It’s spring semester of freshman year, and my friends are starting to make spring break plans. For most college students, the first college spring break is something to look forward to. Alcohol, loud music, dancing, big crowds, and lots of regrettable decisions? Honestly, what twenty year old wouldn’t be excited? Unfortunately, I was not like most college students. I had consumed hard alcohol probably a total of two times in my life, never tried a drug, and got major anxiety from large crowds and loud parties. So, naturally, when my much cooler friends insisted that we attend Ultra Music Festival in Miami for our first spring break together, I was, to put it gently, shitting myself.
I spent the days leading up to the festival with family in Palm Beach, enjoying some much needed rest and relaxation before heading down to Miami to meet my fate. The night before leaving, I got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and legitimately fainted. I’m not kidding. I literally fainted from anxiety about attending Ultra (I know that’s not normal, don’t worry, I have a therapist now). But I hope that gives you a sense of just how hysterical I was about the whole thing.
When I got down to Miami, I was happy and relieved to see my friends, who assured me that the weekend would not be as bad as I was expecting. We’ll all stick together, they said! We’ll have a good time, they said! And if it turned out that I really couldn’t stand it, I could always return to the comfort of my friend’s apartment, which was our home base for the weekend. This definitely calmed me down, and I actually started to get, dare I say, a little excited! We threw on our indecent festival outfits, splashed some glitter on our faces, and went over to our friend Tommy’s apartment, where the pregame was being hosted.
My enthusiasm was short-lived. It became apparent to me that I would be one of the only girls in my friend group of twenty that was not going to take molly. So to compensate for my relative lack of insobriety, I started pounding shots of vodka. Like, I literally was walking around the pregame with a handle of vodka in one hand and a wing of fried chicken in the other hand, asking my friends to hold my nose while I took a shot and chased it with fast food. All these shots occurred within the fifteen minute span before we got into an uber to the festival. So, needless to say, by the time we arrived, I was pretty far gone.
Next thing I know, I’m prostrated on the ground outside the festival. I open my eyes to concrete, a lot of blood, and my friends in a circle around me. Turns out, I tripped out of the SUV and face planted onto the ground. And then passed out.
There happened to be a medical tent about fifty feet away from where I fell, so some medics offered to clean the gashes on my face and wipe the copious amounts of blood off of my body. In my intoxicated state of paranoia, I thought that the medics were evil doctors who were going to tie me down and perform facial reconstruction surgery without my consent. So I refused to let them touch me. Instead, my friend patiently stood in front of me wiping blood off my body, everywhere from my neck to my crotch. Not sure how it got down there. But she still has the blood stains on her shirt to this day.
In all honesty, it wasn’t that bad of an injury. I just had a really bad gash on my chin and some bruises on my body and face. But I literally thought I was dying. I had never been so drunk before and genuinely thought the apocalypse had arrived and everyone was out to get me. The medics suggested I get stitches on my face, which they offered to do right there on the spot. Instead, I eagerly accepted their offer to take me in an ambulance to the nearby ER to treat the wound. I literally would have rather been in an emergency room than at Ultra.
I begged my friend Selene to come in the ambulance with me. Turns out, she was even more gone than I was. She spent the ride flirting with the medics as her left boob hung out of her shirt. When the medics kindly gave her a bag in anticipation of her throwing up, she pushed it away, pointed at me, and exclaimed, “SHE is the patient! Not ME!” Meanwhile, I was silently sobbing to myself at the thought of how disappointed my parents would be when they found out. The medic next to me was also my personal therapist during that car ride. Seriously, God bless our healthcare workers.
When we arrived at the hospital, Selene received a call from her mother, who was staying in Miami and had found out, through the grapevine, that we had managed to land ourselves in the hospital. “Everything is fine, Mom! Seriously, there’s nothing –” *leans over her chair and throws up*. Ten minutes later, Selene’s mom furiously storms into the ER, demanding that Selene leave with her immediately. When Selene refused, her mother threatened to throw a gown on her and admit her to the hospital.
Meanwhile, my mom was on the way down from Palm Beach to pick me up. I spent about two hours alone in the ER sobering up and nervously awaiting her arrival. I couldn’t even get in touch with my friends because there was no cell service at the festival. (But I did hear later on that they heard the news of my fall while they were on their molly come up. Yikes. Sorry about that, guys.) I was still drunk when my mother came to pick me up, which was evident in my desperate attempts to explain to her where and how I had gotten so drunk. “WE WERE AT TOMMY’S, MOM!!! TOMMY’S HOUSE!!!” I managed to yell out between sobs. “Celia… who the hell is Tommy?” “TOMMY, MOM!!! TOMMY!!!”
The next two days in Palm Beach were filled with incessant lectures and disappointed looks from my parents. I had a brutal headache for the entire weekend, which, as it turns out, was not only a hangover, but also a concussion. When my mom drove me to the airport to meet my friends and fly back to Providence, she really laid it on me, and I ended up limping into the airport with tears streaming down my face and bruises and cuts everywhere. Of course, I run into the hottest guys on the football team, who gives me one look and just says, “oh.. Jesus.” I subsequently heard one of them mumble, “she had such a nice face… that’s really too bad.”
The aftermath of Ultra was even worse than the injury itself. I had a concussion for a month at school, so I couldn’t do much. And when I could, the quarter-sized dent on my chin served as an inescapable, everyday reminder of my idiocy. To this day, I still can’t stand the smell of vodka. On the rare occasion that I take a celebratory shot with my friends, they have to hold my nose so I don’t gag. Zedd’s song “Clarity” used to be my favorite workout sound and now it is a full-on trigger. Ultra still likes to torture me by sending my Happy Birthday emails. Truly, I couldn’t think of a worse birthday present than an email from Ultra reminding me to buy tickets to their next festival.
So, that is the story of the worst day of my life. If you’re ever feeling bad about yourself, I hope this story is some consolation that you could truly never, ever, ever be as much of a fuck-up as me.