(2/15/06) when you don't have to pay for anything

(Entered in paper journal at 6:28 PM at Mid-Manhattan Library on 40th Street and 5th Avenue in Manhattan.)

Dream 1

I was at dinner with my friend R and probably his fiancee L and a couple other people. At least R and I had sheets of paper before us. On mine I figured out for everybody how much I had paid for my meal. I was really excited about some good deal I'd gotten, or some smart way in which I'd figured out how to budget my money.

When I finished, R wrote on his piece of paper a few numbers, finishing with  35, which, when the sum of all the other numbers was subtracted by it, left zero. He said, "That shows I paid nothing for my meal. And I got more food than you!"

I was angry. I knew my pride had been injured. I had been too prideful by bragging about how well I'd budgeted. But I also just was angry because I had been trying to show how I had been using my money wisely, not making it so I never had to pay for anything.

I just wanted some approval for R for starting to do something good with my life. But all R could do was get jealous about how happy I was with doing something good. And he had to shut me down by showing me that he went above and beyond acting wisely with his money. He never had to pay for anything.

But I thought it was disgusting never to have to pay for anything. It was like socially engineering yourself never to have to be responsible for anything. And it did seem to me like this was what R wanted. I didn't want to have no responsibility. I wanted to act wisely with my responsibility. I wanted to act wisely with my money. I didn't want to act like R. When you don't have to pay for anything, it doesn't matter whether you use your money wisely.