Bates Motel
On occasion, more often than I care to admit, Anxiety sets up shop in my stomach. Just saunters on in, brushing past the ineffective bouncer at the door and takes a seat where it darn well pleases.
Most days I manage to quell its merciless influence on my adrenal glands, implementing a repertoire of relaxation techniques that stem the tsunami of cortisol flooding my system.
The theory goes that at some point in my past, the ever-ready fight-or-flight reflex served me well in some capacity as a coping mechanism.
At this point in my adult life however I am more than eager to bid it a fond farewell, along with a few of its step-siblings - Guilt, Lack, and, the ever-popular, Approval.
Over the past five years, there have been numerous shining moments when a particularly potent tool in that repertoire of mine has so completely distracted me from the mafioso's grip that I've remembered what stress-free living feels like.
And it's pretty darn agreeable, let me tell you.
So agreeable, in fact, that the contrast of NOT living like that on a regular basis fuels my determination to do so come hell or high water.
Another one of these mafia-busting experiences came over me again recently, and you can bet that once I realized what was going on that I initiated hyper-observation mode.
What clued me in was the slow recognition of a strange sensation in my stomach - nothing. No tension, no hunger, not the need for a rest area - nothing.
Huh. This is interesting, I thought. Granted, I was on my way home from a lovely weekend of R-and-R out in the country with my sweetie, but recovering from some upper-respiratory crud hadn't exactly set the stage for enlightenment.
A few minutes went by, and still, nothing. But at the same time, something - there was a contentment and calm that permeated the compound as if a squeeze-bottle of chocolate sauce were slowly coating the nooks and crannies of my gastro-intestinal tract.
Wondering just what the depths of this encounter might be, I rooted around, seeing if I could stir anything up.
"Going back to my day job tomorrow."
Nope.
"There's that endless list of things that I should be doing for my website."
Nada.
Well now. This was new. Intentional distraction couldn't even budge this state of grace.
My mind started to wander then while I was driving, and the image of a pet rodent running in its exercise wheel abruptly filled my head, that classic symbol of anxiety.
Ohhhhhhhhhh no, you don't. The fledgling bliss-monger in me was not inclined to accommodate a surprise attack into the proceedings.
The next image that floated across my brain's movie screen was the steel girders that moor a public building solidly in the ground.
I want steel girders for my campaign, I thought. Something as immovable and all-knowing as those girders.
Then the most perfect, most excellent scene flashed across my inner eye - a nine-inch knitting needle, appropriately adorned with the embellishments of vaudevillian magic, rammed through one side of the metal slats in the rodent wheel and out the other, planting itself firmly in the progress of any further anxiety maneuvers (no animals were harmed in this fantasy).
I replayed that skillful movement a few times in my head ala Norman Bates - eee, eee, eee, eee, eee.
Talk about a Tawanda moment. You remember Tawanda, from Fried Green Tomatoes? The warrior priestess who avenged the shameful capture of her rightful parking place?
When I got home, I Googled "gerbil wheel" and got the true sense of the mechanism. Interestingly, it is not an enclosed contraption. One is able to hop off when one is so inclined.
I did go out and buy a pair of nine-inch bamboo knitting needles. I plan to create a prototype and add the finished product to the line-up of Resistance Toys - stay tuned.
And someday, with enough practice, we can all rebuff a chance encounter with Anxiety with the nonchalance of a child savoring a popsicle on a summer afternoon.
As his travels in the sun bring him to a playground, he instinctively climbs atop a teeter-totter, straddling it in dead center.
After a moment or two, he lunges to one side of the plank, pushing it firmly to the ground and hops off. He's got places to go, dirt to play in, trees to climb.
Say it with me - "Stop the teeter-totter, I want to get off."
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