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Monday, October 28, 2013

Who's to blame?


No, I'm not talking about the mess in Washington D.C. (it's quite obvious it's the Republicans and their rabid Tea Bag fringe of mouth breathers). I'm talking about who's to blame for who we are.

I get a bit tired of listening to people blaming their parents, especially since I am now a parent and understand it is a job that no one is really ever trained for and just when you think you are getting the hang of it, your kids move into their next stage and the job description completely changes anyway. Though I'm sure my kids will blame me for an uncontrollable urge to shout out, "Hay is for horses because pigs won't eat it" every time someone starts a sentence with "hey."



Oh, I went through my own period of blaming crap on my parents...and my brothers...and my teachers...and my ex-girlfriends...and employers...and the government...and television...and religion (which does deserve a great deal of blame)...and the weather. But I finally came to the realization, as Jimmy Buffet did his song Margaritaville, that it's my own damned fault that I am the way I am.

It all boils down to decisions we make and decisions we don't make. All decisions and not making decisions lead to consequences. We just don't often think out decisions long enough to calculate the consequences. And if the consequences aren't really what we want, we look for a scapegoat for our decisions. I finally looked into the mirror and realized I have a goatee and sometimes bleat for no apparent reason.

I suppose blaming myself for everything isn't really what I'm doing. It's more like I'm accepting responsibility for why I am who I am and where I am (this is particularly difficult when I find myself at Chuck E Cheese's).

This is not to say I accept the blame for bad weather, acts of a non-existent god or gods, spilled milk, bad haircuts (unless I'm the one with the scissors) or other things that my decisions didn't have anything to do with. I am responsible for how I react to those things. You can either accept that shit sometimes just happens or believe that shit happens to you. The first belief frees you to move on. The second belief makes you a victim.

Damn. I'm starting to sound like a self-help book. I was hoping to sound more like I had been staring into a lava lamp and became enlightened even though it is just globs of wax floating in oil heated up by a light bulb.

Sigh...

2 comments:

The random ramblings of a magpie mind said...

....you definitely sound far more 'lava lamp' than 'self help' ;and this particular piece of enlightenment has certainly been a refreshing change from the 'poor me' bleating that seems to come from an increasingly 'blame everyone else' culture . Thank you :)

Time said...

You're very welcome. And I accept full responsibility for this post :)