so what was your first time?

i've been thinking about relationships lately. no no, not that type of relationship silly. i've been thinking abotu our relationships with beer. it seems like we all have a common thread of going through the initial phase of college drinking (i.e. cheap, readily available and what everyone around you seems to approve of) {hmm, that sounds more like the other kind of relationships, huh}, then sometime after college as we get jobs and have more disposable income we dump that cheap beer and start a beautiful long-term relationship with quality beer. beer that loves you back. beer that doesn't leave you empty and hollow. with a little thought i was able to pinpoint the very beginning of my new relationship with beer. here's my story, what was yours?

it was about 2 years after college. i was living at home for the summer and getting set to go off to graduate school (to be a guidance counselor, no less. lasted one semester...) and had plenty of time to hang out with my old high school buddies. one evening while enjoying a local pub's 10 cent wing night, a friend of mine cajoled me into trying a sip of his guinness, which i had always scorned as being nasty (hey i was young and dumb, forgive me). surprisingly, i kind of enjoyed the taste, it was not as bitter and nasty as the dark appearance had led me to believe. i was intrigued...

about a week later my friend tim and i met up with a couple of girls at a bar in kingston, ny. tonight, i was fated to score. little did i know, it would be with beer, not the girl ;) for some reason, i felt like trying something new (it must have been what guinness had awakened in me). i saw the bartender pour a pint of pete's wicked ale. i'd never seen pete's before, but it looked great. dark, with a nice head, but not as thick as guinness. something in me decided this was a beer that i had to try. this was a beer that a guy who scored with chicks drank. so i ordered a pete's wicked, put the creamy head to my lips and took a tentative sip. my god, i thought. what have i done? i've been depriving myself for years!!! you mean beer can taste like, well, it can have a taste? i thought of all those buds and coors lights i had downed over the last few years. i wanted to cry. luckily, i was comforted by the knowledge that i had found a new love. good beer. i finished my pint and ordered another. and another. they were each better than the first. the girls ended up going off somewhere else, but it didn't matter, because i already had a new passion in my life. sure, i still drank my share of cheap domestics over the next few years, it was cheap and i was poor, but i started trying more and more different kinds of beer and i'll always have a soft spot for guinness and pete's wicked ale for starting me down the path to beer nirvana. cheers!

andy