Happy Valentine’s Day everyone. I really mean that. I hope you all feel loved today. Tomorrow you can go back to being hated by everyone if you want, but today should be special. I’m talking to you, guy who proposed the new freedom of speech policy.

Personally, true love wasn’t in the cards for me this year, though, so I’m going to have to settle for a different kind of love: stripper love.

Any guy who has never been to a strip club will think this is stupid, and every girl will think it’s stupid regardless. All I have to say to those people is this: You don’t know what you’re talking about, but T-Pain does. Stripper love is very real.

I have fallen in love with a stripper on several occasions, and I’m not ashamed of it. You have to understand, the world doesn’t operate the same way inside a strip club as it does in the real world. You are talking to beautiful women who are paid (very, very well) to make you think they are interested in you. Imagine any girl who has ever buttered you up so you would buy her a drink, and then multiply that by a thousand. You can laugh about how ridiculous it is when you’re sitting around getting ready to go out, but once you get there and you’ve got a professional gaming you up, all bets are off.

It starts off innocently enough. You’re not naive enough to actually think you’re going to get some action at the strip club. You’re not looking to fall in love. You just want to go get drunk and see some skin. You watch the girls dance but one of them stands out for some reason. Maybe she’s not even the hottest one there, but she tickles your fancy. She can tell immediately, of course, because she is a pro. You’re a seal and she’s a shark that smells blood. That’s how it starts.

You fend off the other girls that want you to buy dances from them. Some of them are nasty, others are cute and fun to flirt with… but you’re distracted. You stall for time until your girl makes her rounds.

“What’s your name?” she asks when she finally approaches you. She totally wants you.

She thinks you have a sexy name and she also apparently thinks that she should sit on your lap. Okay, I know it sounds dumb, but seriously dude, this girl is into you. She doesn’t just say that to everybody.

Even so, you’ve got to play it cool because you know her game is tight. She’s not some drunken party girl.

You have already become naive enough to think you might actually get some action at a strip club and you’re not even finished your second beer.When she starts dancing again she’s only dancing for you. Also she’s dancing a little bit for that fat guy at the other end of the bar and kind of for your friend sitting next to you, but you know it’s mostly for you. She blushes when she catches eyes with you. After her dance she comes straight back to your lap; you’re so in. Next thing you know, you’ve bought her three drinks and you’re halfway through a $40 lapdance. You don’t get her number, but she tells you to come back and see her again. That’s basically the same thing. You’ll wonder for a good two days afterwards whether there was a real connection. After that, your dopamine levels return to normal and reality sets in: what the hell were you thinking?

It’s got all the elements of a real romance: nudity, regret, and a hefty price tag. See, who needs a girlfriend?

I just turned 21 last month, and despite what people say, it’s just a number…. a number that will turn you into an alcoholic.

My older brother took me out at midnight on my birthday with some of his friends, because none of mine are old enough yet. We went to Federal Hill and I had my initiation at a bar called Ropewalk. The group hooked me up all night. It was awesome. I must have tried a “slut” of every hair color imaginable. Also I had a lot of drinks.

Compared to the stories I’ve heard of other 21st birthday celebrations, mine was pretty tame. No one got into a fight, no one got arrested and everyone made it to a bed or couch before passing out. I got about as drunk as I can get without getting sick, and that was enough for me. There was no rush. I knew there would be plenty of debauchery in the coming months.

It’s been roughly three weeks since, and I have been drinking any chance I can get. Obviously there are the weekends and the parties, but things are getting ridiculous fast. The freedom is addicting. Every liquor store becomes fair game, and swinging by one on the way home is impossible to resist. A lot of the time I’m not even drinking to get drunk anymore; I’m just drinking because “Nip/Tuck” is on, it didn’t rain, or I’m making Tuna Helper. Those are all acceptable reasons now.

Take Monday night as an example. I got a text message from a friend I haven’t seen in a while asking what I was up to. After a little back and forth, I suggested we meet up for a beer later at Rec Room. It still tickles me that I can “meet up for a beer” anytime I want. I felt like a real grown up for the first time in my life. A few hours later we were sitting at the bar with a couple of brews, catching up on old times. We played foosball, we ate wings, we laughed, we cried. It was really mellow and relaxing.

It wasn’t long, though, until our freshly-turned-21-college-kid-side came out. I sort of forgot to take into account beforehand that my friend is an aggressive drinker and that I am easily goaded into drinking more than I want to. Pretty soon “a beer” turned into three beers, which turned into a lot of crazy shots, which turned into me running up a $30 bar tab on a Monday night.

That type of thing probably wouldn’t happen just sitting around the house, but with the power to go to bars comes the responsibility of not drinking yourself into oblivion, or bankruptcy, every night. I’m willing to tiptoe that line. My only real goal is to not end up on “True Life: I’m An Alcoholic,” “Intervention” or “Cops.”

I can honestly say that my 21st birthday was really the only birthday that changed my daily life. When I turned 18 I didn’t start buying tons of porn and cigarettes. Well, at least not the cigarettes. I guess 16 was pretty good because I was able to drive, but somehow I see being able to buy beer as more monumental.

As a side note, I have considered the fact that now I have no birthdays to really look forward to and perhaps my life will become a slow downward spiral towards senility, but those thoughts are easily drowned in legally obtained vodka.