ONE SUMMER, MY girlfriend Ivory and I decided that after all our hard partying at community college, we deserved a vacation. My parents' summer home in Martha's Vineyard would be empty until mid-July, so Ivory and I generously volunteered to look after things.

We had many rules that summer. After a long conversation about money and responsibility, we both agreed that a job would add too much pressure to our very hectic drinking schedule. At one point during that summer, when we were really broke, we were left with no choice but to join a cleaning service. It only took fifteen minutes of scrubbing the inside of a toilet for me to realize that the only time I felt comfortable facedown in one was after a hard night of margaritas. It was then that we resolved it should be men's responsibility to pay for our alcohol and whatever small amount of food was required.

Our other rules were that we were both required to lie in the sun with nothing higher than an SPF 2 and for no fewer than three hours per day. I explained to Ivory that you could get better color while actually in the ocean, but even with Cuban parents Ivory had never learned to swim. I wasn't a good enough swimmer to teach her, so instead, I bought her a pair of yellow water wings.

Ivory and I had taken enough pot to the Vineyard to last us through the end of the month. I fancied myself quite the pothead. We ended up getting so high on the drive up, however, that we rolled each and every morsel of it into finely rolled joints, then proceeded to smoke our entire supply the first night on the island. I had a similar experience with macaroni and cheese once. I haven't had either since.

One of the more enjoyable rules we came up with that summer was to photograph our victims of sexual abuse. We took pictures with every guy we brought back to the house.

One night we were at a bar playing pool with two guys. Ivory and I were on the same team and hadn't shot a single ball into a pocket when I picked one up and stuffed it in a side hole.