Off to the Races

The headache lurked around the edges of my brain.  It was soft, not so pronounced.  In fact, one could almost question whether it was really there. I was in that half sleep/half awake state, where sleep seductively tried to keep me in its embrace, but wakefulness poked at me, prodded me, tried to pull me away from slumber’s grasp.  Wakefulness had the headache to its advantage. 

It made me wonder what the cause of it was.  And with that thought process begun, wakefulness was on its way in and sleep on its way out.  I began to wonder the myriad of sources.  Effects from the second shot of Covid vaccine?  Sinus pressure? Allergies? Stress? Dehydration? 

For you see, I am a worrier.  An overthinker. A ruminator. My OCD brain can process a million catastrophic What If scenarios in milliseconds.  Once started, well, my brain can run through any number of ruminations, over and over and over again.  Relentlessly.  Once engaged, it was like a horse race. 

As I laid there, on my way from sleep to waking, my brain was activated, and the horse race was on.  The worries and stresses were loaded into their starting gates.  The gun is fired and they are off!

Conversation with the Boss is first out of the gate and has the lead, followed closely by Husband Hasn’t Had Sex in a Week and is Looking for Some Action, and Too Much Screen Time Caused Dry Eye.  In the mix are Haven’t Heard From Kids in Awhile, Gimpy Dog, Diabetic Cat,  and Is It Too Early To Retire. Making a play for it are Gotta Fill Out that Excel Spreadsheet, Call the Dentist, Schedule That Mammo, When was your last Colonsocopy,  And Does That Mole Look Funny.  Bringing up the rear are Just One More Glass of Wine, Why Can’t I Remember Anything, Was That Pork Fully Cooked, Covid Variants, and Getting Covid.  Scratched from the race is Can’t Wait for My Covid Vaccine.

 I decided I might as well get out of bed at that point.  Wakefulness smirked at Sleep, preening a bit over its win.  I made my way to the bathroom.  As I stepped on the scale before getting in the shower, as I do every morning, I hoped the scale would give me a number I wanted to see.  I contemplated yesterday’s calories, instantly regretting both the brownie at 3 pm and the ice cream at 7 pm.  The scale is forgiving though and registered a number I’ll take. 

I got into the shower and the horse race was still ongoing, only now Too Much Screen Time Caused Dry Eye has the lead.  I find that my dried out right eye was really bothering me.  I could barely open it.   I contemplated what life would be like with a glass eye, in the event I lose the eye.  I wondered if I should make another appointment with the eye doctor.

 After my shower, I got dressed and then made the bed.  I glanced at the time and saw I had 15 minutes for some meditation. 

Ah, meditation.  The antidote to the horse race.  I settled in to my sitting position on the bed, pillows behind me, spine upright, hands resting, cupped, in my lap.  Guitar zen music playing, I took in a deep breath and exhaled.  I focused on my breathing and started to feel relaxed.  My mind started  to wander, but I noticed it, and said gently, ‘thinking, thinking’ and went back to focusing on my breath. 

At the end of the 15 minutes, I felt good, dare I say it, even zen-like? I felt I had slowed the horse race down a bit.  I walked into my home office, turned on my laptop to begin my work day.  I was hit with several urgent IM’s from my boss typing in all caps.  And just like that, Is It Too Early to Retire has raced to the lead and Zen Peacefulness dropped to dead last, with Ain’t Life a Bitch laughing at Zen Peacefulness as she flies by.