The events that lead up to chipping my front left tooth, for the third time, started way before I was drunk in a hotel room in Memphis. They started when I was drunk at a Clutch concert in February of 2008. I was at the concert with my then roommate Adam and Clutch had been playing a lot of songs off their album From Beale Street to Oblivion. We were both about 6 MGD’s in and I asked Adam,
“Have you ever been to Beale Street (in Memphis)?”
Adam replied, “No.”
“Do you want to go?” I asked.
Adam’s eyebrows raised, eyes lit up and he exclaimed, “FUCK YES!”
Throughout the rest of the set list we kept talking about when we’d go, how we’d get there, etc…you know, all the logistics of an impromptu road trip.
The morning after the concert I woke up with a moderate hangover. I stumbled down stairs and thought the rest of the burrito, that I barley remember eating the night before, would nurse me back to health. Adam was sitting on the couch watching tv and asked,
“Do you still want to go to Memphis?”
“Not this exact moment, but yes.”, I replied.
That Monday at work, I received an email at about 2 PM. The subject line read “Beale Street” and the body simply read “Joel, Evan, and Anthony are in. 2 weekends.”. Having no girlfriend and only a couple of friends in Chicago, I really didn’t think 48 hours ahead, let alone 2 weeks. The only thing in my foreseeable future was my brother’s wedding, in 3 weeks. I put in my word and agreed, hence booking my ticket in Adam’s ‘98 Chevy Malibu.
The weekend of the trip, Anthony and Joel arrived on Thursday night. Evan lived in South Carolina and would be meeting us in Tennessee. After work on Friday, I picked up Anthony and Joel, then sped to pick up Adam from work on the South Side. About a quarter after 4 we were on I-57 bound for Booze and Blues. The drive itself sucked. It was long, the scene remained the same…fields and railroad tracks. We were also very giddy to get to Memphis and start drinking.
Friday night. We cruised into town at around 11:30PM. Evan met us at the hotel. We walked three blocks to Beale Street and had our first whiskey sours in hand at midnight. My first impression of the place was just as I thought…heavy pours, good live music, and rickety bars. We had several more drinks and headed back to the hotel knowing we had a party marathon the next day.
Saturday. There was a consolidated wake up around 9AM and we started to plan out what we were going to do all day. It netted out to a simple plan. Walk to Beale Street and drink. Being excited and still a little drunk I started to jump on the bed, bouncing off my stomach then my back. On one back bounce I landed high on the top of my back and my knee quickly found it’s way to my mouth. I sat down and felt that all to familiar feeling…my tongue sliding from one perfect tooth over to a chipped, jagged, hillbilly chicklet. Having knocked teeth out before I knew the first all-important step, find the tooth.
After searching through the covers for 5 minutes I managed to find the needle in the haystack. I was elated! But then quickly snapped back to reality. Where the fuck was I going to 1. Find a dentist 2. Find a dentist that would take a walk in. 3. Find a dentist that would take a walk in on a Saturday at 9:30 AM. To make it even harder, all of the local businesses, except bars, were closed because the University of Memphis men’s basketball team was playing in the Final Four. After walking around a 4-block radius, tooth in hand, for a dentist office, I changed my strategy. I knew there would be no way to find a dentist and get work done. I remembered a temporary dental solution used by soccer and hockey player friends of mine. Find super glue and glue that thing back in. Now I was looking for a hardware store, which seemed harder than finding a dentist office. After a 45-minute search, I found nothing. Feeling defeated I walked back to the hotel. In a last ditch effort I stopped into the gift shop.
“Can I help you sir?” asked the clerk.
“You got any super glue?” I asked.
To my excitement, she replied, “Sure do. What kind ya need? Red package or green?”
In astonishment, I hesitated to reply.
“Errr. Ummm.” I looked at the packages. One had a picture of a construction worker holding on to and hanging from his hat that was super glued to the product package lettering. “If that shit is strong enough to hold a 200-pound man, it can certainly hold this tooth in”, I remembered joking to myself.
“Green.” I said to the clerk.
That day and night we had a blast. I was checking my tooth all day and to my surprise it felt really stable. In fact it ended up staying in all weekend. When I got back home to Chicago I tried to make a dentist appointment but could not get in anywhere until the following week. I was really nervous because that weekend was my bro’s wedding and I didn’t want to be the “smiling all weird to hide a chipped tooth guy” in his pictures. The day before the wedding I did a quick re-glue job. The day after the wedding, I woke up missing the tooth. I must have lost it while eating pizza at the after party the night before. Three months later I saw the wedding pics…they turned out great!
Here is Steve with his chipped toof.
And here's Steve after he super-glued his toof.
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