All in a tizzy

Ask anyone who knows me (or even anyone who just met me) and they'll tell you my most obvious character trait: I am a worrier.

I worry about everything and nothing and all that lies in between. I'm wound tighter than a spool of thread, from what I've been told; I'm one straw away from breaking the camel's back. Wait a minute, that may be a mixed metaphor. I'll have to worry about that later.

Today there is a noticeable lack of things to fret over (poor metaphor choices aside). As I sit on the porch of my aunt's lakeside summer home, enjoying the gloriously sunny but not too hot/humid summer weather, I suddenly realize I have not a care in my head. And with that thought, I am immediately gripped by a sudden and utterly debilitating sense of anxiousness. Yes it's true: I worry about not being worried.

I spent the vast majority of this weekend with Doc, who abandoned his study materials to placate me after a two-week absence. We didn't do much of anything, really, but the days happily flew by and now that he's gone to run some errands around Western Mass before returning to New York, I'm left to my own devices as far as relaxation goes. Book in one hand, Diet Coke in the other, I was all set to have a nice, quiet afternoon of reading and... well, that's pretty much it. Yet here I am, fifty-four pages into my novel, seized with the overpowering sense that something, somewhere is wrong.

The horror!

I have the weight of the world on my shoulders, all right.

I may be slightly anxious but at least I'm prepared when disaster strikes. Or rather, the adrenaline is already pumping when catastrophe happens and I'm ready to swing into action if necessary, before absolute panic sets in and I'm rendered completely useless.

Some people might tell me to simply stop worrying. Hey, really? Thanks! I never thought of that. While I'm at it, how about you stop breathing and tell me how life works out for you?

So I sit here with the breeze blowing my hair in every direction but the one I want my hair to fall, and I look out at the happy, care-free people floating in the lake, and it occurs to me that I'm wasting the day worrying about nothing. Not that I'm worried about it, I'm just saying...