Parade Day weekend is upon us.

While Irish eyes are smiling, they could make the most unfortunate faces look like pots of gold. When you are out with your friends this weekend, make sure they aren’t kissing any regrettable Blarney Stones. Being the sober friend on Parade Day is a life changing experience. Have you considered changing some lives?

It happens every year, the day starts out normal and fun. Drinking is casual. Friends hang out huddled up in groups. Everyone is chatting, sipping their drinks and listening to the music. Flash forward two hours and the party is a completely different scene. Strangers are grinding up on each other and making out in corners. People are throwing up in the streets. Casual sipping has turned in to mass chugging as everyone tries to make the most out of the happy hour specials before the prices sky rocket. The lines to the bathroom seem endless and all you want to do is kiss a fool, eat a cheeseburger at 9 a.m., or take a nap.

This is Parade Day.

It was a really odd thing being the sober friend on Parade Day. A decade ago, I went to the parade when I was pregnant ergo making me the official car driver and babysitter to all of my friends. This was long before the days of Uber, when a cab ride from Kingston to Scranton was $75 each way and simply not an option for my group of broke 22-year-old friends. The day started out normal enough; it wasn’t my first rodeo so I knew what to expect as the hours dragged on, or so I thought. Being sober through the madness made me see Parade Day totally different.

The day started out with a line forming around the building. Tinks was the only bar that mattered that morning. As the $1 Bud Light specials started, people were going crazy. To get to the bar was nearly impossible and every one was elbow to elbow. You could spot the people who were experiencing this day for the first time and had no idea what they were getting themselves into. They were the ones ordering Irish car bombs and shot-gunning full beers at 7 a.m. People were already buzzed, or drunk, as a result of their kegs and eggs from earlier that morning. Seasoned parade veterans had lined their purses with icepacks and filed them with cheap beer rations for later. The bathrooms were already gross and out of toilet paper.

It was going to be a long day.

I was knocked around quite a bit as the day went on. I helped girls who drank too much, strangers who needed to pee or hold their hair back. If I weren’t already sober, it would have been a sobering experience. I saw a man whip out his junk and start urinating on the parade route as there were children standing nearby, it was then that I vowed the child in my belly would never attend a Parade Day.

This day was for the grown-ups.

As the day wrapped up I corralled my friends and took a head count. I made sure they all had something to eat and had switched to drinking water. I took special care to get them all home safely and I myself was ready for the excitement to end.

Being the sober friend on Parade Day was an eye-opening experience. While it’s always fun to be the not-sober-one, my friends were extremely grateful to have me in their corner and know they were going to be safe. If you’re going out this weekend, be sure to take a sober friend and if you don’t have one, make sure to download the Uber app and give your keys a rest for the day. Don’t let your friends kiss strangers and don’t pee in front of children. If someone needs their hair held, be a helper and do it.

We are all in this together.

This is Parade Day.

Melissa Hughes
https://www.theweekender.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/web1_girltalk-3.jpgMelissa Hughes

By Melissa Hughes

For Weekender

Girl Talk began in 2012 as a telltale horror story of the city’s most epic dating disasters and has evolved into a column about love, life experiences and growing up. Melissa also has a weekly Girl Talk TV segment on PA Live and WBRE.