Your Most Cringe-Inducing Memories Serve a Very Important Evolutionary Purpose

Sarah was a beautiful blonde beach girl. She snorted when she laughed and had this perpetually raspy voice, like she had this cold that never went away. Both qualities were oddly charming.

We lived in my hometown of Virginia Beach and were planning to meet up at a local house party.

I was your typical insecure teenager who overcompensated and tried too hard to be cool. I was worried about what to wear and had checked my hair three times in the mirror before leaving. An hour later, I was immersed in a loud party without a parent in sight.

We stood on the second floor, talking in a hallway full of people. The house was packed. Sarah still hadn’t arrived. I turned to my friend and said, “Well, I am going downstairs to refill my beer.”

And just as I got to the stairwell, it was like an invisible hand came and pushed me from behind. I tumbled down the stairs head over feet several times— and not in the charming way you see in movies where you land, dust yourself off and take a bow.

I hit my head and elbows on the wall with loud thuds, and eventually splatted face down on the kitchen floor. My hair was mopped over my face. My shirt was ripped and soaked in beer. I sat up to see a room full of people quietly looking at me, and sure enough, there was Sarah, staring down with a concerned, but pitying face.

This moment became an endless well of embarrassment that I couldn’t fill with concrete. I still think of it occasionally, for no reason and with no provocation.