I'm not a big birthday celebrator. I'm not the type to make a big thing and invite all my friends out or throw a party.

My close friends know this, so usually I'll do something more

low-key with my family or close friends. One year in particular, after I went to dinner with my

family, three of my friends were texting me trying to make plans to go out and do something.

Not out to bars or anything, we were only 19 at the time and didn't have fake IDs. My friend Jay

has a Jeep, so he suggested we

go night off-roading on one of the trails about a half hour from our houses. It was this really

huge state park that had trails big enough to off-road on. He had done it before. Technically,

you're not allowed to, but past dark, nobody's in those woods. Since my birthday's in July, the days are

really long. It doesn't get pitch black until around 9 o'clock, and I'd say that was around

the time we started heading over to the park. My friend Carl brought a bunch of weed, and my other

friend Joey brought a handle of vodka to celebrate my birthday. The plan was to hotbox the car in the middle of the woods

and just get really fucked up. Jay wouldn't be partaking in the alcohol since he was driving.

So past a certain hour, the entrance to the state park's parking lot would be conned off. But since

there's no night security guards, it's easy to just get out and move one of the cones and drive

around it. We just were

on the lookout for any cops before entering the parking lot. Once we passed the entrance, there was a

somewhat long stretch of a narrow one-way road with woods on either side, and then eventually

it led to the big open parking lot, which also was surrounded by woods on three sides and then

baseball fields in a playground on another. Jay knew

exactly where to go to get to the trails, which were technically for walking, but they were

plenty wide enough to drive on according to him. We made sure there were no cops sitting in the

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