March 5, 2008

Ready, Set, Panic

Get ready to celebrate. Sunday, March 9, marks one of my favorite holidays. It's Panic Day, the day when you're encouraged to run around and tell everybody you can't take it anymore. I love this holiday because it provides permission to freak out and express the panic that lurks under this façade of calm self-control that I present to the world.

You might think a sophisticated, successful, and suave person such as myself would have it all together. You would be wrong.

Inside, I'm all about fear. Today, for instance, as I'm writing this column, I'm scared I won't be able to make my deadline. I'm convinced something will happen to thwart my plan of writing my column at the last minute and having 10 minutes to review it before I send it off. Any number of things could be my downfall. The cat could throw up, necessitating a protracted session with the shampooer. The UPS man could arrive with that new shipment from Amazon and I'd get lost in a novel. I could get a call from a friend I've been neglecting, and good manners would dictate that I drop everything and talk to her.

This internal pressure is much worse than the external pressure I lived with when I worked for other people. In former jobs, there was so much that had to be done, and so much insistence on perfection that it's a wonder we didn't all implode. Now that I'm my own boss, of course, I am twice as hard on myself. I just don't have anyone to complain to. Except you, of course.

So, in honor of Panic Day, here's what I'm in a tizzy about this morning.

I have to give a speech on Friday, and I haven't prepared. What if I freeze? What if I stand there with my mouth hanging open and drool running down my chin? What if nobody laughs? Maybe I should abandon my career as a humorist. I saw a "help wanted" sign at Baskin-Robbins the other day and I'm pretty good with a scoop.

I can't think about that now. We're out of bananas. If I don't buy bananas before Keeper gets home, he might pass out again from low potassium. What if the store is out of bananas? What if they are all too green to eat? Didn't the doctor say that watermelon has a lot of potassium? Where do I get watermelon out of season?

I'll think about that while I'm walking the dog. I hope she does her business somewhere other than right in front of someone who's working in his yard. Even though I stand there with my little bag conspicuously at the ready, I nearly die of embarrassment every time we're observed. Do I smile sheepishly or pretend to be inspecting the trees?

Speaking of embarrassment, did I remember to inspect the recycling for black plastic, which Keeper insists on putting in there? I don't want to receive another scolding for putting unacceptable items in the bins. On one humiliating trash day, they threatened to cut us off for putting our recycling in tidy white trash bags.

What happens to all the stuff we can't recycle? They just pile it up, right? Some day the landfill will be the largest manmade structure in the Bay Area and it will block out the sun. The crops will fail and the oceans will freeze and I'll be kicking myself for giving away my winter coat in a lame attempt to help the homeless, who will all die anyway along with the rest of mankind because we trashed our once-lovely planet.

Whew. I achieved full-fledged panic status and it's not even Sunday yet. For once in my life, I'm early.

I'm also exhausted. Good thing that Monday is National Napping Day.