I Do the Dew: Do You?

Alright, I have a confession. My name is Jen, and I’m a Mountain Dew addict. It’s my drug. It’s my euphoria. It’s my baby blanket of comfort and warmth and all-is-well-in-the-world. And right now, I’m sitting with a two-liter bottle cradled in my lap like a lime-green toddler.

By CC Staff

I know what you must be thinking. EVERYONE has their weaknesses. But mine’s a little out of control. Sure, some people cross the street for Starbucks instead of Dunkin’ Donuts. Sure, some people can’t make it through a bad day without a pint of the gooiest, most-fattening Ben and Jerry’s flavor (uh, did you know our favorite boys now make Cake Batter? Yeah, I know. Look out waist-line, plus-size ahoy).

But do they base their entire college existences around their indulgences? I think not.

Freshman year of college was a hard year. Hard in the sense that I didn’t make many friends, the friends I did make liked pot better, and my roommates’ parents petitioned the Dean of Students to have me expelled for being a lesbian (it created a hostile environment for their innocent little girls, who were later expelled themselves for plagiarizing their final ethics papers). I seriously considered transferring, preferably to a college with lots of ivy on the walls, and maybe a neat statue or two.

Why didn’t I transfer? Because it’s the little things in life that matter, and my school, well, my school was a Pepsi school. Not a Coke school like most of the others. A Pepsi school, meaning Mountain Dew in the vending machines, in the convenience store, in the dining hall and at every extracurricular activity. When my roommates kept me up to 4:30am every night, drunk-handcuffing their boyfriends to their beds, it was okay—I had a liter of Mountain Dew to get me through the night, or at least until my 8:30am Expository Writing class. Yeah, I got fat, but I was happy, at least as happy as any lonely, misunderstood Mountain Dew addict could be. And the cross-dressing, Mariah-loving boy across the hall? Yeah, he did the Dew too.

Years later, my obsession has dwindled a bit. My withdrawal is no longer physical, just emotional. I’ve gotten a little more health conscious in my old age, and I realize that Mountain Dew will probably kill me before I’m thirty. But I do miss the reckless abandonment of those late-night binges, the sugary-sweetness of that neon drug dripping down my throat, tickling my taste buds, partying in my stomach, and probably my liver and other vital organs.

But I still choose the Pepsi movie theater over the Coke movie theater, even if it’s further away and more expensive. I wander hallways for vending machines with that beautiful, heavenly green and orangey-red button. Some days, I even think I’d trade my semi-girlfriend for an ice-cold can.

Yeah, this is the epitome of civilization, the greatest success of mankind. And I still have half a bottle left.