Guilty as Charged

Guilt and I go way back.  I suspect if I were hypnotized deeply enough, I would feel guilty for being conceived.  Sorry, Mom and Dad, stupid rubber!

Being an Irish Catholic raised by an Irish Catholic raised by an Irish Catholic, etc., etc., my mother used guilt as her one and only disciplinary tool.  Oh, that and calling me names. (You Little Snot was her favorite.  Awww!)  But I routinely got, "When I drop dead like your Aunt Mary Jayne and your father marries the Young Sexy Blonde she'll make you clean up your room."  Which did not make me clean up my room, by the way, I just figured I'd wait till the YSB showed up. Never put off till tomorrow what  you can put off indefinitely.  Sadly, for my father and my room, the YSB never showed up.  But the threat was effective in that I felt guilty for not cleaning my room.  And pretty much anything else that I did when I was conscious.  (Well, wait--I had a recurring nightmare every night from the ages of 3-5 and I always woke up yelling for my mom; so, actually, I felt guilty for being unconscious, as well.) 

Anyroad, being the Gullible Gertie that I am, I believed all the Irish Dogma my mother fed me and guilt soon became as much a part of me as my curly hair and extreme shortitude. 

Now, 150 years later, my hair is still curly and I'm still short (and shrinking by the minute, thanks Osteopenia!), but I am slowly and surely divesting myself of the guilt.  I kinda feel like Christopher Reeve trying to walk again, only I hope I don't die before I lose the guilt.  (I'm debating whether to apologize for that last sentence, let me know if you think I should.  This is a Democracy, after all.) 

NOW for the actual point of this entry.  Last evening I was working the door for Theatre Downtown (don't ask), which is a fairly solitary duty.  I was thinking about my new job and how they basically pay me for doing pretty much nothing and what a sweet deal that is and I should be really happy about it.  But I'm not.  And I was trying to figure out why.  And in one of those rare, nicotine-induced moments of clarity, I realized it's because I feel guilty for getting this job.  What right do I, Little Snot Debbie, have, holding down a sweet job for quasi-decent pay? 

Well, I know the correct answer is:

A:  Every fucking right in the fucking world, motherfucker!!!  but I went with:

D:  No right at all, You Little Snot. 

Pavlov's Deb, or should I say, Peg's Deb.  So maybe the divestiture is more slow than sure. 

At least I realized that I was being haunted by guilt; in the Olden Days (last week), I would have accepted the feeling as Just The Way Life Is.  But, in the words of the great inventor, Thomas Edison, "Fuck the Olden Days".  I now have a job that basically pays me to read and play Yahtze and do whatever else I want (barring checking out porn sites, you can't have everything).  That's pretty sweet.  And so am I, so therefore I deserve it. 

And as soon as that YSB shows up, I promise I'll clean up my room.