Putting both the "Pro" and "Nate" into "Procrastination."

Let's start this rambling at the beginning.

I was a very smart kid growing up, constantly being tested, evaluated, and generally praised for my intelligence levels. Having two very bright parents, one of whom was an educator until he became a school owner/principal, I had a lot of advantages for my intellectual prowess. However, I'm something of a lazy mook, so by the time puberty hit I decided I could rest on my laurels and piss school away... Eventually dropping out a few weeks into my Jr. year at 16 years old and going very quickly into the full time work world, and becoming an "adult" before I was legally entitled to the title.

Ten years later, I have a resume which looks killer from an experience standpoint, and like crap on the educational side. 3 years management experience, time served anywhere from retail to being a legal assistant/administrative assistant... And a GED. Needless to say, given the current job market, I'm in something of a limbo spot.

Overqualified for entry level, but at least from what I've been able to find, undereducated and as such under-qualified to return to management. I've been looking for work (half-assedly I admit) for the last half a year, and haven't gotten anything lined up that would earn me more money than my Unemployment Insurance was getting me by on.

So, this is life telling me something, and it's about time I listened to it when it says:

"Hey, moron. Go back to school. You think you're so smart, you're going to have to prove that for a couple years to get people to believe you. Gotta get the 'man's' piece of paper that says you actually know a thing or two, and you may actually find that financial security which is the REAL American dream."

So, at 26, I'm finally a full-time, full-fledged, full-of-it college freshman. And I have to say, the experience thus far is one of the best I've had in my life. My teachers (not butt-kissing Dr. C, just being honest) have all blown my mind as to how effective they are at getting my interest. All three of them are very funny, which if you know me personally you know that's how I tend to communicate myself, and very wise... Even though my math teacher seems to be my exact freaking age. (Dude even shares a bunch of interests with me, needless to say, I'm man-crushin' on that one.)

I've developed a pretty solid work ethic as a result of my past, but I find one little bad habit haunting me... I LOVE to procrastinate. Not that I actually take joy in it, but the way I put things off, you'd think it was some sort of sexual experience.

My first real assignment in my English class is actually writing a blog, or at least three entries therein... And ironically, I'm blogging as a form a procrastination on that assignment. Thing is that I don't want to just do my typical fare introvertive song and dance for the assignment, but I haven't been able to commit fully to any of the subjects I've come up with thus far.

First I thought about doing something on the process of producing music, but I don't want to be quite that narcissistic... Then I was kicking around the idea of doing lyrical anaylization, but realized I'd really struggle to come to any concise conclusions in that subject. So I think I've settled on my subject of choice... I'm just going to drum up some difficult situations I'm going through, and just write out my thoughts on how to handle them and what the ramifications of my actions are. In the next few months I have to tackle some financial demons from my past in the form of moving back to my mom's house and filing bankruptcy, not to mention trying to develop the skills and behaviors that will allow me to become a better college student than I ever was in any educational arena in my past.

I'll be posting these entries here once I finally shoot 'em out. But for now, it's Friday, I have some music to work on, and as it's a sunny day, I'll probably be scooting around on the old skateboard for a while before I get anything significant done. To those of you that have made it this far in the text, thanks for sifting through. The N8 is off for now, but no worse than usual.

-"The" Nate