The Dark Side

It's been a long time since I've been in a structured learning environment (a.k.a. school), but that doesn't mean that I don't remember anything I learned.  That is, unless you are counting my business classes, of which I remember little or nothing.  This is unfortunate because it happened to be my major in college.  But this doesn't really bother me because exactly one day into my first job after graduation I realized that I would have been better off receiving a daily enema than enduring months and years of classroom blather about marketing strategies, supply & demand and the Peter Principle (hee, hee ... "Peter").

No, the disciplines I enjoyed and remembered are from those "filler" classes for dimwit business majors like English composition, political science, history and psychology.

Especially psychology.  I couldn't get enough and particularly devoured those classes featuring psychology in its more heinous forms; abnormal, deviant and criminal.  I loved covertly analyzing others and often wondered how others classified me.  I learned early on that this was called a "neurosis",  but at least I had a name for it.  And once you have a name for something, it's not supposed to bother you so much, right?  Boy, I hope I am, otherwise I have some problems ...

I bring this up because for the last week or so, I've been bringing my rudimentary knowledge of psychology into my everyday life.  And it boils right down to the Big Three:  Id, Ego and Super-ego.  Here's the way I interpret these three guys;  The Id is the Tasmanian Devil, a slobbering beast only interested in self-satisfaction.  The Ego is like an NBA basketball referee, trying to keep the Id satisfied, but without getting everybody into trouble while managing the point spread. And the Super-ego is God, who makes the Id and Ego feel lower than whale shit for every rotten fucking thing they've ever done in their miserable lives.  Here's how these three bastards are messing with my shit this past week ...

Case One.  Yesterday I was supposed to get something out of the freezer to thaw for dinner.  Id says fuck it, I'm busy.  If I forget to defrost something, I'll just go get a pizza.  Ego says well, that's a thought, but you ought to get something out.  You can always put it back in the freezer later if you change your mind.  Go ahead and do your thing and wait a bit to get it out.  Super-ego says get that goddamned thing out of the freezer now!  Pizza costs too much and it's not good for you, you lazy ass punk!

Late in the day, Id and Ego told Super-ego to go take a flying fuck at the moon and picked up a tasty pizza.  Plus they felt no guilt.

Case Two.  I keep thinking about buying a new flat screen TV.  Id says go buy it, plain and simple.  Ego says, well your present TV is only 5 years old and there's nothing wrong with it.  Maybe if it starts going bad, you can think about getting a new one.  You know, maybe it will fall off of it's stand or there will be a power surge or something and you can get another one then.  Super-ego says, are you fucking crazy!  Do you know how much those things cost?  You shouldn't be wasting your time watching TV anyway.  Go to the library and borrow a book to read, you lazy ass punk!

Super-ego seems to be winning this one for now.

Case Three.  I'm presently unemployed.  Id says, you've got a roof over your head and plenty to eat.  Enjoy yourself, you've earned it after busting your ass all of these years.  Ego says, I don't know, you need to keep spending a portion of your day looking for work and going on interviews.  After all, you're not ready to retire yet. Super-ego says, you had damn well better spend the majority of your day looking for work, and when you're not looking for work, you'd better goddamned well be feeling guilty about not having a job.  Everyone else does you lazy ass punk!

Ego and Super-ego definitely have the upper hand in this one, and I'm glad they do.  The only thing about this is that when I do go back to work, I'll feel bad that I didn't enjoy my time off because I was so worried about getting another job.  Super-ego wins twice on this one.

In proofing this, I wonder if I need to go see a therapist. Nah ... Super-ego would make me feel guilty about it.

I hate that guy.