October 16, 2007

Meatstick
The man, the myth, the legend

Bill O'Connor | managing editor
woconnor@smcvt.edu

If I told you about my friend Taylor, it may not ring a bell, but you know the St. Michael’s senior regardless.

Maybe instead of Taylor, you know him as Meatstick. But maybe not.

Maybe you just know Taylor as that guy behind the bar who’s ripping beer can lids off with his teeth and head butting the wall while singing “Rock Lobster.”

Regardless of how you know him, one thing is for sure, Taylor is an original; a St. Michael’s character that will be immortalized in stories passed down through the ages. He is Meatstick: The man, the myth, the legend.

• • •

When you meet Meatstick, the first thing you notice is his voice. Meatstick is loud. Loud like a 6’2”, 220 lb. 3-year-old laughing hysterically when the cartoon dog pops onto the television screen shrugging after a perfect round of Duck Hunt.

The second thing you notice is that Meatstick is big. It doesn’t take seeing him running down the rugby pitch on a kickoff screaming “I GOT CHASE,” to figure out that he’s probably not someone you want get into a scuffle with. After all… his nickname is Meatstick.

Meatstick earned his nickname when another St. Michael’s character, the recently graduated Steve Munroe (though you may better know him as Drunk Steve), pegged Taylor at a rugby practice Taylor’s freshman year, screaming, “Hey, Meatstick, get over here.” Taylor responded to Munroe’s call, and the rest was history.

Meatstick breaks things. And not just bones (of his own, he says he’s broken 10, of others on the football field or rugby pitch… who knows?).

No, Meatstick has also been known to break ceilings, walls, and Alliot lunch tables. Acquaintances will tell you it’s because he’s clumsy, close friends will tell you it’s because he’s an idiot. As Meatstick’s longtime friend Connor Sullivan once told him: “Taylor, we need to get you a shirt that says ‘I ruin everything.'"

Don’t be fooled by his close friends' claims though, Meatstick is clearly not an idiot; his SAT score was 1420 (back in the days when SAT scores were out of 1600). As one of his roommates Mark Gould says, “Taylor is probably one of the most intelligent people I know, you’d just never guess it because he’s Taylor.”

Or as Meatstick himself once drunkenly proclaimed to me as I was attempting to write a sports column, “I’m [expletive deleted] smart, give me a room with rubber walls and I’ll write you the best [expletive deleted] sports column ever.”

What makes Meatstick a legend aren’t his not-so-subtle characteristics or personality traits, but the feats that he has accomplished as a St. Michael’s student.

Many can lay claim that they have drank so much that they “blacked-out” on St. Michael’s notorious P-Day, but how many can claim that they have told this fact to Lou DiMasi while still inebriated?

Meatstick can.

After Meatstick lifted a friend up in the air on P-Day of his freshman year, DiMasi came over to make sure the boys weren’t fighting and see if everything was alright. Witnesses recount that Meatstick naturally told DiMasi, “Yeah everything’s fine; I’m just black-out drunk.”

Needless to say Meatstick didn’t spend the rest of P-Day enjoying the festivities.

No doubt each year sees a decent number of St. Michael’s students escorted to ACT 1, a detox facility for college students in Burlington, but how many students can say that they’ve been kicked out of ACT 1?

Meatstick can.

Meatstick says that he unknowingly broke the rules students in ACT 1 are required to follow, which include not talking with other students at the facilities, mainly because he was too drunk to remember being read the rules upon arrival.

In movies and on TV, when someone is confronted in a bar or restaurant, they might flip over a table full of food and drinks. In reality, how many people have actually done something that dramatic and over the top? Not many may be an understatement.

But Meatstick has.

Senior Evan Sivo says that one night in Canada, in a bar, Meatstick and another friend were goofing around with each other and Meatstick just stood up laughing and flipped a table over.

As the bouncer slowly walked over, Meatstick calmly greeted him, asking the rhetorical question, “It’s time for me to go now, isn’t it?”

And how many people do you know who can do this.

Meatstick is truly one of a kind. He pays homage to the great figures of college folklore, the Daniel Simpson Days and John “Bluto” Blutarsky’s of the world. Like them, Meatstick is a man of few words, a man instead of action.

Or as he has been known to say, “Meatstick likey beer. Meatstick smash.”