Fear of Flinging

I realized I had a problem when I hung up a brand new, black shirt and discovered I already had two that were exactly like it.  I do like black shirts.  Specifically, I like scoop-necked, short sleeve, long t-shirts in a cotton/ spandex blend.  But somehow I forgot that I already had one, (or more), when I bought it. I even got them all from the same place.

I also tend to forget that I already have Duke’s mayonnaise [three jars at last count] and black yoga pants [two pairs, still with tags] as well.   God I love yoga pants. No, I don’t practice yoga.  I practice eating macaroni salad made with Dukes mayo and the yoga pants allow me to do this comfortably. Still, when I pull my drawer out to put away my new black yoga pants, the exact pair stares back at me.  It’s delightful, like Christmas, but also disturbing, like overdrawn at the bank.

I hope I’m not getting dementia.  I remember going to my parent’s house and discovering that the pantry was full of Busch’s baked beans and little else.  This was about the time mail ordered items from Mom were arriving at my door on a regular basis.  I got things like Siamese cat salt and pepper shakers, several pairs, and anklets with bells on them like belly-dancers wear.

I decided to Google obsessions and dementia. I hoped that my multiple purchases were merely an obsession. Obsessions are a little classier. I can at least tell people I’ve got OCD and take a drug for it. But dementia is not cool at all. It can involve adding Depends to the black shirt and yoga pant obsession.


According to the American Heritage Dictionary, an obsession is a compulsive preoccupation with a fixed idea, or an unwanted feeling or emotion.  Psychiatrists have even categorized them.

1.      Somatic obsessions (hypochondria, dysmorphophobia)

2.      Physical obsessions (eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia)

3.      Sexual obsessions (paraphilia), and pathological jealousy.

There does not appear to be a black shirt or mayonnaise obsession. Although I did not specifically search psychosis/black shirt,  or psychosis/mayonnaise.

However, when I looked up senility, I found this definition;

A deterioration of intellectual faculties, such as memory, concentration, or judgment. 

Judgment and memory.  It appears I fit more into the senility category than the obsession category. Greaaaat.

                                                                  

I suppose this explains how I forgot how to open my car on the passenger side from the inside of the car. I pressed the unlock function on my key and the little button wouldn’t go up.  So I tried to grasp the little button and pull it up, but it was flush with the door panel so I couldn’t get hold of it.  I thought about trying tweezers, but I had no tweezers handy.  I had a corkscrew, a pen, and a Swiffer Duster.  I also had a front seat full of groceries.  So, cursing under my breath, I dragged everything over the gearshift and schlepped the stuff around the front of the car to take it into the house.  I then tried to unlock the passenger side from the outside with my key but the little button STILL wouldn’t go up.  So I dragged the rest of the stuff over the gear shift as well.

I told this story to a friend at work, lamenting that I’d have to get the lock fixed because otherwise I’d have to unload things across the driver’s side, and passengers would have to climb in that way too.

“Why didn’t you just open the passenger door with the door handle?”  She asked.

“What do you mean?”

She looked alarmed. “The DOOR handle.  Did you pull the handle?”

“Oh yaaaaaaa….” 

I had flash-backs of my Mom trying to turn on the TV with the phone, or clapping to turn off a lamp at my cousin’s house, over and over again, while we wondered what the hell she was clapping about.   I imagined myself in a facility flinging poo at the nurse’s assistant.

Someone once said we become what we fear.  Or maybe they didn’t say that.  I don’t know.  It sounds like something someone would say.  At any rate, it makes sense.  I mean, if we are what we eat, then why couldn’t we extrapolate that to fear? 

Based on that premise,  I will become  a senile, fat, spider, in a filthy  nursing home that serves only pureed food. I will have to exercise all the time as well as climb sheer, high, rock mountains, (when not scuba diving,) and do lots of mathematical equations.

But I think I’ve wandered off-topic.  

I work in an office that sends appeals to insurance companies.  Lori, who I always call Shelly, used to work at United.  She writes appeals to United now.  I’m very familiar with her history at that insurance company. She asked me one day if I knew anyone there.

“Actually, I do.  My cousin was an attendant and her husband was a big-wig there too, I think.” 

“Wow! How long were they with United? I might know them because I used to travel to the different offices.”

“They both retired, so they must have worked there a long time.  I don’t know exactly when they retired. They live in a cool house on the west coast.”

“Can you write their names down?  I have a friend who’s been in corporate for over thirty years. It would be cool if they knew each other.”  

I wrote down my cousin’s name and told her they lived near San Francisco.   I said I thought her husband had actually been a pilot with them.

She looked at me funny.  “So he has his own plane?”

 “No.  He flew for the company.” 

“So he was a big-wig in corporate and he also flew the corporate plane?”

“No silly.  He flew for everyone!”

Silence.     That’s when it occurred to me.  I was talking about the airlines and she was talking about the insurance company.    We had a good laugh over the silliness of it all.  As soon as she went back to her desk I downed six gingko biloba vitamins and brewed a cup of Ginseng tea.  I wondered if a person could O.D. on Gingko…

Even though I’m fairly concerned about my mental faculties, I’ve decided to chalk it up to stress.  When it can’t be explained, blame it on stress.  And besides, you really can’t have too many yoga pants.  They fade quickly, loose their cling, and get all snagged and stuff.  I was just being smart buying extra ones.  As for the mayonnaise, it can be used for soooooo many things.  Imagine a home without mayo!  Tuna just wouldn’t hold the same fascination as it does with good mayonnaise, some onions, and green olives [six jars at last count]. 

Now why can’t I get this damned TV to turn on? 

Oh shit.