Day 9: I Know What You’re Thinking

Note: This was actually posted last evening, on Day 9. This morning, it flat out disappeared. Nothing on the page, nothing in drafts, no sign of it on social media. Perhaps I was dreaming?

Do you ever wake up all angsty and nervous for no apparent reason? (If you don’t, good for you. You can stop reading now.) It’s like the moment you lift your head from the pillow, you’re filled with dread. And you don’t know why. There’s no big business meeting to attend. No outstanding bills to pay. No bad relationships that have to be addressed. Yet you’re going through your morning routine with a nervous stomach.

It seems like something a little Xanax could fix, but you can’t run to the drug store and grab some without a prescription. So you pull it together as best you can and try to make a day of it. Sometimes, life can feel overwhelming even when it isn’t, you tell yourself.

If you’re lucky, a couple of hours later you realize you’re going to be okay. (Of course you are, silly.) Your breathing slows; your neck muscles relax. You’re left bewildered by what just happened. Then you shake your head and move on, putting the experience in the back of your mind until you have to deal with it again another time.

Or you go to church and feel a shiver run down your spine as the first reading seems to be speaking directly to you (1 John 4:18):

There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not yet perfect in love.

Well, I’ll be danged.