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penfieldHow Much Stress is Too Much Stress?
- Matt Groening, Life in Hell, 1990
I am stressed out. I am filled to the brim with stress, now fortified with stress, part of a complete stress. Were I to take a stress test, I would stress out the test, and it would explode. I have all the major stresses: job stress, money stress, relationship stress. None of these stresses alone reach the level of critical stress, but they are collectively forming a stress union, holding derisive picket signs and barricading the entry to my Happiness & Relaxation factory.
Normally I am able to sublimate most of this stress by working out, or writing, or clipping coupons. But my brain seems to be careening out of control, like a plinko chip rattling against the pegs on the board, at the mercy of incessant gravity.
It's like I can't stop thinking. The simple act of going from work to home takes the shape of a giant decision tree, consuming the analytical, efficiency-obsessed part of my mind.
Should I walk fast or medium fast? It's cold outside, and walking fast would keep me warmer and get me to the train station more quickly. But these business shoes are not really designed for fast walking, and could give me shin splints. Plus I'd look like one of those uptight dorks, huffing and puffing down the street in my preppy little outfit. And I'm at the mercy of four different traffic lights anyway, so does it really matter? I just hate it when I'm making good time and then all of a sudden I have to break my stride and stop at a traffic light.
Of course, this could depend on which Metro station I take home. Since my office is at 15th and M Streets NW, I could walk the five blocks southwest to Farragut North and take the Red Line to Gallery Place and then catch the Yellow Line home to northern Virginia. Or I could walk four blocks due south to take the Blue Line all the way home. Or, if the Blue Line is delayed in that direction, I could take the Blue Line in the opposite direction to L'Enfant Plaza and transfer to the Yellow Line. The Red Line-to-Yellow Line includes the longer walk, but the faster train trip, although there are no alternatives once you're in the station so if the train is waylaid or anything, I'm sort of screwed. The Blue Line direct has the shortest walk -- although the fact that it's a straight line prevents me from avoiding any stop lights -- and it offers the easiest train ride in that it's just one line, with no transfers. But it's also the longest ride on the train, which can be particularly unpleasant if it's truly crowded, like at peak rush hour. The Blue Line-to-Yellow Line combines the shortest walk with the shortest train ride, but it doesn't really save much time because it's only one fewer total stop than the Blue Line Direct, plus there's the transfer, which means that it usually takes just as long as the long train ride, it's just that I'm always moving and getting on and off trains, which can relieve some of the commuting boredom but makes it difficult to read my Newsweek.
Once I get to my home station, it's a fairly easy walk to my neighborhood, but I usually spend that time trying to determine whether I need to stop by the grocery store on my way home, which forces me to do a quick inventory -- from memory -- about what's in our fridge, pantry, etc. and what J. and I are going to do for dinner, now that I can't just fall back on macaroni whenever I need to, like in my bachelor days. So I think to call J. and ask her about her dinner preferences, except that my direct route through the shopping mall and the parking garage precludes sustained cell phone coverage, so that I can't call her until the point when I have to decide whether I'm going to the store or not. So I usually end up heading toward the store anyway, which I normally don't mind but after a long and stressful day, more options and decisions are not what I really need right now, especially once I realize that I left my coupons and my reusable nylon grocery bag at home.
Whether or not I go to the grocery store, there are basically two ways to enter my apartment building: on the main (first) floor or through the basement. The first floor is where the mailbox is, which is nice, plus it's more heavily trafficked so that there's less of a chance I'll have to fumble through my pockets to clear the outer security perimeter, and it's more likely that an elevator car will be waiting on the first floor to take me up to my apartment. The basement offers quicker sanctuary from the cold weather and it's not uphill, but it can sometimes take a while for the elevator to come to the basement, so you're just waiting there, possibly with several bags of groceries. And sure, I could enter on the basement level and then walk up one floor to the mailbox and then take the elevator from there up to my floor, but this seems like an obnoxious and unappealing detour for some spatial or psychological reason that I can't quite explain.
And then once I get up and in to my apartment, the rest of my evening sprawls out with more questions. Go to the gym or not? Cook dinner alone or wait for J.? Eat at the table or in front of the TV? And when do I write for this journal? During the early evening hours, in which case I'm basically ignoring J. while she's awake, or should I write later at night, thereby staying up until some God-stupid hour?
Maybe I should have waited until later. Maybe then I'd be too exhausted to lie awake, stressed.
- Matt Groening, Life in Hell, 1990
I am stressed out. I am filled to the brim with stress, now fortified with stress, part of a complete stress. Were I to take a stress test, I would stress out the test, and it would explode. I have all the major stresses: job stress, money stress, relationship stress. None of these stresses alone reach the level of critical stress, but they are collectively forming a stress union, holding derisive picket signs and barricading the entry to my Happiness & Relaxation factory.
Normally I am able to sublimate most of this stress by working out, or writing, or clipping coupons. But my brain seems to be careening out of control, like a plinko chip rattling against the pegs on the board, at the mercy of incessant gravity.
It's like I can't stop thinking. The simple act of going from work to home takes the shape of a giant decision tree, consuming the analytical, efficiency-obsessed part of my mind.
Should I walk fast or medium fast? It's cold outside, and walking fast would keep me warmer and get me to the train station more quickly. But these business shoes are not really designed for fast walking, and could give me shin splints. Plus I'd look like one of those uptight dorks, huffing and puffing down the street in my preppy little outfit. And I'm at the mercy of four different traffic lights anyway, so does it really matter? I just hate it when I'm making good time and then all of a sudden I have to break my stride and stop at a traffic light.
Of course, this could depend on which Metro station I take home. Since my office is at 15th and M Streets NW, I could walk the five blocks southwest to Farragut North and take the Red Line to Gallery Place and then catch the Yellow Line home to northern Virginia. Or I could walk four blocks due south to take the Blue Line all the way home. Or, if the Blue Line is delayed in that direction, I could take the Blue Line in the opposite direction to L'Enfant Plaza and transfer to the Yellow Line. The Red Line-to-Yellow Line includes the longer walk, but the faster train trip, although there are no alternatives once you're in the station so if the train is waylaid or anything, I'm sort of screwed. The Blue Line direct has the shortest walk -- although the fact that it's a straight line prevents me from avoiding any stop lights -- and it offers the easiest train ride in that it's just one line, with no transfers. But it's also the longest ride on the train, which can be particularly unpleasant if it's truly crowded, like at peak rush hour. The Blue Line-to-Yellow Line combines the shortest walk with the shortest train ride, but it doesn't really save much time because it's only one fewer total stop than the Blue Line Direct, plus there's the transfer, which means that it usually takes just as long as the long train ride, it's just that I'm always moving and getting on and off trains, which can relieve some of the commuting boredom but makes it difficult to read my Newsweek.
Once I get to my home station, it's a fairly easy walk to my neighborhood, but I usually spend that time trying to determine whether I need to stop by the grocery store on my way home, which forces me to do a quick inventory -- from memory -- about what's in our fridge, pantry, etc. and what J. and I are going to do for dinner, now that I can't just fall back on macaroni whenever I need to, like in my bachelor days. So I think to call J. and ask her about her dinner preferences, except that my direct route through the shopping mall and the parking garage precludes sustained cell phone coverage, so that I can't call her until the point when I have to decide whether I'm going to the store or not. So I usually end up heading toward the store anyway, which I normally don't mind but after a long and stressful day, more options and decisions are not what I really need right now, especially once I realize that I left my coupons and my reusable nylon grocery bag at home.
Whether or not I go to the grocery store, there are basically two ways to enter my apartment building: on the main (first) floor or through the basement. The first floor is where the mailbox is, which is nice, plus it's more heavily trafficked so that there's less of a chance I'll have to fumble through my pockets to clear the outer security perimeter, and it's more likely that an elevator car will be waiting on the first floor to take me up to my apartment. The basement offers quicker sanctuary from the cold weather and it's not uphill, but it can sometimes take a while for the elevator to come to the basement, so you're just waiting there, possibly with several bags of groceries. And sure, I could enter on the basement level and then walk up one floor to the mailbox and then take the elevator from there up to my floor, but this seems like an obnoxious and unappealing detour for some spatial or psychological reason that I can't quite explain.
And then once I get up and in to my apartment, the rest of my evening sprawls out with more questions. Go to the gym or not? Cook dinner alone or wait for J.? Eat at the table or in front of the TV? And when do I write for this journal? During the early evening hours, in which case I'm basically ignoring J. while she's awake, or should I write later at night, thereby staying up until some God-stupid hour?
Maybe I should have waited until later. Maybe then I'd be too exhausted to lie awake, stressed.
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no subject
Date: 2008-12-18 04:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-18 04:56 pm (UTC)I'm not in that building, I'm across 15th street from that building, in the old Swedish Embassy. So that's, what, the north-east corner. I'm not very good at direction.