May 14: Anxiety All Day

I've been experiencing a great deal of anxiety all day.  It's unfocused anxiety, with no specific genesis to point at.  I'm healthy, except for a persistent twinge in my ankle (I think I twisted it on my run yesterday).  My car is healthy (the mechanic was unable to find the culprit of my ABS brake light's sudden appearance on my dashboard).  As far as I know, none of my household utilities are about to be disconnected, and I don't have any major job stresses at the present moment (I just signed my contract for the fall semester, and I'm getting paid this week from the hospital).  So this anxiety has me perplexed.

I've read that people who are going to have heart attacks often experience an impending sense of doom or dread beforehand.  That's not me, either.  I don't think I'm going to die.  It's more like I forgot to put on pants before I left the house this morning.  It's a nagging notion that I forgot something important.  I've checked for forgotten birthdays.  I've even gone so far as to Google this date in history, and I found nothing of note (unless you count the launch of the Lewis and Clark Expedition or the settling of Jamestown as an English colony).  Nothing.  Zip.  Nada.  Zilch.

I need to let this anxiety go, but it's difficult.  I keep expecting the phone to ring with some horrible news:  my wife found a mouse in the bathtub, my son fell down and knocked out a tooth, Mitt Romney really won the 2012 presidential election.  I've been practicing deep breathing for the last hour or so.  If anybody was sitting in the office with me, she or he would probably think I was surfing porn sites.

There's nothing to worry about, though.  No catastrophic event.  Not even a minor cut or bruise.

Saint Marty is just slowly going insane.

Room, please!