Dear Irresponsibility,

     We met in August of last year. You were a first year and I was a senior. My stuff was already on my half of the room as you were free to do whatever you wanted with the other half [thank you for never hanging any rebel flags]. Your mother asked me where the nearest fire extinguisher was located for reasons concerning your insurance coverage [I never had to know anything about the position of any extinguisher for my insurance coverage. I immediately identified your mother as a lunatic]. I had a TV in the room.  I had sent you an email telling you I was going to bring a TV.  You still brought your own TV. Did you ever think it was weird that we had two TVs in our room? I did.

     As the first few weeks passed I found out you had a girlfriend back home, but you didn’t have a car to go visit her. I then found out your girlfriend was only fifteen years old thus she was unable to drive to visit you because she had yet to obtain a North Carolina State Drivers License.  I was in the room when you tried to break up with her.  I was also in the room when you tried to make her break up with you.  We never talked about those times even though I was there for over 45 minutes on each occurrence.  You never asked me to leave.  Why didn't you?  You should have.  Each time I was in the room when you were fighting with your girlfriend over the phone, I recorded it with my digital camera.  I then uploaded clips of the two videos onto YouTube [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbM8qqTrzDE and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Sy2KnvkFZs].  I was surprised to know you hadn't found out about them by second semester.

    Midway through the fall we had grown a little closer and had asked you what you wanted to do with your life.  You stated, "I want to be a surgeon."  When I asked why you wanted to be a surgeon you responded, "Because I have really steady hands.  One of my friends loves to paint, he's an artist, I've got steadier hands than him."  This was the first time in my life I wished to never be in attendance when someone realized their dream.

    I remember there was one night when you had a chemistry exam the next morning and you never opened your book to study.  When I questioned you about this you said, "There is a make-up exam at the end of the semester that will count double if one of your  previous grades is lower than the final.  I'm just not going to go tomorrow, take a zero, and replace it at the end of the semester."  At that time, I think we both knew you were destined to do poorly in that class.  I remember when you had a Political Science exam the following day and asking, "How do you withdraw from a class?" This was after you found out you were supposed to be reading articles in a book you hadn't bought and didn't even know existed.  I remember waking up and smelling urine and knowing all too clearly where it was coming from.  I remember you flipping the mattress over and sleeping on the opposite side of the piss pool you created.

    I talked you into dropping out of school.  Now you occasionally send me a message whenever I'm online saying things like, "I'm coming back down, I hate it here at home."  But two semesters have passed and you still aren't back at school.  Which is fine.  I hope whatever you do in life, you do it well.  If that "do" you do is surgery, please never operate on me or anyone with my last name. 

I still think your mom is a lunatic.

--