The Sunday Memory Drawer - Revisiting the Littlest Bartender

Think about this. The little angel in this picture mixing your holiday cocktails. Well, it really happened.

I ran this story last year and it fits perfectly for another shot (non-alcoholic) as we approach New Year's Eve.

The Littlest Bartender.

Sounds like a new pop-up book for child alcoholics. But, indeed, that is what I was at a lot of my family's New Year's Eve parties. A bartender. The fact that I was ten years old was not an issue. When it came to cocktails and the like, my family was an equal opportunity employer. Age not a concern.

For a few years when I was a kid, my parents staged these elaborate galas to ring in whatever new year needed ringing. For some inexplicable reason, they would host this merriment in our basement, which was more than unfinished. There was no heat down there and I could never comprehend the attraction. But, that didn't stop my folks. They rolled out a linoleum floor, hid the furnace with some streamers, and then it was time to cha cha cha.

My cousins were all older and had hit puberty in a variety of degrees. They would show up at these family gatherings with whatever boyfriends and girlfriends they had at the time and then sequester themselves away from their parents in another part of the house. I once walked in on them and viewed a master class in groping. They probably thought I didn't know what they were doing. Well, I did.

Since I was not yet educated in the polite forms of sexual assault, I really had nobody to connect with it at these parties. So, I would camp out at the liquor table. My parents were so proud of the array of bottles they would feature at these soirees that I actually found photographs of nothing but booze. It was sort of my folks' stock portfolio, 85 proof.

To keep myself busy, I would help my father make the drinks. At first, I was relegated to the placement of ice cubes. Then, I graduated to the insertion of tonic, Tom Collins mix, or whatever soft beverage was being included. At some point, my father decided to go and have some fun on his own, and I would man the cocktail dispenser all by myself. Each relative would come up and direct me how to make whatever libation they were desiring. And, pretty much every exchange started with this conversation:

Relative: "Whoa, you put way too much booze in there."

Me: "Okay, I'll start over."

Relative: "No, I'll drink it."

This happened every single time. One of my relatives knocking back a drink with way too much liquor. And it's no wonder why most of them were sacked by 12:15AM. A few years ago, I found all my father's slides taken of those evenings. You can actually tell what time the photo was taken from the looks of some of those faces. In one shot, I saw some distant uncle who was modeling certain body parts made out of balloons. Like some sex-starved clown entertaining at a kid's birthday party. And, in the background of one of the slides, you can see me. Wearing a stupid New Year's hat and putting too much whiskey in somebody's sour.

Dinner last night: Sausage and peppers sandwich at Vito's.