11.20.2013

how camest thou in this pickle?

I worry a lot. (Is it obvious? I should probably be concerned about that, too--hmmm.) The things that trouble me vary in size and relative intensity, from the sort that would bother almost anyone (money, health) to other things that seem to vex only me. For instance...


  • I worry that the freckles on my face, which have been there my whole life, are actually signs of something awful.
  • I worry that someday, when I'm having a rough day and it seems like no one's listening, I'm going to blow up the blog without first backing it up, and then be furious with myself forever. (I'm way more impulsive than anyone would ever realize, and if I had a dollar for every time I acted first and thought later, I'd be loaded.)
  • I worry that I'm never going to get out of the soul-sucking situation that I feel like I'm drowning in.
  • I worry that if (when) I do get out of the soul-sucking situation I feel like I'm drowning in, my heart will shatter when I have to leave this cat, who loves me to pieces. Don't even mention the people, because I'm not going to think about what it would feel like, leaving the people.
  • I worry that I don't drive well enough to make it through another winter living in the great white north. Nevermind that I've got two snow-brush/scrapers, a shovel, and a bag of winter gear in the car from the end of October until it's flip-flop weather in the spring, plus whatever cold-weather gear I'm already wearing when I'm in the car. Nevermind that I take really good care of the car and drive smart and never leave home without the phone charged and ready (though I never, ever use it while I'm in the car, so, there). 
  • I worry that my friends only like me because [name some useless, temporary nonsense], and it's only a matter of time before they don't anymore. Not because there's anything wrong with them, or that they've given me any reason to think that this is true. These are in-the-dark-of-night kinds of worries, not out-in-the-light-of-day logical analyses.
  • I worry that the soul-sucking situation referred to above has stolen my vocabulary for some of the good things in my life, like gratitude and warmth and contentment, and placed it with grumbling and venting and a sort of vacuous lethargy. If I'm not bitching or whining, I often feel like I'm sleepwalking through every day. Surely that's not literally possible, no matter how much it feels like the only answer.
  • I worry that I've used up my allotment of romantic love, that I somehow managed to run through it too quickly and now I'm simply 'out.' And that I will be like this--alone, sort of lonely but not exactly, sort of bored but not totally--forever.
  • I worry that I'm too foolish or stubborn to take care of my health, and that something dumb will incapacitate or kill me.
  • I worry about dropping my keys when I walk over a grate or past an opening in a curb.


Please understand that some of this is more tongue-in-cheek than not, all of it is sporadic, and that the existence of the list, in itself, is nothing about which to worry.

[the title quotation is by William Shakespeare, from The Tempest, Act V, scene i]

3 comments:

  1. I love freckles! I do! I worry that they will one day figure out how to erase them, and it will become a freckle-less world. The grate worry... definitely share that one with you. The one worry that stands out for me is the state of "gray" that you are experiencing. I've been there and go back into it once in a while. It can change, but some days you really wonder if it will.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This blogpost has been brought to you by the letter W and the number 2. As in 2 a.m. Worrying.

    You drive just fine, despite what Certain of Your Family Members may have subconsciously indicated. Really. Truly.

    Hang in there. Your friends love you for your ineffable you-ness, not because you are/have ________.

    ReplyDelete
  3. "I will be like this--alone, sort of lonely but not exactly, sort of bored but not totally--forever." -- DITTO.

    ReplyDelete