Sometimes I will drink a single Cape Codder and relax. I don’t drink much; I pretty much quit while working at a brewery, oddly enough. That brewery makes a mean canned Cape Codder, however, and I am going to have one. I wrote a beautiful, lengthy essay this evening, only to decide I hated it. It’s due tomorrow, but I’m just cooked. It’s also 2 AM, so I am not going to get any smarter tonight.

I take a bunch of pills and shit, so drinking more than one of these bad boys would put me on my ass. Way back when, a six-pack was just the pregame, but if I had six beers now, I would be hungover for two days. There was definitely a time in my life when I had problems with alcohol. What made me never drink wasn’t some wild epiphany or a sit-down intervention or any of that. I just got really tired of feeling like shit all the time. 

When you work at a brewery that also sells cocktails and spirits, it’s an infinite free booze glitch. It’s awesome for a while, but the fun slowly erodes without you even noticing. So many cool people that I met working there were profoundly sad at times, and in those moments we all cracked jokes about taking it easy. 

We never did, though. Before the place became a mega-corp, we were cracking beers at 10 am. We needed to taste-test them so we could accurately describe the mouthfeel (it’s a thing) to the customers. When the assistant manager was running the morning shifts, she would pour way too many tiny cups, and we would all be half-in-the-bag by noon. My manager was a very professional lady. She worked hard and often. She was nice but also direct, and we were all motivated to do good by her. I thought she was great before I even knew there were weekday morning shifts where the OGs got a little wild. I was honored to be scheduled on those days.

I would love to go back someday. It’s fun and chill. I left on my own terms, but it was pretty obvious that I was going through something and that something overtook me. Even though they were all very understanding, I am way too embarrassed to go back. It was a good job, though.

Initially, me and this other dude were hired to only work in the parking lot. Eventually, we got so busy that all the guests just whipped by us to park wherever they wanted, so we were both brought inside, given excellent raises, and sent on our way. We had a bond as the parking lot dudes. 

There was one time where I was having a bitch of a time pouring a Czech lager. There’s a whole trick to it where you submerge the nozzle and pour at a specific angle. It’s fucking hard. Pouring in general can be tricky, but these lager pulls made me want to drown myself inside a keg. My homie from the parking lot saw me struggling, and we always picked each other up. I was doing poorly, and we were super busy, so he jumped into action. Hundreds of patrons, most of whom consider watching you pour their beer properly as part of the experience, just lined up. There had to be about 100 people in our tap room, and I felt every eye.

This fucking guy, while cheering me up and giving me some tips, had one nugget of knowledge that will stick with me for the rest of my life.

“When you’re pouring, you just gotta let your balls hang, brother.”

I’ll never forget the swag he said it with. You can’t fake that kind of confidence. What a great dude.

There are many times in my life since then when I have come into a situation and said to myself, “You just gotta let your balls hang,” since then. It’s perfect for any pressure situation. Take, for instance, the essay this evening that has driven me to drink. Tomorrow, I’m going to write the shit out of it, and you bet your ass my balls will be confidently hanging (metaphorically).

I’m feeling less angry about having to completely scrap multiple pages of my work now that I have had this delicious cranberry treat. I wasted hours of my life, and the only thing to show for it is this stupid story.

Stay crescent fresh,

JTC