As I was savouring a fresh cup of green tea and doing my morning routine of purusing blogs and news sites (is this the nouveau morning coffee and paper bit?) I was reading backlogged issues of a friend’s blog. As I made one final pass through the current issue on my way out the virtual door, I came across an entry about wanting to drop of out of the “race,” and it got me thinking.

How true is it that as youth we’re told that we have to get on this big cosmic treadmill and try and keep up, for falling off would certainly mean that we’d end up homeless or jobless or poor. Perhaps this is the curse of those fancy college-prep high schools (the type that I went to) that drill into you the frantic need to “keep up.” I guess I’ve never really thought about this before, to the extent of speaking what was always unspoken.

Since my freshman year in high school, I feel like i’ve been running this never-ending race for prosperity…and even now I feel the pressure. In fact even more now that I’m out of the academic world. It’s as if I *have* to get married, get a salaried job, have a retirement fund, own your car, buy a house by a certain age. And since this “Hurry! Hurry!” mentality is so engrained in me by now, i’m not sure that the nagging, hurried voice in my head is not my own. I think that even as my friends take other, equally mature and valid routes in life, my inner voice is still screaming “Dear God! You need to buy a house! What’s wrong with you!?! You’re 23 and don’t own a house yet?”

Now, don’t get me wrong here, there’s a valid and true part of myself that would love to have my own house, for renting to me is a complete pain in the rear (or front-butt if you have one). But there’s this extra octane, extra boost behind this urge that sends it all into an almost panicked tizzy. Why? Mainly because I feel like most people do things a bit too late in life and regret them later (worrying about cholesterol, fiber intake, retirement funds, etc) and don’t want to get bitten as well. I guess it’s the eternal boyscout in me that drives me bananas: I have to be prepared all the time for anything.

But as of late, i’ve caught glimpses of this insanity. I’ll catch myself obsessing over the fact that i’m only putting away 25% of my monthly salary and not 30%. I’ll realize that exercising 5 days a week is not the end of the world, and that my cholesterol will not skyrocket through the roof into oblivion if i miss the sixth day. These split seconds of seeing who’s behind the curtain, cutting through the paranoia, are unnerving. They’re unsettling because they show me a more relaxed life that I should be living, a healthier approach towards life. I get scared to jump off this Treadmill for fear that it’d be the worse decision of my life and I’d always regret trying to cut back, even just a little, in my delusional chase of adult responsibility.

Days like today, I wish I’d done what my friend Tyler did and take a year off after undergrad to follow a dream. I could be just rolling in from DJing at a club from the night before, or just pulling up to my warehouse studio space to begin my day of printmaking. But, instead…oh crap. it’s already 8:34, and although I get to work an hour and a half early and don’t usually take a lunch, I’m still somehow late to start work that I don’t even know that I have yet! Hurry! Hurry!