The Enigma of a Bachelor Party
Notes on Sanctified Chaos
I. EXUBERANCE
Disregard the marathon-not-sprint nonsense. This is a sprint. So you take off, vices at the ready, with unwavering spirits. The first day is about reacquainting yourself with those ever-shrinking shreds of your lost-boy youth. Senses reel — lips numb, cheeks flush, pupils dilate, and even the palm tree seems to whisper secrets.
II. INTROSPECTION
You greet dawn with paralyzing fatigue. Your mind considers self-castigation as you spend the morning tête-à-bowl with porcelain. Brugal enters and exits from the same hole. Your dependence on vices is unrelenting, but their allure and novelty begin to wane. Historically, vulnerability falls by the wayside; tonight, as spirits calm, we’re open books.
You ask a question—nothing too threatening, obfuscating details wherever necessary. Eventually, the dam breaks and like mistimed fireworks—under cover of liquid and pharmacological courage—you all contend with careers, impossible real-estate prices, purpose, and the lab-grown vs. natural diamond debate.
Pain and pleasure reveal themselves in an unsurprisingly laconic manner. And, however momentarily, loneliness abates; shared confessions and mundane admissions reveal a reverence for the shared fears that encompass growing up.
III. THE ODYSSEY HOME
Hangover, meet Zenith. You want nothing to do with people for the next 72 hours. The airport’s hot. Flight, delayed. All you need is the cold airplane, that aisle seat, and the extra quarter-inch of legroom that ran you $47. All’s quiet on the boarding front.
But just like Odysseus, the journey home has a few more treats in store, like the gentleman in the middle seat.
As the plane ascends, you consider proposing new legislation to outlaw men with enlarged prostates for consuming beverages on a flight, let alone a family-sized portion of Diet Coke. Between him getting up 70 times and your body’s inability to detox at 37,000 feet, recovery is an afterthought. Now we greet all those responsibilities we so willingly left behind just 72 hours prior. At this altitude, discomfort and regret make for unwelcome travel companions.
But a cursory glance at a passenger’s phone stops the spiralling. You catch sight of someone beaming as she swipes through a collection of new memories. And like a stranger yawning across the way, you can’t stop the involuntary mimicry. Pain and anxiety subside. But only for a moment. You face another hiccup: the giddy teenager four rows in front of you thought it best to Prom-pose to his Juliet. Can 300 people clapping kill someone? You’re about to find out.
A quick blink and you’re home, in bed, with half a bottle of Tums doing God’s work.
Alone, you’re left wondering: What was it all for?
IV. UNRAVELLING THE KNOT
A bachelor trip is just hedonism's brief intermission. Or so you tell yourself, even as you catch your reflection studying those concealed corners of your identity. Is it an elegy to youthful freedom and an ode to embracing future commitment? For the groom-to-be, maybe. But not for you, right?
Right?
V. EPIPHANY
Bridging life’s chapters, you’ll often find a gap—an empty page. That canvas serves as a sanctuary—a moment of pause. Between the worn pages of who you were and the crisp sheets of who you'll become, these blank spaces hold your confessions, Brugal-soaked revelations, and shared terrors of growing up. Here, even the silence speaks volumes. It affords us time to honestly grapple with who we are and who we want to be.
VI. A REVELATION
Give way to debauchery; all rise for communion.