Sweating The Small Stuff

One of my many faults is a consistent inability to correctly judge what problems warrant my worry. I'm no different than anyone in that many bad things both large and small transpire within my sphere of awareness. Maybe more than my share directly concern me. At any rate, a person will burn up quickly if they expend themselves in anxiety over every little thing. More than the very most consequential is just too much a burden for any human. This is something that I can say to be true but have no internalized understanding of. I think that was true of most wisdom espoused by Ben Franklin, so maybe I'm not in such bad company there.

I made reference once to a particular Metro bus driver. After riding her bus out to South Pasadena so many times, I had flattered myself into thinking that I had an unspoken but friendly rapport with her. I happened to be riding on her bus while in the company of a friend one night, which meant that for the first time I was engaged in conversation rather than reading or typing something up on my phone. When I'm speaking enthusiastically, I'm speaking at a deafening volume. That's a problem in libraries and peoples' homes late at night, but never before had it been an issue on a city bus to my knowledge.

At the end of a perhaps half-hour ride, my friend and I got off, and the driver chastised me for speaking too loudly. I felt that was unreasonable not just because being loud ought to be all right, but because she waited until then to say something. I wasn't angry, you understand- I was upset. I felt hurt, and it wasn't a passing emotion. That lingered all night and well into the next couple days. I still am unhappy about it. Is it reasonable to have felt this way and held on to it? Obviously not- any sensible person would have cast the driver's opinion on the matter out of their mind as irrelevant and unimportant, but not me.

I recently had a little accident at a social occasion, spilling a sweet confection on carpeting. That's what has this on my mind. As with the bus incident, any right-thinking person would have let it go, but I worried over it as though I had hit a pedestrian with my car and left the scene. I- and you who find yourself silently agreeing with me- must cease the concern over such frivolous and minor issues, or life will be shorter and less pleasant than there's any reason for it to be.