He was a wise man who Invented beer, according to Plato.
Of course I'm positive whomever HE was had to have been at least twenty one.
I say this because I, a 20 year, 11-month-old adult, was looking in the mirror recently, looking and observing. I noticed how facially different I must look compared to that of a 21 year old. I observed my ridiculous baby face, which must have screamed underage and I thought how it would be when all this suddenly changes, all in just three weeks.
I mean, it's obvious isn't it? When I turn 21 my face will solidify, my underage facial fat will dissipate, my confidence will boost as it sends out assured signs that I am indeed of age, and my liver will magically and finally be ready to filter that substance which has been consumed for millenniums.
But for now I am still too young, for whatever the reasons. The dangers are imminent. They are real. What these three weeks mean for my body, mind and liver, I don't completely understand. But what I do understand is that I am clearly not ready to drink.
Never mind the fact that nearly every other country in the world (we shall think of them as third world countries) allow such children to consume liquor, never mind the fact that various studies attribute alcohol abuse in America to the value put on drinking here in the United States, never mind what the laws used to be, I mean, come on! How many times has the U.S. government been wrong?
When I'm 21 I'm sure I'll be ready. It's not to say I haven't experimented before, but always with dire consequences. Every time I got drunk! And it should be stated as fact that this is a common characteristic of drinking under the age of 21. But I'm sure this October 5 things will be different—which is why I'll be drinking as much as humanly possible at my Beer Olympics (to which you're all invited), not because I can, but because clearly I'll be ready.
Isn't that what being 21 means? I'm not sure what training I'll go through, but what I do know is that in three weeks, I will be ready to drink. It wouldn't be the law if it weren't true.
Now I bring all this up to you because of yet another experience I had. For the past week, I've been in Reno, Nevada, the laughable offspring of Sin City.
Just about everything here requires me to be just three weeks older. Seems ironic that it took me 20 years, 11 months and one week to make it to Nevada, but nevertheless I digress.
And it didn't start in Reno. Already kicked out of a bar at Sky Harbor (I wasn't even drinking, only sitting), the tone was set as I landed in Reno to the tune of slot machines mocking me in chime.
At casinos I was given only sharp looks, angry faces at bars as I played the role of scavenger, trying to consume and gamble what my little undeveloped body would tolerate. It was a world built for someone just three weeks older.
It seemed I did not belong. "Come back in three weeks" seemed the common sentiment. Three weeks? Such strange irrationality that we all hold our ideals on, what an absurd emphasis put on fruitless time.
And while my lonesome liver and I wait, I will fret not. I'll be back and I will be ready. Ready with the same ID I've always had, ready with the same American attitude to drink as much as I shouldn't. Ready because I've waited so long, from hiding from cops to getting kicked out of bars. Ready because according to the State of Arizona, it is indeed my turn.
And while you can argue that three weeks somehow does means something, you cannot argue that in those three weeks I will change, even in the slightest. Because I am already 21 (just ask my friends), I've been 21 for years, ever since I understood what alcohol was, ever since I had a beer. My brother was 21 when he was in Iraq at the age of 20, my mother was 21 when the law was 19. You were 21 when you had a beer and didn't die. In a sense, we're all 21. Because it's just time, it's just a date. It's a fixed irrelevant that our society has been forced to abide by, and only recently.
It seems the only thing which signifies being mature enough to drink in this country and in this state is having an ID which says it. And while some may agree, I'm just not sure Plato would have thought that to be too wise after all.
Reach the reporter at: joshua.spivak@asu.edu.
