Better than Blood Pressure Meds

Yesterday there was a confrontation at work with a member of the public.Without going into details, I can say that by the end of it I was, quite literally, a quivering blob. I haven't experienced my hands actually uncontrollably shaking in a long enough time that to look down and see it was disturbing.

The adrenaline rush started bleeding off pretty rapidly, with fear and fight-or-flight turning into a healthy dose of anger. With the adrenaline went, apparently, all of the heat in my body. I couldn't get warm. Worse, I had to go and sit through a meeting where I couldn't knit. There were faculty other than my own present and while I was just attending to listen and ask a couple of questions, knitting was a no go. And so I politely sat, twitching and jotting notes of things to do when back at my cube.  My knitting was in my purse--right there on the floor--and I couldn't pull it out.

After the meeting it was back to work and I got a hot chocolate to try and combat some of the chill. It slowly faded, to be replaced by a monstrosity of a headache.

Finally, after another meeting only ratcheted the headache up another notch (not the fault of anyone in the meeting, just reliving the morning), I went for the needles. Just two rows, I promised myself, and then back to the email queue and the articles I want to read and the book I'm interested in looking over and the three things I want to take care of before I go home....

And a couple of rows took the edge off. I stepped out of my head and into the yarn and ticked through a few stitches and for five minutes the day receded.

But then an email popped up that needed to be answered and there were things to do and it was time to be on a public service desk. I grabbed another round of caffeine (probably not helping that headache) and kept slugging.

After work I had to run an errand that took me out of my normal commute. Before I even got to the train platform my needles were in my hands. With "whatever song comes on next" on the headphones, my head went down and the needles ticked. Errand completed, I climbed onto a bus for a 30 minute ride across town. A teen sat down next to me because it was one of the last seats available. At first he seemed uncomfortable, though that seemed to have less to do with me in specific than that I existed as a person in a seat in general. While I normally like to look out the window, yesterday I was just focused on my needles and the names of the stops the bus was making. Round and round the sock I went.

I got to the Blue Line and home and washed off the day in a shower as hot as the water heater would allow. And I noticed my headache was finally gone. The stress had finally filtered to the stitches and, while there was still a fair amount of "dealing" to be done, at least I felt a little better equipped to cope.

And I got another inch done on the socks I haven't shown you yet. I'll try to get a picture for you soon.