I have been a bit stressed of late. Mainly due to work worries to be honest. In case you have not guessed from my previous entries, I do worrying particularly well. I’ve started this week feeling to get a bit more levelled though. I think my pattern of behaviour is basically to worry myself into near-illness, then to suddenly take the camera lens of my life, and metaphorically zoom out to see my concerns in light of a much grander context. Soon enough, on a contemporary global scale, the things I worry about at any given moment seem to have about as much significance as a single grain of sand on a whole beach. And realising the sheer insignificance of my actions always becomes a great comfort to me. I appreciate that celebrating one’s sense of personal futility seems a rather odd way of looking at things. But this should not come as any surprise. I remember writing in an earlier blog about how most people find comfort through believing that their deceased friends and relatives watch over them; whereas I find the finality of existence much more agreeable (citing the example about how it would be of absolutely of no comfort to me to imagine my dead relatives watching over my indulgences of lustful onanism). Clearly, I must be wired differently to the common man. I guess this must mean I am probably a genius. Not that I'd want such a burden you understand; obviously if I were a genius I couldn't stand the responsibility of my own significance. But I can’t see any other reason why I’d hold such contrary views to the general consensus. Unless I was just your run-of-the mill psychopath. But I feel too calm to be one of them.
Talking of which, my current sense of tranquillity will be of great relief to my colleague Simon with whom I share an office, for he has had to bear witness my unpleasant moods for the last couple of weeks or so. Things came to a head last Thursday when – with him generally fed up with my wearying curmudgeonly face - we ended up having a bit of a row. It is quite uncommon for me to row. But I suppose a row now and again when one is under stress is inevitable. After all, I am cocooned for eight hours a day, five days a week with just Simon for company. I am under duress to spend more conscious time with him than I do with anyone other single person in my life. Which means effectively he is the closest thing I have to a wife. Ignoring how fundamentally depressing and warped as this sounds, it does mean make the odd row rather inevitable. But it didn’t stop me feeling guilty. When I applied for my current job, amongst other things I wrote on my CV that my character was “non-aggressive”, “honest”, “patient” and “even-tempered”. I probably should have written that I was “generally laid back but had a tendency towards repressed passive-aggressive behaviour which manifests in an occasionally irate temperament”, but at the time it didn’t seem a very enduring thing to put in a job application. Although sadly, since I also wrote I was “honest” I inadvertently wrote in a clause which obliges me to demonstrate all the other virtues I listed. Failing to do so could technically be a breach of contract, for which I could lose my job over. I think that’s how CV’s work anyway. Otherwise what would stop people writing a load of self-aggrandising bollocks?
I suppose what I am basically saying is that if you have had to bear witness to my screwed-up miserable stress-face over the course of the last two weeks, then I can only apologise, But although I am sorry, lest we forget what big news we’ve all learned here today. For if you agree with the notion that I might actually be genius, then let’s be honest, it must be quite an honour for you humble folk to have witnessed the live torturous workings of a genius’ mind. But if you find such proclamations absurdly delusional, then by proxy, you must believe me a psychopath. In which case, it would be equally ill-advised to condemn my failings.
