Bro-ing Up, or You Can Never Really Go Back to College

Two short years ago my daily schedule looked something like this:
Noon: Wake and bake, breakfast, shower, TV
1 p.m.: First class of the day, lunch
2 p.m.: Second and third classes
4:30 p.m: Work slinging burgers at the school dining hall
10 p.m. Work out, dinner
11 p,m. Start pounding beers with my buddies
4 a.m.: Pass the fuck out

Now my days look something like this:
5 a.m.: Drag myself out of bed
6 a.m.: Start work
4 p.m.: Go home and start writing
7 p.m.: Dinner, work out
9 p.m.: A little TV and a beer
10 p.m.: Bed time

Last week I left the chilly fall weather of New York and my new schedule for the Florida sunshine and I hoped my old one. My freshman year roommate was getting married near Tampa and I road tripped with a bro from Jacksonville through Tallahassee and then to the wedding. Without too many bros or a lot of cash in N.Y., I had been longing for the bromantic embrace of my college drinking buddies and the countless drunken, debaucherous nights we spent together in those four years. The trip was (almost) everything I expected it to be. I was thrashed for five days straight and had the most fun I've had since I left college. However, as I quickly learned, things change, even when you're not there to see them; and my post-weekend reflection on the plane back to New York made me realize what happens when a bro grows up.

My friend and the driver on the trip greeted me at the airport with a fat bowl and before I could say, "Pass that shit," we were at Five Guys destroying a bag of burgers and fries. We set out on the road and smoked the entire two-hour ride to Tallahassee and were greeted by another bro and the dirtiest motherfucking house I think I've ever seen. Two years ago I wouldn't have batted an eye at the over-flowing trashcan, stray cats, and pizza boxes littering the floor, but I guess living with my girlfriend has opened my eyes to the "Hoarders"-esque living situation my roomies and I used to be in.

After sharing a celebratory bowl, grabbing a quick dinner, and pre-gaming a case of Busch Light, we headed to this new bar my bro had been lauding since it opened. We pulled up to an apartment complex in a quiet neighborhood and behind two French doors was a new hipster bar, not unlike something I'd find on the Lower East Side. Mismatched furniture, curly mustachioed bartender and an impressive beer list were definitely not what I was looking for in a Southern small-town college bar. And every time I kept trying to get people to go to our old place, home of the $5 All-You-Can-Drink special, they looked at me like I was a freshman whose significantly older brother had told me all the hot spots that were now defunct. My friends had grown out of our old bar and graduated to pricier drinks, while I was still okay with swilling Natty.

The next day we took a walking tour around campus and, again, things had changed. New buildings erected and old ones torn down but the sunbathing girls were just as hot. After a late lunch and some of the best Cuban food in town we headed out to our old bar to see if the stink eye we were getting upon its mentioning was justified. The same bartenders who hate themselves and every drunk patron still work or frequent there. The same band plays the same cover songs and the same giant projector plays the same college football games. The only thing that changed were the people. Our bar used to be fun because we would run into another friend every five steps we took. But now I recognized no one save for the two friends I came with, and now I felt like the older brother, trying to relive my glory days vicariously through a younger brother.

The next morning we set out to Sarasota, did some early evening fishing and stayed in that night with a case each for me and my two friends. We fried up the day's catch, got blazed, and watched a foreign horror movie. The next morning, after chicken-fried steak and eggs at a local breakfast nook, we started smoking, pounding beers, and getting ready for the wedding. Our friend the groom looked happy during the ceremony and while he stepped on the glass I saw myself up there in front of everybody for a moment. I had more in common with my now-married friend than with my two bros sitting on either side of me. We both live with our respective girlfriends/wives, we both have restaurant jobs in New York, and we're both more or less moving on beyond getting wasted every minute of every day. My two bros on either side of me still spent a large amount of their income on weed, lived in their hometowns, and worked jobs that were just O.K. I know they'll eventually move up and on but, for now, they're stuck in an un-envious retelling of the previous four years.

Fun was had. Bowls were smoked. Beers were shotgunned. On my trip through my old college stomping ground I saw things and people had changed since I left and not necessarily for the better. And at my buddy's wedding I realized that no matter how much I complain about my job and living poor in New York, it's better than still being (in mindset, at least) in college. What happens when a bro grows up? He keeps in contact with his bros. He works his ass off, maybe he gets himself a nice girl, and when the opportunity for a chay-cation presents itself with his old best friends, he re-drinks every beer and re-smokes every bowl he did in undergrad.