals. The night was warm.

After the party we accompanied the family back to their house for the gift opening ritual. I sat between my brothers in the back seat. My father drove. I tell you: I was tanked. Did no one smell booze?

How we ignore what’s right in front of us…

While friends and family watched the bar mitzvah boy tear apart envelopes and shiny boxes, the older son of one of those families was with me in the guest room. A shaggy blue-eyed blond with braces. The lights at full spectrum and him with his hands up my blouse, unbuckling my bra, touching my breasts.

This moment remains a crystalline snapshot in my mind, but only the singular image. I don’t remember any feeling, just the fact of it. Me, the shaggy boy, his hands on my bared torso, the bright light overhead, the spinning world.

Sometimes memory is like this. You can only see the picture. You can’t feel a thing.