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Teething Trouble

I’ve just started the new job and am happy as hell to be here. I’m finding I’ll fit right in. But when a person is a couple days into a new job, there’s usually an unsettled feeling. In my case, the challenge is not to be an asshole about it.

Mood music:

I’m not sure I’m having much success there, particularly at home, where I’m told I’ve been cranky and snippy and in OCD overdrive. I know the latter is true, because I know my trigger behavior when it surfaces. I get anxious to set up the new laptop, get work email on the phone and get access to all my various online portals. Most of that went fine &emdash; until I tried to access the dashboard for this blog. My username and password wouldn’t work. When I got home, I became obsessed with fixing the problem.

Erin and I tried all kinds of things to get me in and I dug in deeper every time we failed. It turns out I was simply using the wrong admin link. How stupid do I feel right now? Pretty stupid.

It’s been a long season of feeling unsettled as I went through the process of getting the new gig. I stayed a month at the old job before starting here so I could finish my various projects instead of dumping them on someone else’s lap. The result was that I pushed myself hard to the bitter end, leaving myself no time to detach and enjoy being a lame duck. Friends said I should have taken a vacation before starting the new job, and they’re probably right. But what’s done is done.

I have to right myself and pull it together, which means:

  • Being more disciplined about meditation. I’ve been doing it, but I can’t seem to sustain the balanced feeling for more than a few minutes after doing the exercise.
  • Getting a new therapist. Though my last therapist told me I didn’t need it anymore, I’m realizing that I still do. I don’t need weekly sessions or even bi-weekly. Once a month might do it (or not). But I need an objective voice to keep sounding the siren when I go barking up the wrong tree.
  • Making the kids pull their weight. My kids have chores they’re supposed to do. But I have no patience right now, so if they don’t move fast enough I do it for them. Being children, they’re happy to let me do that, but in trying to do everything on the chore side I become a scattered mess. I need to pull back.
  • Praying. Checking in with the man upstairs is always helpful to me — when I remember to do it.

I know I’ll get through this, and the truth is that there are nothing but good things happening in my life right now. I’ll keep you all posted.

Cracked Glass
Photo Credit: W J (Bill) Harrison via Compfight cc
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Traffic Jam Meditiation

When I was younger and more anxious, traffic jams used to push me to the point of madness. I’d let the f-bombs fly. I’d flip people off (I did that once with my future in-laws in the back seat). I’d punch the roof of the car so hard and so often I’d leave dents and tear the fabric.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:5Uw5Hdjb2zAZPR6YJKWlGK]

Flashback, 1989: 

It’s registration day at North Shore Community College, where I’m enrolled for the fall semester. I’m just out of high school and angry at the world for a variety of reasons. I’ve been working long hours in my father’s warehouse in Saugus, and I’m rubbed raw. I’m frustrated because a girl I like is getting cold feet about the idea of hooking up with a loose cannon like me. It doesn’t take much to trigger a temper tantrum.

That day I was rattled hard by the long lines of college registration. I wasn’t expecting it and was full of fear that I wouldn’t get the classes I needed. Not that it really mattered, since my major was liberal arts.

Two hours in, I realized I had to give them a check for the courses I was taking. I had no money and panicked. They allowed me to drive to Saugus to get a check from my father. I was in full road rage mode on the drive there and back, crawling up the bumpers in front of me, riding the horn and yelling out the window with tears running down my face. Clearly, the world was coming to an end at that moment.

By day’s end, I was breathing into a bag between the chain of cigarettes I was smoking.

I still get claustrophobic and somewhat anxious in traffic jams. Yesterday was a prime example. I-93 north was a parking lot and it took nearly two hours to get home. I was already tired and under the spell of winter-induced depression.

But I got through it without a tantrum. I’ve developed a nice meditation for moments like these.

I’ve been drinking tea on the ride home, turning the typically hour-long commute into a break time of sorts. I crank up the music and get comfortable. I do a little praying. In yesterday’s case, I prayed for the safety of anyone who might have gotten hurt in an accident up ahead. I did some breathing exercises I learned in a recent mindfulness class.

I was still pissed and cranky when I got home, especially since I had to get right back in the car a short time later to take one of my sons to his Cub Scouts meeting. But I wasn’t a freaked-out madman.

That’s progress I can be grateful for.

I’m also grateful for Erin. I always am, but yesterday, knowing I was thrown behind the eight ball, she did some of my chores for me. That took a load off my shoulders.

Thanks, honey.

Road Rage