Sleepless Nights and Sneezing Fits

Funny what fall, stress and allergies do to you. Funny what we do to ourselves to augment stress. A friend of mine likes to tell me that stress is not "real." By which she means that it is all in our heads. And I guess it is, in a way. Still, that unreality triggers a really impressive biochemical reaction, one that expresses itself in different ways in different people. For me it is sleepless nights and allergies. Sure, yes, I know - fall and leaves and dust and all that. But it seems to be worse when I am fretting over something. Like being unemployed. Like living in my friends' spare bedroom. Like researching all the crap that goes into starting a new business.

So scratchy throat, itchy eyes, and sneezy me spends a lot of time gazing at the ceiling, fretting about all the stuff that I fret about. Which makes it worse. Which leads to more ceiling gazing. There are nights when I long for a switch to just turn my brain off. The endless loop of what ifs and concerns and oh mys and all of it, running around in my head like a group of demented hamsters tucked into those little clear plastic balls.

Sometimes I can derail myself, I find decorating fantasy homes is a good diversion. I have now decorated a dozen different places from a beach house in Croatia to a townhouse in Seattle. I have planned trips to Turkey, trips to Germany, trips to Costa Rica, and trips to visit friends. Sometimes it is enough just to try to list as many international cities as I can for each letter of the alphabet (yes, I have gotten all the way to Zagreb a few times).

There are upsides, of course. Having those quiet hours late at night, or early in the morning are often wonderful. There is something about early morning that is calming. There are nights when it allows me to finally finish a book, or spend time scribbling madly in a notebook (other diversions that help turn off the feedback loop in my brain). And sometimes it allows for a clarity of thought that surprises me. But it would be nice to not to have to yawn, sneeze and sniffle my way to get there!

I want a new party.

I am a liberal. There it is. I am a card-carrying member of the Democratic Party. I like most of what the Democrats stand for. But, God love 'em, the party makes me nuts sometimes. Friday I received an email from the Washington State Democrats. I get a goodly amount of email from them and most of it makes me crazy - Friday was the last straw.

It seems that the Mayor of Mt. Vernon, WA (pop. 31,000, a pretty little town about an hour north of Seattle), is giving the key to the "city" (which seems a fairly grandiose term for Mt. Vernon) to Glenn Beck, a conservative talk show host on Fox News who is primarily known for crying on cue and sounding outraged over pretty much everything liberal. The WA Dems are livid. They would like me to sign a petition to tell the town council of Mt. Vernon to "overrule" this presentation. It is useful to know that the Mayor of that burg - one Bud Norris - was a classmate of Mr. Beck's at Mt Vernon High School. Hence the "honor" he is bestowing.

So why am I ranting? Because there are important issues in this state and this country. Health care anybody? How about quality education? How about jobs? Just to name a few from the top of the list of REALLY IMPORTANT THINGS TO WORRY ABOUT. Glenn Beck getting the key to the city of Mt. Vernon? That isn't even on the list.

Why does this need to be explained to the folks in charge? It makes my head hurt to think of the amount of time it took to just send out the stupid email in the first place (and really, that was probably automated). Still, the Chairman of the State Party put his name on it, and even took the time to reply to my email back to them. A reply that equated Glenn Beck with Joe McCarthy. An obscure talk show host on Fox News with a US Senator, a comparison that is laughable.

Even on the home page of the State Party this is the headline. Healthcare is there, in the guise of telling the party faithful that we can all get wristbands that read "Health Care Now!" because as we all know, wristbands are the key to getting good policy passed. We have petitions for Mt. Vernon to consider, petitions that we are to send to All Our Friends. But for healthcare we have wristbands.

I wonder if it is time for a new political party. The Common Sense Party. Perhaps have some sort of test to join - or at least an essay. If you can't focus on the issues in rational, sensible way you can't join. Anybody interested?

New Ventures

After a month of job hunting; which, by the way, is a soul-killing way to spend your time; I have found that I keep coming back to the same thought. This thought has haunted me since the day I walked out of Zymo wondering what the heck I was going to do now, wondering why the universe had heaped this new challenge on to my plate. It is a thought I have talked out with my brother Erik, a thought that I have bounced off a couple of people who I trust (my 'wise council'), it is a thought that each time I think I have gotten around it, it pops up again. The thought? Why not work for - ME???

Once I got past the fantasy of sleeping late, going to the gym any time I wanted to (instead of dragging myself out of bed at the ungodly hour of 5 am), and taking meetings in my pajamas while West Wing played silently on the TV in the background; once I came back to the reality of how much time, effort and heartache running your own business really and truly takes - I figured no way. I can't do that. What about health insurance? What about benefits? What about paid vacation? What about a 401k? How would I live without those???

But this little voice in the back of my head keeps persisting on talking about it. "You have a really good idea," it says to me. "This is a great niche market," it adds on occasion. "You like what you would be doing and you like how it sounds," it chides when I try to rationalize my way around it. "DO THIS. DO THIS NOW!" It roars and pounds its fists on the ground when I try to ignore it.

So maybe I should. Maybe I really should. In fact, I think I will.