a great response to one of those "Childhood is idillic bliss" glurges.

Originally found at http://www.angelfire.com/geek/arvay/resignation.html I changed the order around so you get to see the chain letter debunked expertly, piece by piece. with a few minor edits.

Chain Letter: I am hereby officially tendering my resignation as an adult. I have decided I would like to accept the responsibilities of an 8 year-old again.

Chain Breaker: I am hereby officially tendering my resignation as a child. I am pleased, proud, thankful, and honored to have gotten where I am today, and am excited to see where I might go tomorrow.

Chain: I want to go to McDonald's and think that it's a four star restaurant.

Breaker: I am thankful that I afford to eat whatever I like and not worry about paying for BOTH good food AND rent.

Chain: I want to sail sticks across a fresh mud puddle and make a sidewalk with rocks.

Breaker: I am thankful that I can walk past a fresh mud puddle and understand, with the intimacy of an engineer, how the water molecules are held together, how the dirt particles are suspended within, and what life might be teeming inside, thanks to education that I have fought for and won.

Chain: I want to think M&Ms are better than money because you can eat them.

Breaker: I am thankful that I can, of my own volition, choose whether to buy a bag of M&Ms or save the dollar for some other small treat.

Chain: I want to lie under a big oak tree and run a lemonade stand with my friends on a hot summer's day.

Breaker: I am thankful that, when I wake up of a Saturday after a hard week's work, I can freely choose to lie under a big oak tree and sip lemonade with my friends, or by myself on a hot summer's day. Truly there is no relaxation finer than that that comes after hard work.

Chain: I want to return to a time when life was simple; When all you knew were colors, multiplication tables, and nursery rhymes, but that didn't bother you, because you didn't know what you didn't know and you didn't care.

Breaker: I am pleased with the level of education I have achieved thus far and look forward to pursuing even more advanced degrees, because I am tickled with what I know, mystified with what I don't know, and excited, tingly, and thrilled to pursue the latter!

Chain: All you knew was to be happy because you were blissfully unaware of all the things that should make you worried or upset.

Breaker: All I know is to be happy because I am painfully aware of so many tragic, heartbreaking, ugly things that can happen in this world, but that I am lucky and blessed to have escaped most of them, with both my own strength and with lots of luck.

Chain: I want to think the world is fair. That everyone is honest and good.

Breaker: I am aware that the world is not fair. This makes me especially thankful for the good things in my life because I know that they are part chance. It makes me also thankful for the bad things in my life because they remind me that there are no guarantees, and that I should be modest and thankful for my successes. I am thankful that still, the majority of the poeple I've met have been honest and good.

Chain: I want to believe that anything is possible. I want to be oblivious to the complexities of life and be overly excited by the little things again.

Breaker: I know for a fact that anything is possible. It gives me chicken skin thinking about it! I am amazed and awed at the complexity and generosity and essential goodness of the universe!

Chain: I want to live simple again. I don't want my day to consist of computer crashes, mountains of paperwork, depressing news, how to survive more days in the month than there is money in the bank, doctor bills, gossip, illness, and loss of loved ones.

Breaker: I am pleased that my life is so simple--when I want to get a pet, not needing permission from anyone; when I want to advance my education, I go for a master's degree, even if I can't afford to quit my job and thus lose sleep working fulltime while going to school; when I want to have nothing but apples and baked potatoes for dinner, I have nothing but apples and baked potatoes for dinner; when I want my husband to quit physically abusing me, I throw him out, file some papers, wipe my hands, and am done with it; when I want my mother to approve of me, and she doesn't, I very politely cut her off and hang up the phone; when I want to be in a good relationship, I find a good relationship, and the balance of power is stable, since I am financially and emotionally independent; I can build my own bookshelves, replace my own garbage disposal, change my own car oil, and make my own mortgage payments, and I am happy and honored to do so! I am thankful that I have the honor of access to things that no king had access to a hundred years ago. Computers are cool tools, often misused, but also unbelievably productive and powerful; mountains of paperwork go with the territory, but where would we be without 'em? Without proper documentation, how would we ensure that our corporations aren't overspending and devaluing their stock? I am thankful that we have the bureauracracy, however annoying it is, to control how our corporate monsters behave on a microscale. I am thankful even to hear of depressing news--people dying in Darfur deserve to be mourned, even if it is only by me wiping away my tears as I sit in traffic; a hundred years ago, no one would even give them that in their death. I am thankful that I have the gifts of budgeting skills, access to health care, friends that care enough to spend time in idle chitchat with me, illness to remind me to appreciate health, and losses to remind me to appreciate the gains.

Chain: I want to believe in the power of smiles, hugs, a kind word, truth, justice, peace, dreams, the imagination, mankind, and making angels in the snow.

Breaker: I still, and ever will, believe in the power of smiles, hugs, a kind word, truth, justice, peace, dreams, the imagination, mankind, and making angels in the snow.

Chain: So . . . here's my checkbook and my car-keys, my credit card bills and my 401K statements. I am officially resigning from adulthood.

Breaker: So . . . I'll cling fast to my checkbook and my car-keys, my credit card bills and my 401K statements. I've come a long way, baby, and I ain't going back!

Chain: And if you want to discuss this further, you'll have to catch me first, cause.......

Chain: I'm gone.

Breaker: /egotistical rant. You could not pay me enough to be a kid again. :D

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