Theory of Relativity

I had a REALLY stupid professor one time (actually, most of my professors seemed to be lacking in the intelligence department—but this one really took the cake) who was supposed to be teaching us about "cognitive development." Sounded awesome to me. A nice, real science class—neuroscience-y to the extreme, I hoped—all about how exactly it is that people learn how to think. Awesome.

Not. What a joke! One of the most profound of his "lessons" was explaining how Einstein developed the ability to do a "thought experiment." Wow! A thought experiment! You could THINK THROUGH something instead of ACTUALLY doing it hands-on...? Where did Einstein come up with this stuff? Brilliant! The best quote of all my years in college came at the end of this mind-boggling (not in the way he meant...) lecture:

"And THAT'S what enabled Einstein to develop his Theory of Gravity. ... And how it's relative.... And, uh, so forth...."

HA HA HA HA!! I paid tuition for this, people. 

I've developed an only slightly better understanding of the theory of relativity (of gravity...) with gas prices. They've been so useful that way. Hehe. Yesterday we bought gas that was a whole dollar cheaper than only a month or two ago, and I thought to myself as we pulled up: "AWESOME!! Only $3.70!" I almost got of the car to do a savings celebration dance. 

Compare this to four years ago.... We lived here, in San Diego, and the gas by our house was almost always $1.81. For some reason, I actually remember that. And I also actually remember—because it was SO ridiculously traumatic—the time we were seriously running out of gas before we could get home and had no choice but to buy some downtown at $2.24 a gallon. I was fuming mad. I even surprised myself a little with how depressed I could get over spending $2.24 a gallon on gas—my bad mood lasted all evening. $2.24?! The INSANITY!! I couldn't believe we were getting ripped off so badly.

Fast-forward a year after that—now in Denver—as gas prices crept up to over two dollars all the time. I worked at an elementary school with a bunch of wannabe socialists—people who thought it was downright WRONG for gas to not be practically free, or for their credit card company to charge interest when they missed a payment. Huh? Whatever. They complained daily about the gas prices (they complained daily about everything, actually...:)) and by then I was thinking, dude. Calm down. The world is NOT going to end because you have to pay a little more for gas. Grow up. $2.24 a gallon—heck, $2.84 a gallon—just didn't bother me.

And it REALLY didn't bother me when we came back from Europe this year to gas that was over three dollars a gallon. Dude, let me tell you! I felt like we were getting the best deal in the world! In England, France and Italy, gas was routinely about $10 a gallon. We drove (and camped! It was AWESOME!!) all over Wales and England for 9 days, filling up every day and a half or so. Do you really want to know how much it cost to fill our tank...? I'll tell you. TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS. No joke. $200 to fill a tank of gas. (We also drove for a few days in France.... Every other aspect of our trip was impressively budgeted, which turned out to be REALLY good considering how much stinking money we spent on stinking "petrol.") To come back after a month and hear Americans complaining about $3 gas, heck, even $4 gas just made me sick. And every time we went to the gas station to fill up and it was only $50 or $60 or $70, I couldn't help but smile over how glad I was to not have to spend a lot to fill up our car. I also always wondered how long that feeling would last.... Hehe. How long would the memory of $10 gas keep stinging...? Stinging enough to feel overwhelmingly grateful for cheap $4 gas.... 

Well, I guess that question was answered when I started hyperventilating again over gas that got up to $4.70 a month or two ago. I guess a change in perspective can only last so long.... 

Theory of Relativity! Maybe Dr. X should incorporate this into his brilliant lecture.... :)

[However, I must add here that while I may hyperventilate, I do still retain the determination to not complain about it, as well as total disgust when people do. We're pretty lucky people here in the overabundance-of-luxuries department! Beyond lucky. And beyond overabundance-of-luxuries. So economy cynicism still makes me want to puke. Or spit. Or something. :) I only wish we could visit my parents an hour away for a little cheaper! But, there again...! Pretty insanely lucky. So I should even shut up about that. :)]