I am really really really depressed. I mean, it's like this actual, physical weight on me. I know what it is that made me all depressed like this, but I don't want to say what it was  because it was just an irrational, emotional reaction to something that was unimportant and irrelevant, and plus it was obviously none of your damn business.

 

Now it's true that I have spent the last few days feeling sad and kind of dragging around, and not wanting to do anything, and having no friends and being pathetic, but it's also true that things could be worse. And when most of your friends are married and raising kids and involved in their respective churches and PTA meetings and dinner-at-sevens, you're not only constantly reminded that things could be worse, but you're faced with evidence of just how much worse they could actually be.

 

I don't mean to say that I don't want the American Dream (or that I'm not involved in the PTA, or don't eat dinner at seven). I totally totally do. I just want it on my own terms: I don't want to be all buttoned down and repressed and have to read Christian movie reviews every time I go out. Or, worse, to actually like a movie or a song only to have some repressed, buttoned-down conservative housewife try to convince me that I didn't actually like it at all.

 

If there was a checklist of political and social issues, I could go down the list and check almost all of them off the conservative column. Almost. So it's not that I have anything against conservative fundamentalists for anything that they actually believe. But I am kind of starting to resent their attitude.

 

Maybe a lot of folks don't realize this, so I might be giving away trade secrets by telling, but I'll tell you anyway: A lot of folks think that being a Christian makes them smarter.

 

Which, obviously, is not true.

 

But take Dr. James Dobson. I have absolutely nothing against this guy, I've read his books and heard him on the radio and I think he's really smart and he makes some excellent points. But you know why he's smart? Because he just is. He's a psychologist, and an educator, and I think mostly he was just born that way. Whether you like his politics or not, whether you agree with him or not, he's just smart. The fact that he's a conservative fundamentalist Christian is not what makes him smart. And even if you, personally, got down on your knees right now and prayed to the Lord God Almighty to save your wretched soul, it might actually happen that way, but it won't make you any smarter, or give you any special insight into the human condition.

 

Here's an example of what I'm talking about. Pick any issue, any issue or topic at all, especially one that's controversial, say, abortion, or homosexuality, or evolution, or assisted suicide. And then ask a conservative fundamentalist Christian what they think about it, and ask them to explain their position. Odds are, you're going to hear all about geology and biology and psychology and have all kinds of research and statistics thrown at you, because there's always science and logic and plain old common sense to explain what they, conveniently, happen to believe anyway.

 

So what does all this have to do with my being depressed and sad and pathetic?

 

I'll tell you.

 

 

I call up a friend of mine. This particular guy I've known for a very long time, and I know that I can always count on him to tell me exactly what he thinks, so in that sense at least I know he's consistent. But here's how the conversation goes:

 

 

 

 

Now let me just interject here, and take note not just of what is being said, but what's not being said. Because in no way is he saying "What's wrong?" or in any way trying to identify a problem. We're guys, of course, and mostly insensitive, but still.

 

The assumption is that I don't have a normal, 9-to-5 day job just because I don't want one, haven't been looking for one, and that finding one is just as simple as saying "Get a job" in the same way you might tell someone to get a haircut. So, right away, without asking any questions and not having had a conversation with me in several weeks (at least), this guy knows instinctively what my problem is and how to solve it.

 

It is true that I don't have a normal, 9-to-5 day job. But I am trying to start my own business and I'm taking some classes and all my bills are paid and I don't have any debt right now. Everything's cool and I'm not worried about it, and I really resent having to explain that every time I talk to someone about it. I don't fit your mold, ok? I don't wear a tie every day and sit in a cubicle, and there are lots of folks who do what I'm doing. So, anyway, the reason I was dragging ass for two days had nothing at all to do with my job situation.

 

So, I was like, "Gee, thanks for pointing that out."

 

And he goes, "It's true. Psychologically, the American male has a need to have a daily job to go to, and he gets really depressed when he doesn't have one. Ask [insert name of mutual friend who was unemployed for several months]."

 

The conversation just ended here because, honestly, when anyone begins a sentence with a phrase like "Psychologically, the American male...", I'm going to completely lose interest in by the time the sentence finishes. Sentences that start like that always make a lot of assumptions, like "all American men are exactly the same" and "all of your problems can be solved by this platitude". And I know, I just know in my gut, that everything he's telling me he got from a statistical study he read about that was done by the American Center For Family Conformity, called The American Male: Why We Should All Be Exactly The Same. And it's also very likely that this is the exact thing he was just reading as the phone rang, and he couldn't wait to apply it to the next person he talked to.

 

More than anything, what he was saying was, you should be depressed, because you don't even have a job. No wonder you're depressed, get up off your ass and get to work.

 

I was just disgusted and hung up the phone. And the worst part is, he knows that I was pissed off and he thinks it's because he was right, He thinks I'm only depressed because I don't have a job, I don't want to even get a job, and I just can't bear to hear the truth.

 

But I really don't believe in worrying. I think I'm really really fortunate to be able to have time with my kids, to keep on a flexible schedule like this, to get back to school and try to improve myself. If I have to later on get a job digging ditches or cleaning toilets, I will, but so far I haven't had to. And a part of me totally would love to have a daily 9-to-5 job in a cubicle somewhere, but so far that opportunity has not presented itself.

 

Let me show you here part of the Bible:

 

Matthew 6:25-34 25 "Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? 28 So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; 29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

 

The thing is, I wasn't even asking his advice, I was just telling him how it was going. And let's even assume that I was really depressed because I didn't have a job, how is it going to help me feel any better about myself to just have someone tell me to get a job?

 

 

It's kind of like how I have all these women in my life who tell me how to be a parent. What's up with that? Especially since I've been a parent longer than some of them. Especially since some of them don't even have kids. They seem to think that being a woman gives them some inherent parenting ability that I lack.

 

And almost everyone I know does it. And then they tell me obvious shit I already know, and they say it over and over like I'm retarded or something. And then, to make it worse, they bring it up later, like "Remember that time I had to tell you...?"

 

They'll say something like "It's really important for a kid to have structure, and be on a schedule. Consistency, that's the key. Consistency and structure."

 

And I'll kind of go, yeah, I agree, and then they'll reword it and tell me the same exact thing. "It gives them stability and lets them know that they can count on you, they need to know that they can blah blah blah whenever you blah blah blah and, believe me, it'll help them later on when blah blah blah high school or blah blah blah blah blah wind up in jail"

 

And of course I've tuned her out by this point. And sometimes I even like to do a kind of mad-libs thing where I substitute words like "marshmallow" and "graham cracker" in there so it winds up being like this:

 

 

It's like they all think that, because I'm a man, the extent of my parenting abilities are showing the kids who can belch the loudest. Or maybe it's not that I'm a man, maybe it's just because I'm me? Because they all think I'ma screw up?

 

Anyway, who really cares?