Is that gasoline I smell?

"Is that gasoline I smell?" - Brandon Lee, The Crow

You know that feeling of impending doom that people sometimes get? It's that feeling where the tiny hairs on the back of your neck stand straight up, almost like all the ions in the atmosphere around you are charging, and you're about to be flash-fried as a result. That's the feeling I've got tonight.

Thirteen hours from now a ceremony will happen that will unleash all that potential energy, and the concussive blast that results is destined to derail a couple of trains, at least. I am referring to The Signing of the Papers. Other people would call it a wedding, but that insinuates a couple of things that this mockery is simply lacking.

A little bird recently told me that a parasitic little speck of a person I've basically been supporting for the last year or so considers himself to be "a more successful person" than I am, based solely on the twin facts that he's got himself a girl, and the girl has a bun in the oven. This marks the end of his argument. At the age of 20, with no education beyond his C average high school diploma and his 10-hour-per-week job at Kohls, he is officially farther along on the "Success-O-Meter" than yours truly. I won't bore my one reader with a list of my own personal accomplishments, largely because I don't want this to be about me. I want this to be about him...him and the terrible situation that he has managed to get himself into.

A year ago our little scamp called me out of the blue and asked if he could move in with me because he needed to get away from his dad. Keep in mind, I hadn't spoken with him in over a year prior to this, basically because I had concluded that all the effort I'd put into trying to teach him to be a decent human being had been a complete waste of time. But, I've always tried to be a positive influence for this kid, and I thought that getting out of daddy's house and into the really real world might do him some good. After talking it over with daddy dearest, I agreed, and he moved in shortly after. This was in February of '08. In July he got a girlfriend, in September she moved in with us, and by November he had a fiancée. In January, she got pregnant. Here's an interesting twist - she did it with full awareness (stopped taking her birth control), and didn't tell him.

Now, experience tells me that you don't really know a person all that well after 6 months of dating, but just so I'm not making subjective interpretations of the situation without some background basis, I'll also add that my education tells me that people under the age of 25 don't have a fully developed frontal cortex - that's the part of the brain that allows for higher order thought processes, like making judgment calls.

Naturally, I'm a bit alarmed at the speed with which the relationship developed, but I decided a long time ago that I wasn't going to interfere in this, mostly because I resented the interference of other people in my love life. So I'm not going to comment any more on that part of it. I will, however, comment on the personal habits of this little slug, because I think they are indicative of the how this thing is going to go down.

Mr. Successful, who will be married in 13 hours and have a child in September or something like that, has a car. He was given the car by his dad. The car hasn't had insurance since September of 2008 or so, because the slug can't afford it. I'm pretty sure he can count the number of times he did the dishes in our apartment over the course of a year on one hand. No, I'm not kidding. The bedroom they had together at the apartment looked like Pigpen lived in it, and the room at the new pad isn't any better. I could continue, but I think my point is pretty well made - he can't take care of his own shit, how does he expect to take care of a wife and child?

Part of me feels kind of badly for being so pissed off, particularly since I know he only said what he said because he's a scared little bitch right now, and he's lashing out at anything to make himself feel better about just being him. And if I were a better person, I'd just let it go.

Trouble is, I feel pretty slighted right now, and I'm tired of his bullshit. And where I was once willing to put up with it with a good natured chuckle and the patience of Job, I find that I'm entirely disinclined to continue coddling him and letting him think that his behavior is acceptable.

So, Mr. Successful, here is where you get to prove to God, the world, and everyone around you that you really do have your shit together. How sad and unfortunate it is that in order to accomplish that goal you had to alienate the one person who has tried to hold your head above water since you were 8, and how equally unfortunate that when your existence begins to unravel and you don't know who to go to for advice, you will find my door closed. The Dr. is out, sir; you're on your own.

Like I said, congratulations are in order. But you're not going to get them from me.