February 12, 2006
whaddaya mean, angry?
I don’t get angry very often. I get irritated. I call people “bastards” and mean it. I get frustrated. But not angry.
I’m angry right now. I don’t know what to do. I want to break something that isn’t mine and I want to feel good about it. I want to kick a hole in something and not have to paste it back together. I want to yell at people and have there be no repercussions. As I write this, I think, “You know if you did any of that you’d just be sorry you did it and then you’d be even angrier because no one’s going to understand why you’re so frenzied anyway.”
And then I think, “I really want to break something.”
What do people do with anger? There’s nothing to be done with it. I’m angry, for one thing, that I have had a cold for a week. What am I going to do about that? Nothing. How is it helping me to get angry? It isn’t. It isn’t helping. Yet I’m angry.
Another thing, when I go this particular meeting, there’s a guy there who’s very nice. He’s very involved in things. He has his heart in the right place. But I hate his voice. He sounds like Winnie the Pooh inside a metal drum would sound if I were wearing ear muffs. And he’s saying annoying and repetitive things. And I start to wonder, “What the hell do you know? You’re a bear in a can.” And then I get angry because we’re talking about nothing and even when I distract myself, I can still hear him banging around in there. “Oh! It’s dark in here. Hmm, let’s talk about the utility bill. You know, they use coal in that plant down there. There’s a usage fee and there’s a handling fee. This cooperative association…works with small governments and cities and non-profits and organizations and community centers…” Yeah. I’m rolling you down the hill if you don’t shut up. Silly old bear.
Another thing, I got some stuff online from a company I used to like. Right now I hate them. I hate their stupid returns personnel who didn’t read my email. I hate their restocking fee. I hate that they’re in Utah and I bet they’re Mormons and I bet they have all of their little Mormon friends nodding and saying “Latter Day Saints” and I bet they’re all working hard and making money and delivering value to all of the people they have yet to save and some who they have and they should feel bad for treating me like I’m an idiot and I want them to feel really, really guilty for making me so angry, but I’m even angrier because I know they don’t care and they aren’t going to care.
Sons of bitches.
So my anger comes down to a simmer. It feels like there’s a pot boiling in my gut with the chimney piping the heat toward my back and then up my spine until it stops right at my voice box. Whatever all this angriness is made of, it’s burning and expanding and making me want to scream or yell or cry.
Rereading this (and refusing to make changes), it’s clearer to me that futility triggers me. I get angry and then want to do something and think, “but what difference do it make?” Then I get angrier and then the cycle continues and continues. And what I’m angry about doesn’t really add up to much of anything. What’s really there to be angry about? Then I get angrier…
And I still want to scream. But I’m so insightful now. Perhaps I’ll put that insight in a jar and go smash it somewhere. Smash it against the drum containing the bear. But what difference would it make?
Oh. I am so angry.