The Angries

I don't want to be angry anymore.

I thought this lying in the dark a few nights ago, waiting for sleep. It's hard to imagine me without anger; it's my idiom, my identity. I have a black belt in anger; it's an emotional Swiss army knife for me - it has so many uses. I'm the guy who is funny because he's angry; in fact, I have a radio show because I'm that funny/angry guy. When faced with difficulties, I use anger as fuel to get through. We've talked many times on this blog about my competitive nature - that savage gameface is based in anger. I can wring what I want out of customer service reps with anger. I have pried open bureaucratic puzzles using anger like a crowbar. I can deflect and ignore pain through anger. In fact, with anger, I can put up a shield that Montgomery Scott would envy.

Despite all of that it carries a downside that far outweighs its usefulness. Regardless of how scathing my ire might be toward the topic of the moment, I always reserve my greatest fury for myself. I am often moved to trembling rage at my own lack of focus and forgetfulness. For example - I brought a bottle of flavored water with me to work today. Once I got in the building and got to work, I realized I had left it in the car. For some inexplicable reason, I was enraged by this. I am not dying of thirst, and I could easily slip away from my desk for a few seconds to retrieve it, but instead I spent a few minutes berated myself for not remembering it.

This was a minor incident. You should see the personal fury that can arise when I misplace my car keys or wallet. Worse yet are the days when I can't remember where my sunglasses are. These spacey moments sometimes create a rage in me that, albeit brief and self-contained, is still ridiculously out of proportion to the moment. I have, thankfully, become adept at containing these fits so that no one has to endure their full brunt but me, but this is pale comfort.

It should be noted that not all of my anger is without merit. If you can read the news and you're not angry, you're not paying attention. Wars, the economy, intolerance, and the short-sighted wrangling of our elected officials is reason enough to make the blood boil. It's just that I don't dissipate it well. I stay angry, to my own detriment.

It is a trained response, I think. There is the proper, healthy anger that aids you in survival situations, and then there is the anger that takes the place of other, more useful responses. In our modern world, there is little opportunity for the former; the greatest threats to my survival each day are my own eating habits, not actual struggles for life. In most cases, the anger I feel could be more productively replaced with another response - compassion, humor, etc.

I know - I'm late to the party on this. I know that most of you are thinking, "Yes - and this is why you're a jackass, Linus." Sorry. I'm slow. Better late than never, right?