All this time, I followed the maxim, "if you want something done, ask a busy person."
Right now, I'm not that busy. As you might expect, the few things I have to do aren't getting done. And I don't care. At the end of high school, teachers warned us that college acceptances may be revoked if our grades dropped too much. As college wound down, I was jobless and needed every last GPA point for my resume. This time, I've got a job, I don't picture myself getting any more educated and it's more or less impossible to flunk a class.
At the beginning, it's like a new New Yorker venturing out past the curb during a red light. An email comes in and I respond in a day instead of an hour. A class I would skip if attending meant getting only four hours of sleep gets skipped if I'd get less than 7. Reading gets skimmed if I pick up the book at all. I used to volunteer for this or that within my various pursuits around school, but all I'll volunteer for these days is to buy the next round.
I get to thinking: does this make me a bad student? What about the joy of learning and the importance of pulling your weight on the team?
Oh, put a sock in it. I was your average overscheduled kid with parentally-imbued ambitions to make something of myself. On the heels of every achievement was some other task to start from scratch. I have some time now to release my inner slacker, that laid-back, relaxed guy I beat back into the deepest corner of my psyche for all of these years.
Run free, slacker! Or just hang out on the couch. Whatever.
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