Today I made some calls and completely got myself off welfare. Several hours later, I got a phone call from a job asking if I could come in today to start training. Still later I got another call for an interview. I'm already employed part time, but need to pick up extra work.

I should be thrilled at my new independence. I owe some debts, sure, but I'm no longer dependent on anyone but myself for support. You would think I can finally do whatever I want, be whoever I want, live however I want... by can I really? Do I have any right, after years of entitled usury, moral failure, and a general train wreck of an existence, years of doing and thinking in ways I had no business with - do I have any right to anything in life at all? Isn't it wrong for someone like me to now dress well, eat well, engage a rich inner life, talk about abstractions, learn useless things, or pursue personal goals, when they were once doing half of things on government money because they're too lazy and apathetic to search harder for work?

And I keep running into political talk involving welfare, and how much people hate welfare recipients. Talk about entitlement, getting something for nothing, how anyone who doesn't pull their weight should be executed, or just how the welfare mindset is indicative of instant gratification and low IQ. I have no right now to espouse any conservative thought whatsoever, though I'm in favor of cuts to welfare and increases and improvements in education. My mind's a mess in this subject - the whole thing feels like a huge personal attack whenever I read anything about it and I get this urge to confess what a horrible person I am.

I feel like I'm just the worst person in existence. I'm so ashamed of the life I've led I'm not sure if I even want it, going on with my past looming over me forever isn't worth it. I was thinking I might have good reason to be asocial now - nobody wants contact with someone who got their start in life by scamming welfare for a year, ten went on to shamelessly live as though they did nothing wrong.

I want to be punished, I want to be condemned. I want judgement from someone who realizes how need despicable I am and my behavior is, someone who despises welfare and its recipients. I should be excited about a new life, instead I'm paralyzed and afraid to do anything at all.