@Belgaer
I've been trying to figure out what you could have done at 15 that would continue to haunt you now. Short of being convicted of sexually assaulting toddlers, I can't think of anything that people would continue to hold against you. Apparently whatever it was, you've learned your lesson- which is all anyone really asks.

In the case of my friend, he has been doing the same sort of shit for well over 20 years now. When you do something again and again and keep hoping for a different outcome, it's called insanity. If it's not harming anyone else it can be laughed off, but if it is making problems for others it becomes a serious issue. In his case he relies far too heavily on the charity of others- he doesn't really do enough to get by, just enough to supplement what he can beg off of others.

I know people who do oddball freelance work and do quite well at it, but they're disciplined enough to start a job and work through it, hard. With Sparky he'll start a job, do a day's work on it, then go hang out with friends until 4:00 and smoke weed and drink and play chess and watch movies, then not show up for a day or two and be unreachable by phone. When he does show up it will be early afternoon, he'll be blinking and disoriented for an hour or two, then he'll work for a couple of hours until it's too dark to work, go home and get together with his friends again. That's behavior one expects from a 20 year old kid just starting out, not a 42 year old man who's been doing this for decades.

In the case of this job, it was simple and straightforward- I figured that even with his habits it would take no more than a week, two at the outside. But it's been a month, and when I've gone by in the afternoons on weekends to get him going, he comes blinking and stumbling to the door, plainly still recovering from whatever he was doing the night before. This has happened multiple times, and I've expressed concern over this and asked him what was wrong, and gotten nowhere with it.

Now, however, I've gotten his attention. Yesterday we had a major confrontation over the phone, and I shut off my mobile because I needed to concentrate on work. When I switched it back on after work there were 12 text messages from him on it, basically begging for the opportunity to finish the work and get his tools back. Being the far-too-soft-for-his-own-good type that I am, I'll likely agree to let him do it and take his saw home- but this is the absolute last time, ya know? And it's going to come with conditions so that I don't get stuck with this shit again.

But after that, he'll go to hell on his own terms, and I won't try to stop him. He's bent on self-destruction, and all I would be able to do is tangle myself up in it and get injured with him.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Wed 28 May 2008, 13:20, Reply)