A long fucking rant

Today has been a fucking beating.

I fucking hate life today.

It seems as though TGLJC has it out for me today. Why? Probably due to the terrific amount of blasphemy and other such nonsense which regularly spews from my mouth. My wife asked me today if I planned on going to church with them for Easter Sunday. I thought I wouldn't--I hate to be one of the many hypocrites who crawl into the service on that particular Sunday to pretend like I give a shit. If it mattered that much, I would probably be there every Sunday (twice) and Wednesday nights. I would probably sing in the church choir and everything, as most of you have already witnessed my relative comfort with singing, dancing and making a complete ass out of myself in front of groups of varying sizes, you shouldn't find this too difficult to believe. But for some reason, perhaps it was my troubled youth, perhaps my troubled early adult years, perhaps it is my troubled life now--I don't know--but I just have a hard time crediting someone else for all the bad shit that I've done. No offense, Satan. I'm sure you do your part.

Or maybe it's because life is not a box of fucking chocolates. So who the fuck do you thank for that? Who do you thank for my sorry-ass dad lying to me for years about the affair he had with my mom's best friend? Who do you thank for getting the boot from the house by that same man while I was only a year and a half from graduating high school? Who do you thank for getting a girl I was barely dating pregnant so that I felt responsible enough to marry her, even though it was pretty clear that I didn't really want to? Who do you thank for losing a fucking job (about 55k)--getting fired--because some prick of a corporate VP found my DWI paperwork while rifling through my desk at work (Why would I leave it there, you ask? Because I was working 70 fucking hours a week--which basically meant I had no time to arrange all of the assfuckingload of bullshit at home, because I was never at home)? Who do you thank for losing my last job because I was diagnosed with cancer? TGLJC? Okay, then. Thanks a fucking lot. And this shit is probably the tip of the fucking iceberg. Thanks. So. Fucking. Much.

Hallelujah.

As you can tell, my mood is beyond sour or bitter. Maybe surly would be the best word. I mean can't a motherfucker catch a break? I fucking bust my ass at everything I've ever done--worked as hard or harder than anyone. And the fucking thanks I get? Bullshit on top of more fucking bullshit. Glory to God? Are you fucking kidding me?

It's funny because my mom is such a fundamentalist. I've got a couple of buddies that are very religious. A few years ago, I was at my buddy's house, we were drinking beer and burning a bonfire--cause that's what you do when you're drinking beer in the fucking boonies. So his neighbor/friend comes down, a guy that I knew or knew of, as his brother was my age. So it turns out the guy is a preacher and my buddy is going to his church. So naturally, we start talking about religion and TGLJC, God and all that other stuff. So I tell the guy--and I'm being very fucking honest here--"you know, I've always wanted to be a religious person, but I've never been able to." So like all good Christians, this group of people (I think they all went to the same church) gathered around, asked me to close my eyes and repeat some random prayer after the preacherman. So I did--something about confessing sins and giving my life to the lord and all that. As always, I really fucking tried to believe it was more than fucking smoke and mirrors. I prayed as hard as I could. I was being so completely honest, I just wanted my fucking life to straighten out, to improve, I wanted that sense of peace that many people claim to possess.

But about halfway through my monologue or dialogue with the Supreme Being, I started looking at my shoes and looking around at everyone else. I said it all--all the right words, all the things I was supposed to say. I meant every fucking word. But about halfway through, I stopped being able to imagine that this was doing much of anything besides killing my buzz. "You've gotta have faith"--a common phrase for both religious folk and George Michael fans. But faith is a load of shit. Faith is believing that good things happen to good people, and that everything is going to be okay because we're all in God's hands.

But I know that lots of bad things happen to good people. And maybe that's what makes them worse, or what makes them not believe.

I believe in myself. I believe in my family and friends. I believe in my own abilities. I believe my destiny is in my own fucking hands, and I like it better that way. If I fuck up, that's my bad. And I can take responsibility for it. If I fuck up someone else's life, that's also my bad. And I take responsibility for that as well.
I live by my own fucking moral code, and though that might not particularly jive with what others may think or believe, but at least I don't blame my shitty fucking life on someone else. I am responsible for every decision that I make--not TGLJC, not the devil--and if that makes me a cynical old fuck, then so be it. At least I'm real.