Quote from: assbot on July 08, 2018, 08:58:53 PM

Quite. He was a completely different person back then.

And so on.

Now that you mention it...this has got me to thinking...

That moment of realization that the social contract you believed yourself to be a party to was an illusion all along is not an easy one. Allow me to elaborate by way of an, only very tangentially related, anecdote.

As a young man I was working construction. I was a fucking hard worker. Busted my ass. We were screwing down floors in a subdivision when I developed acute carpal tunnel; woke up one day unable to button my pants or do really anything involving my dominant hand.

Was denied any workers comp, not even sure why, I was young and unschooled in advocating for myself. It sounds ludicrous today...but I really thought the system had my back.

I was very much unable to work at anything I was qualified for at the time and funds became very short. At some point I needed that last $100 in my bank account to eat, and by "eat" I mean a box of dehydrated spuds and the big handle bottle of Pace picante per week, plus what I could bum off friends and pick up after 1:00AM at the convenience store for $0.25/about to expire cancer burger.

So my social dislocation moment came when my, long awaited, tax return check arrived, a very much needed 4 digit godsend of liquidity. I rushed straight down to the bank, up to my favorite teller... ... ...to be informed that as I no longer had an active account the instrument from the federal government in my hand was not actually redeemable.

It was hard at the time, but in retrospect I am very glad that I learned this lesson at a young age.