Corrigan's Corner: The Worst Night of My Life

They say when you’re about to die, your whole life flashes before your eyes. Apparently, I’m a bit of a pessimist as the only memories to arise were horrendously dark moments of despair:

I shit myself at the YMCA when I was 3 years old.

On my fifth Christmas, my father revealed that Santa wasn’t real. Like the Easter Bunny and global warming, the jolly fat man was a myth designed to scam people out of money. We couldn’t be scammed, Dad whispered with a hint of Banker’s on his breath, because we had no money.

On September 12, 2001, I got a demerit for not doing my homework. I pleaded with Sister Maria Annette to show mercy, begging her to let me slide because after all, our nation was in mourning.

During freshman year of high school, I struck out in the ninth inning with bases loaded, costing my CYO team a chance in the playoffs.

Shortly after, I was diagnosed with scoliosis, curtailing my promising athletic career.

I ate a McRib on a Friday during Lent.

In my senior year at Temple, my girlfriend of three years broke up with me, sending me into a whirlwind of alcohol and drug-dependent depression.

I ran over my brother’s iguana the next day, murdering his cherished pet.

On my 20^th birthday, I learned I was adopted. My father’s penis was out of order, like the escalator at Boscov’s, so he encouraged my mother to be artificially inseminated by a ramblin’ man, an early 90s Big Dick Dudley, if you will.

I voted for Gary Johnson in the 2012 presidential election, essentially pissing away my vote, a freedom which countless men and women sacrificed their lives for.

In early 2015, I was laid off from my first full-time job, stranding me in Alabama without family, friends or another employment opportunity.

My glasses broke the morning of my trek back to Philly, forcing me to drive 13+ hours in blindness, surrounded by pillows and speakers and a blender, household amenities that couldn’t fit into my trunk due to the cat piss-stained recliner I bought for 20 bucks from a Guatemalan missionary.

In September of 2016, I began editing Levin’s pieces.

All of the memories above pale in comparison to the horror, the heartbreak, the travesty of January 29, 2017.