Unrelenting, People.
Anxiety.
I have a brain full of psychic tendrils. All looking to grab hold of something to worry about. They are all relatively successful at finding stuff. Everyday I have to go through the process of getting each one to let go separately.
Many of you know that I am trying a medication for the anxiety. I thought it was working but I am not so sure anymore. Not after last week. Jesus.
I spent a week in New Mexico. Just me and my head. It got pretty daunting.
I think the anxiety is twofold. I think my brain wants to latch onto things it thinks it has control over, or at least the repetition of images of the worst outcomes makes my brain think it’s ready for anything. The scenarios play out and all the possible outcomes play out. So, it sees them all the way through and settles on an entire arc. The illusion of control. Then the feelings in relation to this fabrication creates another level of anxiety.
In other words, it’s all fear.
The other element is some poorly parented part of myself wants parents, wants to be comforted, even with bullshit. I think when I am grounded I can do that for myself but if I am untethered all bets are off. ‘It’s going to be okay.’ Or not. Probably not.
There’s so much out of our control. Almost all of it. I guess it's natural to want to have some control in your life.
What will you do to try to have some? Well…
I was staying at a house in Albuquerque. My brain was on fire most of the time with different degrees of panic for different made up reasons. The roots of some were real but absolutely nothing was happening in relation to them outside of my head which was working overtime. Just generating exciting possibilities of dread.
I had a rental car and the house was a real house, not a hotel. I had gone to the supermarket to get some stuff and arrived back at the house. I parked in front, I thought, and got out to bring half the groceries in. I get back out to the car to find the doors locked and the keys inside which is hard to do with a key fob. They’re sort of designed not to do that. The loophole is if you leave the car in drive when you turn it off the car, I guess, thinks you’re still in it. The keys were locked in and there was no way I was going to get them out AND there were two pints of ice cream in the car. Non-dairy. I lost my mind. It was 92 degrees out. I could not accept that the ice cream would just melt and turn to garbage. It never refreezes right.
A normal human would just take the hit. It’s just ice cream. For me, it became bigger. It was global warming, it was all the powerlessness I felt about everything. Me standing outside that car, fuming. Obviously, the correct grown up thing to do is call AAA which I’ve had for decades but rarely use. This is what it is for. In my fury, I decided that there was no one AAA would send who could get into one of these cars. There was no ridge on top of the lock buttons. Impossible. And do they even use Slim Jims anymore? In my futility I realized I had full coverage on the car and I should just throw a large rock through the window. Save the ice cream. I’d have to go to the car rental company, probably fill out paperwork and get a new car. Dumb idea. I saw no other solution.
I found a rock behind the house. I stood to the side of the car, wound up, launched the rock in anticipation of shattering and it just bounced off. I guess they’re making tougher windows now. When it hit the ground I realized I was an idiot and this was not the adult way of handling the situation. I went in and called AAA. I was stuck in a prompt process that seemed to go on forever. I needed to talk to a human. I needed to be told it was going to be okay. I went online to get a guy to come help. I couldn’t even tell if it was happening or not. I looked up the car rental assistance procedure. It probably would’ve cost me money and there was no guarantee that I would get assistance in reasonable time.
I went outside and heaved the rock again. Again it bounced off the window.
Then a text came on my phone that a AAA truck was coming from Santa Fe in an hour. I had to suck it up and just live with the ice cream melting in the front seat. Man up.
I went into the house and started roasting some broccoli in the air fryer. Then I got informed the truck was coming in 15 mins. Great. Ice cream probably wouldn’t make it but fine. I still didn’t believe that anyone could get in the car.
The air fryer started smoking around the time the truck pulled up. The smoke alarm connected to the house was connected to the alarm system. I tried to get the smoke out. I shut off the air fryer and went out to deal with the driver as the alarm blared. He was a native man that looked to be well into his seventies with a bandanna headband, an elder. He had a wobbly wand with a bunch of tape on the end. I asked if he thought he could do it. He said, ‘Probably.’ Fine. I left him to it.
I went back into the house to call the alarm company and tell them it was just a cooking thing and not to send the fire department. They said the fire department had already been dispatched. Around that time the alarm stopped screaming. I went outside to see the progress the guy with the magic wand was making. I heard the sirens in the distance. I said the fire department was coming.
I went out into the street to greet the engine with a driver and two fully suited up firemen. I said it was a cooking situation and that I was sorry that they had to slide down the pole and everything. They said it was fine, it was their job. Good guys. They came into the house with a heat sensor and we had a nice chat and they left.
The elder said he got the car opened. A miracle. I gave him a nice tip and ran the ice cream into the house and put it in the freezer. It still hadn’t melted all the way.
Later that night I got the ice cream out and plowed into it. It was amazing. Too good. I ate half the pint before I realized it wasn’t non-dairy. I stopped eating it.
After all was said and done it was quite an exciting day. I had a half pint’s worth of real happiness before returning to panic of what all that dairy would do to my stomach after being plant-based for so long. Turns out, not much. Just a bit of gas, which is enjoyable in its own way.
It all worked out okay. I have control over nothing but sometimes there’s ice cream.
Today I talk to Sarah Sherman about how she is who she is, a beautiful weirdo. On Thursday I talk to Jackson Galaxy mostly about cats and some about drugs and music. Great talks.
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
Enjoy!
Love,
Maron
