Don't let me be free.

The biggest problem with life after college is the freedom.

Freedom is one of the most revered words in America, it peppers our political speaches, works as a replacement adjective for items derived from annoying countries, elicits a lot of wordplay from citizens wishing to compound their ethos into a bumper sticker, and strikes the singing lips of everyone from Broadway singers to East Coast hardcore tough guys.

Freedom is like the final sword in the videogame Fable. We know about it when we don't have it, we revere the idea of it, we gather a lot of XP and kill a lot of theives and werewolves to obtain it, but when we finally kill our teleporting former mentor to obtain it, we see that we don't really need it. Everyone has been conquered and we are left to stroll The United States of Albion with our Freedom Sword looking for something to use its almighty, hallowed power on.

I have freedom. I don't have debt, I don't have a child, I don't have a significant other, I don't have a steady job, I don't have a lease. I have a trusty Ford Taurus and enough money to get me anywhere in the country or a plane ticket out of it.

I work at Starbucks, and have days of with no time commitments.

This is every man's dream, and I should be relishing it like a child relishing his alfalfa sprouts that a starving child in Africa would love to eat.

I should be watching V for Vendetta daily, listening to Frank Sinatra, and showing off a different colored derby hat every day. I should be scheduling my plane flight to prague. I should ask the middle aged south african reporter who comes to Starbucks on a date. I should be running on the beach with my shirt off. I should be getting in my car to drive to des moines just to eat pancakes with cousin. I should call up the girls that had a crush on me in college. I should bring a football to a park and start a game with strangers. I should wake up at 6 am and drink 24 Coors lights by lunch and then fall asleep. I should get a night job and day job for two weeks, and use all my money to buy a scooter. I should wear my best clothes and dance with vacuous strangers in overpriced clubs. I should learn how to breakdance. I should draw portraits of my least favorite actors. I should get a 100% completion on GTA IV. I should call up my friend in Texas and see what he was doing, because I just got into town. I should move home for 3 weeks for the sole reason of training my dog. I should read Harry Potter.


But I don't want to.

I want a job to go to everyday that I am needed at. I want to have a family who I am tied down to. I want a dog that gets upset when I don't feed him.

I want stability and reliability far more than freedom. I know this is heresy and I will hate myself for writing this when I am older and long for the freedom and brashness of youth. Such is the way of us always wanting what we had/don't have more than what we have, but for now, I am firmly entrenched in this beginning-life crisis.