Lot 13.

"Reality is the leading cause of stress among those in touch with it."
~ Lily Tomlin

One prompt is one prompt, is one prompt, right? As I sit here working on finishing up the last vestiges of work to end this semester of school, the idea that I would ever think such a thing is just outlandishly arrogant of me. Yes, one prompt isn't that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things...until it actually is. 

In the beginning, there were thing here and there that I just didn't give a shit about. Truth be told, a lot of them were directly proportionate to the so-called prompts my ENG professor had posted for me to write about. With things such as "The things I see as I walk down the street - that's heaven to me," as a springboard for writing anything other than episodes of Sesame Street, I figured...What the fuck? I can skip a few of these.

It always starts small. 

My avoidance of these prompts was akin to smoking a joint, if you believe anything that media tells you.  Skipping prompts was my gateway drug into being a total lazy jackass and just putting all kinds of shit off. See, when you only have a class ever-so-often, you kind of don't notice that missing it here and there stacks up on you. You don't realize that you're perilously close to failing the class....until you realize that you're about 15 prompts from being completely raped in the ass by a large Silverback Gorilla, and that you only have about three days in which to keep this awful form of hellish sodomy from happening to you...yes, you. You, who sat around and watched TV. You who decided that going out to the park was more important. You, who sat there on Friday night, drinking beer and playing Dragon Age until midnight, like that was some sort of amazing way to spend your spare time. 

And little did you know it then, but all of those "fuck it's" and I"ll just do five of them at once's" were adding up on you. That the F you would receive would cripple your already in-need-of-life-support GPA, because you thought your Algebra teacher was a jackass, and walked out of his class. 

And guess what?

Low GPA means not coming back. Not coming back means that you don't ear credits. Not earning credits....well...that means you can't transfer to a reputable four-year school, doesn't it? It means no getting that English degree, with a minor in professional writing, doesn't it? 

It means putting back on that goddamned ugly-ass pair of kitchen shoes (comfy and expensive, though they may have been), and grueling away for some asshole that thinks everyone is replaceable until you can buy your way into mediocrity. 

Ah, the ever expanding circle of the larger picture; where everything moves in a slow spiral outward, like the shockwaves of a nuclear blast. 

So here I sit, the stress of finishing my assignments weighing down on me. It would appear to me that as far as classes have gone this semester, I have learned about so goddamned much more than what the class description offered me. Taking culinary classes thought me that well-meaning instructors, no matter how good their intentions or personal accomplishments, don't make for great teachers. Which, consequently, made me realize that the culinary industry is full of shit (which I partially already sensed).  And my ENG course seems to have taught me more about the efficiency of time management and how I want to spend my future than it really has about writing. I'd say that both of these things were worth the money I paid for them, even if I wasn't wholly aware of it when I signed up. 

That being said, I can't think of anything more important than a single, solitary prompt. That one. That insignificant, lowly, worthless ONE... 

Just might be the one that breaks everything.