post-work happy hour, oh how i hate thee I don't particularly get along with the people I work with. It's not really that I don't like them, I just don't relate to them. For one, the average age in my department is about 22. For most of them, this is their first post-college job. Most are not married and have no kids. Most are still clinging desperately to their college years, which included binge drinking, fraternity-belonging, and expensive-private-school-attending. Maybe I just missed out on the whole college experience, but I was never into the whole get-drunk-every-other-night-and-wake-up-in-strange-locations-and-don't-know-how-I-got-there thing even when I was in college. Now that I'm more then six years out of college, I certainly have no interest in those things (okay, technically I was in graduate school as recent as eleven months ago, but when you're 27 years old, raising a baby, working, and studying eighty hours a week, I don't think it counts).

I have really tried to get along with the people I work with. But conversations I like to participate in don't generally revolve around drinking, throwing up, and hazing. And to make matters worse, I'm the "new guy," having just started on this team about two months ago. So people have probably formed one or more of the following opinions of me at this point: a) I'm a prude, b) I'm a snob, or c) I'm incredibly shy. I'm sorry if I don't contribute to your conversation, but I really do have nothing to add. When the conversation comes down to how certain fraternities' hazing rituals compare to those of competing fraternities, what am I supposed to say? My true feelings? That I think hazing is silly and that fraternities are basically just a way for rich kids to buy friends? And when talk shifts to preferred drinks, can I tell them that I like Pepsi and iced tea?

This all brings me to yesterday, the day of the "team happy hour," when all members of my team get together and do the same thing, only this time with alcohol directly involved, as opposed to just as the main topic of conversation. As you can imagine, I had absolutely zero interest in spending real money and real time to go to this, but there was this tremendous peer pressure. "Come on, it'll be fun." So I ran through all the potential excuses in my mind: "I don't want to go." This would never work. It only leads to more whining about how much fun it will be. "I don't drink." Then I'm destined to be completely alcohol-free for my working life. "I don't like you people." No comment. "I'm a recovering alcoholic." That would make them feel guilty for pushing all the alcohol on me, but it would also lead to lots of gossip. "My wife and kid have been sick and I need to go home and take care of them." This is the one I went with, and it's even kind of true. They were sick over the last couple of weeks. We all were. It was miserable. We're all pretty much better now. But I can still go home and take care of them, right? You'd think this would be good enough. You'd be wrong, though. They just told me, in so many words, to ditch the fam, come out and have fun.

I chuckled politely and went on my way. How funny, you're telling me to desert my family to go get drunk with people I don't like. Good one. I just think if I don't want to participate in their drinking activities, that's my decision. What if I was a recovering alcoholic? They don't know me. For all they know I am a recovering alcoholic. Do you really want to be responsible for my falling off the wagon? Well, do you?!
  ¶ monger187 wrote this on 11/10/2004