Wednesday, July 9, 2008

The Fear of Commitment?

In light of the fact that I just started a blog, I wanted a topic that would set the blog off with a bang. As I sat and thought to myself, and subsequently got up to use the bathroom (already walking away from my blog for "more important" things), I realized that I might have very well taken on a big commitment starting this... and then I carried that thought further... If I can't commit to a blog, what can I commit to?

Now, I'm being hard on myself, but in the past few weeks I feel like my life revolves around playing "catch-up" with various aspects of responsible, adult living. Work, bills, groceries, cooking, laundry, and cleaning (& occasionally home-improvement) take up a major portion of your adult-life. Nobody warned me. Nobody tells you this! I mean, you hear people say that the high school years were the best times of their life [Sidebar: I don't know about you, but my time in high school, while kind of fun, did not compare to college!]. Now, I'm sure your parents, if they were like mine, were always complaining about shit they had to do, but I just thought they were getting old and grumpy; so, of course I didn't take it to heart when my mom was complaining about having to pay the bills, cook dinner, help clean the house, etc. It catches you off guard too! You start working in a "real job" and bam, the real world goes, "Gotcha bitch!" In college and grad school, any night could be a party if you made it one... especially during grad school which feels like I partied during more than undergrad, but I digress.

What I wouldn't give to go back in time... I'm talking WAY back... like 5-years old way back. Man, back then, my biggest concern was whether I wanted to play indoors or outside. If I wanted to play in the sandbox, ride my bike, or play on the swingset outside, I was there. If I wanted to watch Sesame Street, Transformers, or He-man, I was doing it.

Added to those standard, adult commitments of living are your commitments to your friends. Sure, I suppose this is somewhat of a "chosen" commitment; a life of solitude is perhaps the other extreme, but I thrive on interaction with other people, so it's not really an option for me. (I mean, what are all my friends on World of Warcraft going to say if I just drop off the face of that imaginary Earth?!?!) [Sidebar: Is playing a game like World of Warcraft an exhibition of social or anti-social behavior? These are the things I think about...*shakes head*] On top of commitment to friends though, you've got to make sure #1 is doing alright too. That's right, I'm talking about your commitment to yourself. You might like working out or drinking heavily (or both). Maybe it's hanging out with your many cats or watching your extensive collection of hard-core pornography (I sure hope there's no overlap here). Perhaps it's just loitering around the internet gathering the most trivial, obscure knowledge to soak up like a sponge (I do not do this... at all... ever). Whatever makes you happy, you've got to do those things that keep you sane.

Now in that little bit of spare time that's left, it's the "dating-game" that occupies any normal, single male's mind (and probably females' minds, but I can't read their minds) [Sidebar: If I could read girls' minds, I would probably not be here, typing this blog right now... and would likely not require a few drinks when talking to you ladies at the bar for the first time]. Whether it be Mrs. Right or Mrs. Right-now, it's got the potential to be a major time-sink commitment as well; let's not even get into all the work that goes into courting someone (and getting used to living with someone, changing your schedule for that person, etc., etc., etc.) in getting to the "ultimate-commitment": marriage.

The short story is that if I don't update this for a little while, well, it's because I've got other shit to do!