THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, March 23, 1996 TAG: 9603230001
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A15 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: George Hebert
LENGTH: Medium: 66 lines
A worry compartment. Something not confined to worry warts either.
I've come to think that's just what a lot of us have, right up front, in our brains.
And this compartment must always have an occupant, something to stew about, perhaps for only a few days, perhaps for much longer. But something in our thinking and emotional processes seems dead-set against any period of unoccupied serenity for this special working space up there among the neurons et al.
I've thought of various other ways to describe this curious, disturbing phenomenon.
For instance, instead of a compartment, it might be thought of as a kind of mental searchlight that regularly probes the world around a person, seeking trouble, locking onto whatever holds the most promise of aggravation and then, if the trouble dissolves, waving around until a new vexation is discovered.
Another analogy would be a kind of lens or focusing mechanism imbedded in our thinking machinery, something that scans for difficulties, locks on, shifts, locks on to a new source of anxiety, shifts, and so on.
But ``worry compartment'' may be as good a metaphor as any.
Let's say I'm dreading an extra-heavy dental session, like a root canal, which has been scheduled for about a week from now. Well, that project has taken up residence - dental pick, drill and all - right there in my worry compartment. And there it gets the full anxiety treatment right up till and part-way through, my time in the chair.
But the experience turns out to be much less hurtful and stressful than I thought. And then it's quickly over anyhow. Exit this problem from the compartment.
But something pops in immediately to take its place. Maybe I've gotten word that a bill payment I know I made hadn't reached its destination. The weekend is at hand, and there's no way to clear matters up by telephone. Ergo, two days of helpless fuming. The payment mix-up remains in worry residence until Monday's sorting-out.
And what happens immediately? That left front tire we've had trouble with before seems suddenly to have lost air again. Is something seriously wrong? Can we trust it for a loop up Williamsburg way after a little air-hose touch-up, or might we find ourselves stranded on the Interstate? Will we have to buy a new tire? Worry room has a fresh occupant.
Well, the trip proves okay, and a couple of days later, a small leak is found at our service station and is repaired. Tire trauma evacuates worry compartment.
Then? Well, how about the economy and all those lay-offs? A coming crisis to speculate upon?
How about the terrorists and other zanies at loose in the world?
How about the possibility of a jump in our next property assessment?
How about that hole in the ozone layer?
Whatever. I'm sure the doorkeeper of my worry compartment will have let something in - without a blip in the routine - to deny me any respite.
Perhaps I should re-examine the notion that all this sequence of worries is some ingrained, self-torturing, maybe even universal, habit of mind.
Perhaps, instead - and as various people have said in various ways - life really is one confounded thing after another. MEMO: Mr. Hebert, a former editor, lives in Norfolk.
by CNB