In my early years of college, I was editor-in-chief of our campus newspaper. The first decision I made under that title had nothing to do with breaking news or investigative stories, however. Instead of getting down to business, I planned a party.

It was kind of business-related. I thought it would be cool to have a summer bonfire at one of the local beaches as kind of a get-to-know informal event, so editors could befriend some of the incoming writers and vice versa. We’d have a united staff, I thought, bonded equally by our love of sniffing out the news and the strong friendships that would stem out of this gathering. It was gonna rock.

And initially, at least 30 staff members also thought it was gonna rock, all agreeing to come after we settled on a date in August that worked with everyone’s schedule. As it drew nearer, I started stocking up on goodies like booze and s’more ingredients.

On the day of the bonfire, people slowly trickled in — until the attendee flow just stopped completely. In all, seven people, including myself, showed up. I’ll never forget the moment we gathered around the fire, outnumbered by the boxes and grocery bags that lay before us. I sat there lost in my thoughts of failure in bringing our staff together. But then I heard a laugh, breaking my concentration. “Well, we can have a bottle each,” he said, pointing to the cooler full of vodka, rum and juice. Hmm. There was a bright side after all.

So there we were, all seven of us, with a gazillion boxes of graham crackers, a boatload of family-size Hershey bars and an estimated 3 pounds of marshmallows. And at least 10 bottles of top-shelf rum and vodka.

We drank like kings that night.

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