2002-08-26 - 1:03 p.m.
On guilt, employment, and Mondays

"Monday Monday ... Can't trust that day ..."

In the mood I'm in, gotta say, truer words were never sung. What a day. What a week, actually ... month ... year ... whatever. My alarm's been "malfunctioning" lately, my car's acting like it either got a bad batch of gasoline or the fuel injector's going out, I was supposed to watch that "ADD Mind" video for my Dr.'s appointment today and only managed about half of it, PLUS I left the stupid video at home so I'm going to have to leave work even earlier to swing by the duplex and pick it up ...

Mom super-styled my hair for the family reunion we went to on Saturday, and you know, it looked good. She used a couple of those comb things, half a gallon or so of hairspray, and much wielding of the curling iron to tame and supplement the natural wave. I liked ... until I got home and took a shower. Then, I remembered why I never do that myself!! Three scrubbings with shampoo and a fistful of shed hair later, it was finally clean and silky again. Waste of time, resources (shampoo, hairspray) and hair health. No more.

I was late for work today, actually. Long story. I'll be leaving early, too, for the appointment. I'll probably manage to scratch down 5.5 hours of work, since I'm not taking lunch. That's only about 2/3 of a normal day ... but even with that reduction, I still got a chew-out from my supervisor for not performing to her specifications.

I am never, ever, ever going to hold out until December, no matter how much my cousin and brother want me to work with them. God help me, I'm about ready to just quit, period, no safety net attached. If I didn't have so many bills ... and if my brother hadn't quit his second job, which means he can't keep paying the duplex rent without my help ...

I am familiar with this feeling. This is the feeling I had that last semester of college, when even the few friends I had were pulling back, my car (poor Lady Jane) got totalled by that uninsured driver, none of my classes were especially exciting, and I didn't have a job lined up yet. It's like walking the edge of a cliff with the dirt constantly crumbling beneath your feet; you can't stop or you'll fall, your legs are weary, and you can't see where the next piece of sturdy ground is.

"Feel no shame for what you are ... Feel no shame for what you are ..."

That's from a song called "New Year's Prayer," I think. It's been stuck in my head, off and on, since I started watching that show "The Dead Zone" on the USA channel. Interesting show. A little confusing, and a little weird, but it's got me hooked. Funny how I like it, when I absolutely can't stand "Crossing Over with John Edwards" -- they're both "psychic" shows. Perhaps it's because the former's entertainment, the latter's realtime, and I can't stand watching Mr. Edwards skillfully draw details out of people to feed into his "contact with the dead" and give them false resolution.

As far as I've noticed in the three or so episodes I saw, Mr. Edwards *always* has positive messages to pass on. It's mostly reassurance, I-Love-You, family messages, that sort of thing. Never anger, rage, resentment, or the like. That strikes me as odd. Let's just postulate for a moment that the dead aren't in some sort of separate afterlife, i.e. Heaven, and *are* able to contact the world of the living through mediums. It seems only logical that the most passionate of the hangers-about would be the ones pushing to the front of the line to speak. Seems to me that hatred, etc. are powerful emotions ... there should be *some* of them mixed in.

After all, from what I've read of mediums and the like, there ain't no picking and choosing once you open yourself up. The spirits just grab you. He should NOT be able to select which ones he's going to listen to and block out the others. So where's the negative crowd? And, come to think of it, where's his backup? Shouldn't he be worried about some more powerful being getting out of control and him not being able to get rid of them? If you're going to pretend *any* aspects of this belief structure are real, you'd better be prepared for *all* eventualities. Not just the ones that induce people to pay you money.

But then again, this world in general doesn't seem to believe much in the dark. When bad things happen, it's because someone was mentally defective, or distracted, or improperly brought up, or insufficiently educated, whatever, as if everyone's naturally good at heart; "if everyone's inner light were allowed to shine, the world would be perfect."

Bullshit. Look at a roomful of two-year-olds interacting with each other. THAT is what we're like at heart. They may be innocent, but they're sure as hell not NICE. It takes effort, and strong beliefs/morals, to be NICE by nature. Sugarcoating the world will only make it harder for people to deal with reality when it smacks them in the face.

Another way to look at it: If you were feeling guilty for being an asshole just before your sister died, under which circumstances are you more likely to tone down your assholeness in the future? If you're still worried about the badness of your actions and thus watching yourself, or if some medium tells you she's forgiven you and you can stop feeling guilty? There's a reason for guilt, you know. It's not necessarily a bad thing, as long as the thing you're feeling guilt over is indeed something you can control.

Fast-food, gotta have it now, me me me. It's infected us all.