part of me in the chaos that's quiet

photo: flickr

I used to dream of days off. Sick days, snow days - I welcomed any interruption to the daily obligation of spending hours learning at school and hours doing homework at home. These respites fluttered my heart with hopes of summer vacation like photographs and letters from a lover far away.

I paid no mind to the Everest of make-up work that awaited me. Rather, I turned my attention to Star Wars (Episode IV: A New Hope) which was recorded on a VHS tape from a television airing and had the commercials [mostly] paused out. Visions of justice-seeking intergalactic rebellion danced in my head, while I laid buried beneath blankets sweating out my fever on the couch.

As a student, my presence at school was compelled neither by positional nor financial mandate. School continued as normal when I was gone, and I lost no money by being absent. Furthermore, I possessed more than enough intellectual capability to catch up to my grade school counterparts with relative ease.

Unfortunately, a new dynamic has emerged as I travel further into adulthood. Now I must navigate a complex algebraic equation in order to determine whether any given illness is worthy of calling in sick for a day. The degree of illness - the money I would lose + the amount of work I would have to make up * the stress of coming up with a lesson plan for a substitute / how much I feel like I've been hit by a truck = either calling in sick or coughing up a lung in class.

Mature life requires many such decisions to be made. The New Super Mario Bros. or rent? Late-night blogging or enough sleep to function tomorrow? Another scoop of ice cream or fitting into my pants?

Why must all of the desirables be double-edged with such wicked consequences? It seems that life is one cosmic hangover waiting to happen.

Yet, these choices are not completely devoid of their joys. Responsibility yields a job well done, which yields a paycheck, which might yield some amusement in the form of a digitized Italian plumber and his dinosaur trying to save a fruitily-named princess. (Am I the only one who thinks Mario sounds more and more drug-induced the older I get?) Some benefits prove much more satisfying too - respect, appreciation, etc.

I suppose I will choose the high road for its glories, despite its challenges, stopping to rest only as necessary or earned. Still, I think I need to go witness the destruction of the death star again.

Use the force, Luke. Use the force.