It occurred to me today that no one wants to pay the bill.

WARNING: THIS IS A LONG ONE, BUT –BOY– IT’S A DOOZY.

I don’t know when it was that we forgot, as a society, that choices have consequences. Granted, I’ve got some theories. Nevertheless, it’s one of my greatest frustrations about American society that we seem to be disconnected from the consequences of our actions, either through systems that protect us from having to fully realize those consequences, or because people enable each other in their poor decision-making. I’m as guilty as the next guy, I’m sure; I complain about things that I had a hand in creating, probably far too often.

But here’s the thing: if you aren’t happy with your obesity, make the changes that are necessary to fix that problem. If you aren’t happy with your occupational situation, make the changes that are necessary to fix that problem. Most of life’s problems aren’t situations that are thrust on us by a cruel universe that wants to watch us squirm; they are beds that we made and then we decided that we didn’t feel like sleeping in them.

Of course, this doesn’t stop people from whining about their lots in life, regardless of whether or not they were self-inflicted wounds. Because whining involves so little of us, it’s the go-to action for countless people who would be better served by shutting their mouths and getting down to the business of cleaning up the milk they spilled.

Somewhere along the way, we’ve become a nation of people who do what they want, with no concern for the price to be paid, and then we complain about the costs.

It’s just foolishness.

* * *

Today, the Superintendents of all of the public school districts in my county issued a joint letter, in coordination with our county’s health department, urging members of the community to continue to follow proper guidelines in public to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus. In the two school districts that I have connections with –the district where I work and the district where my children attend school– the cases that have come through the doors and into the schools are cases that are spreading in the communities in question.

There hasn’t been any spread in the schools.

Because school districts that want to keep their doors open are following the proper guidelines, cases aren’t being transmitted in schools. In the schools, there is a structure that keeps people in line –students and staff members alike– as they are obliged to follow the rules that have been established. In the community, however, where that structure isn’t necessarily present, community spread continues.

Here’s an example. I know that there are people in the community where I teach who are preparing to violate the community’s ban on public gathering during Halloween. I know, not because I am a mole who has infiltrated their secret organizations, or a spy who has been tapping their home telephone lines –> they’ve been posting it on Facebook, for goodness sake.

So, what do events like this cause? An increased risk of the transmission of the coronavirus.

And here’s how that is going to play out:

Several kids will get the virus. Close contacts of those students will end up having to quarantine. Some of those close contacts may happen in the school where I work, several days after Halloween. The outbreak in the district will cause us to have to close our doors to keep the rest of our student population, and the staff, safe.

AND THOSE SAME INDIVIDUALS WHO THOUGHT IT WAS THEIR BRIGHTEST IDEA EVER TO HAVE HALLOWEEN –FOR THE KIDS– WILL BE IN THEIR HOMES, WITH THEIR STUDENTS AT THEIR SIDES, COMPLAINING ABOUT THE SCHOOLS.

Not a single one of them is going to sit down, at the end of one of those hypothetical quarantine evenings, and think to themselves, “Man, it really was a stupid thing for us to have exposed all of those kids with a dumb little Halloween get-together.” Instead, they will get back onto the same Facebook accounts where they got together in the first place to say, “Hey! Screw the man! We are going to have Halloween!”, except a couple of weeks later, they’ll complain, “Hey! Why did the school go into quarantine?!?! They can’t do that! This isn’t fair!”

When it goes down like that, I won’t even feel prophetic. Do you know why? Because I’ve seen this all before.

And it’s starting to get old.

* * *

The thing about choice in America is that it’s linked up with this concept that everyone is so fired up about ’round here: freedom. If you start to take away people’s freedoms –REGARDLESS OF YOUR REASONS FOR DOING SO– then you run the risk of getting bitten by the vicious masses who would rather you not do anything to impinge on their oh-so-sacred freedom and their Constitutional right to choices.

Let me just drop this right here and I’ll point out the fact that COVID-19 cases have been on the rise in the state of Michigan, pretty much constantly, ever since the state’s executive branch was stripped of some of its executive power by other entities within the state government, representatives of the hordes of people who don’t seem to understand that freedom must be curtailed when those who are free won’t restrict themselves from being reckless.

Would there even need to be any executive orders if everyone just agreed to do the right things because they’re the right things?

It’s the height of hypocrisy when people complain about someone taking away their freedoms by forcing rules upon them, only to turn around and be pro-law-enforcement. You literally have no idea how many people I know that would identify with both of these opinions at the same time. Maybe you’re reading this and you’re thinking, “Hey, I’m one of those people.”

You do all understand that the police enforce rules that are put in place because not everyone is going to do what’s best for the society, just as our political leaders are often put in positions where they have to do things to keep free people from exercising their freedom irresponsibly.

IT’S LITERALLY THE SAME THING!!!!

You know what this boils down to; if you’re as smart as I think you all are, you saw me hinting at it in the previous paragraph –> people like the police when they are stopping the bad guys, but no one wants to be stopped when they’re being the bad guys.

And I’ve got news for you, we’re all the bad guys. When you decide that cops are great because they keep the criminals from breaking into parked cars in your neighborhood, but you don’t like governors telling you what to do because spreading a virus around is your Constitutional right, then all that you’ve done is split a hair.

The truth of the matter is that you’re wrong, and I’m wrong, and he’s wrong, and she’s wrong, and when we’re wrong, our bad choices have consequences.

No one wants to be controlled. Not the criminals, and certainly not the criminals, if you catch my drift.