The Walk of Shame

By staff writer Ali Wisch

The walk of shame. We’ve all done it, we’ve all seen some one do it, and we’ll all do it again. For those of you who are not familiar with the walk of shame (a.k.a. those kids who don’t apply to the “everybody at college gets laid” rule) the walk of shame is simply the icing on the morning after cake. You’ve already woken up at an ungodly hour—that time around six in the morning when your drunkenness has just worn off and you would drink water out of your dog’s bowl to get something other than Miller Lite in your system—to find that you are not in your bed. In fact, you are actually in some guy’s bed, with that guy, trapped naked under the weight of his hairy bicep.

So what do you do? The same thing any normal half-wasted college kid would do: get out of bed without waking this stranger up, get on your clothes, and get the hell out of there. Does this ever work? No. It is never that simple.

First let's admit the obvious: the guy will probably wake up. No, he didn’t wake up for his exam at three in the afternoon the day before, however he will wake up this very morning to find you, naked, stumbling around his room in the dark in search of your clothes. In an ideal situation he would either A) Pretend he didn’t wake up and allow you to slip out unnoticed or B) Turn on his bedside light, help you find your clothes, and offer to give you a ride back to your place. Unfortunately for you though, this is a college guy, so the most plausible situation is that he will sit up in bed, look at you like a deer caught in headlights, and ask you to get him a glass of water so he can buy a few minutes to try and remember your name. Let’s face it though, you couldn’t remember his name if it was stenciled on the headboard of his bed.

So, to be a nice guest, you throw on a towel, and walk in search of some water. You run into a roommate, who looks a tad bit too familiar...did you hook up with him before? You can’t remember. You then grab a cup off of the kitchen counter, find that it is filled with a sticky residue, instead grab the Brita filter right out of the fridge, and bring it back to your mystery host.

By this point, he’s passed out again, and hopefully will awake to think the whole thing was a dream. That is, until he finds your underwear. Because as you and I both know, you always leave with less than you came with. You’ve been rummaging through his shit for about a half hour now only to find condom wrappers and boxer shorts. Finding your Victoria’s secret silk thong would be as likely as remembering this guy’s name. You find your jeans inside out and beer-stained, try to get them on without falling on your ass, grab your jacket and head out the door.

You have now entered Phase 1 of the walk of shame. Phase 1 starts when you try to get your bearings. Where are you and how did you allow yourself to stray this far from civilization? As you stand in the lobby of the dorm contemplating this, you must realize ladies, you are that girl. Everybody knows that if you are standing in a dorm lobby wearing your clothes from the night before with a puzzled look on your face, you probably have no idea where you are or how to get back to your dorm. So you play it cool, throw your hair up in a ponytail, and walk out the front door.

Ah-ha, West Hall! You’ve been here before. So you're thinking this is a good thing until you realize what it means. You probably DID hookup with this guy’s roommate. In college when you commit this act (the act of hooking up with two guys who are roommates), you may as well brand yourself with a scarlet letter. You decide you’ll play it off like nothing happened and you enter phase two of the walk of shame.

Phase 2 of the walk is by far the toughest part. You would rather spend the rest of your life working at McDonald's than make the dreaded walk back to your shoebox. You begin the walk down College Street towards your hall and find a little bit of solace in this disaster. You are not the only one making this walk! Actually, you see other people making this walk, and give them a smile and a nod because you have now shared a special bond. Is that the girl from your sociology class? Haha, you knew she wasn’t as goody goody as she pretended to be. You give her a little wave and smirk, for she is not as happy to be seeing you, and continue on your way.

You are now halfway back to your dorm, winded, and wondering what geniuses decided to build your campus on Mount Freakin’ Everest. As you are contemplating this you are also wondering who all of these people popping up are. A biker? A jogger? People actually get up in the morning and exercise? My god, you are a waste of life. You look up and yes, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. You can see the tippy top of your dorm building and boy does it look pretty.

You then break into a minor sprint, and reach your dorm out of breath and sweating. You walk up to your door only to find that your roomies have pleasantly posted "Lily’s out getting laid" on the white board, wipe it off with your sleeve and respond with a generous f-you. After all, you have just made the walk of shame and are in no mood to play nice. You strip off your clothes, throw on a college kid’s most important two articles of clothing—the sweatpants and the hoodie—and climb up into bed. After all, you can't fall into bed because it is stacked on top of two dressers and some bricks. You then pass out only to wake up, go to dinner, get dressed, and get ready to do it all again. We all know you will.