Feeling irresponsible

For the last several days I’ve been thinking about what it would feel like to be irresponsible. I’m trying to determine if it is a good feeling or a bad feeling. I tend to err on the side of being responsible. I always have. I’ve long thought that my word and a handshake should be as good as a contract. For the most part it is and that has lead to a very responsible life.

Tomorrow I really would like to go hiking or go to the beach (or both), but it doesn’t look like it is going to happen. My list for tomorrow is as follows: clean rabbit cage, build better rabbit pen, fix broken rabbit hutch, build compost bin, level garden, pull weeds, hoe rows, connect water to garden, return stuff to Lowe’s, finish up at Brian’s place, write up bills, do laundry, clean room, clean bathroom and go hiking. Because these are all things that either need to get done or I said will get done – I need to do them. What I wish I had the ability to do though was to say – Screw it, I’m going to Angel Island.

And that’s really what I’ve been thinking about – why can’t I do that? Why can’t I let go of the consequences and just do? I don’t drink alcohol or date girls that drink because I may be allergic. I don’t smoke because it will probably cause lung cancer. I don’t drive fast, switch lanes erratically or blow past red lights because I might lose control and I might hurt someone or myself. If I say I’m going to do something I do because if I don’t I might leave someone in a bind. In high school Lanae and I used at least one if not two forms of birth control because otherwise we might get her pregnant. I don’t pick up girls at bars and sleep with them because they might have a disease that I would then give to my future wife. I don’t screw around with married girls because it might cause a divorce that would affect the children or I might get her knocked up and then what would we do? I obey the posted speed limit in residential because there might be a kid and, as much as I like having new clients, I do want to hurt a kid. I think it’s really unfair that while I’ve always paid my bill on time and never missed a payment, my credit card company keeps raising my interest rates to help offset all of those people that are defaulting on their credit cards. But do I keep paying – heck yeah. Why? Because I might buy a house or go to grad school some day in the future and I don’t want my credit score screwed with. Also, they agreed to loan me the money and so I agree to pay it back on the crappy terms we agreed to at the time of the loan.

Why can’t I just say screw it and walk away? When others seem to be able to do it so easily – what is it about the maybe’s, the might’s and the possibly’s that have such a hold on me.

Last night I was talking to a friend about God. She was talking about her desire to give up on God. What has He done for her lately that she should trust Him to do anything for her? Knowing the house I grew up in, she asked me why I never gave up. I told her that I had thought about it. I’ve weighed the options: Do I get home safely because in every closing prayer of every meeting I go to someone says “and please bless we all get home safely” or have I gotten home safely because I’m a good driver, my parents taught me how to drive defensively and I obey most traffic signs? When I pray for His spirit (Christlike persona) to be with me and then on some weeks I don’t pray at all and I for the most part feel no different – then why not just forget about Him and go on living my life as I want to? All I could tell her was that there is a God and He probably is in charge and if He is and I give up on Him – then that wouldn’t be very responsible of me. So for now – I put some of my trust in Him on some things and others not so much. Because I said I would (to my mom) and because it is the responsible thing to do. But that doesn’t stop me from wondering what it would feel like to say Screw it and not care if there is or is not a God. I wonder if it would feel anything like it would to say screw it to my credit card, or my reluctance to pick up girls in the bar or my reluctance to blow off my household responsibilities and go to the beach.