Saturday, May 16, 2009

Not Just the Coffee


Good thing the 7-Up can was empty, else a good portion of the table cloth would have ended up soaked in the sweet, chemical-rich liquid. Still, the knowledge that it was empty escaped me for a split second and, in that wink of a moment, my heart walloped so hard I felt like wanting to reel from its aftermath. I sat there, steadying myself, awed by the Pacquiao-like (but painless) punch my heart had thrown against my chest.

I am easily startled. A handful of people at work know this and have taken to sneaking up from behind me and shouting "boo!" or "hah!" quite often, making me do any, or all, of the following: jumping, shrieking, shouting an expletive or two, and, always, that hard thump in the chest.

It could be the coffee.

Or not.

I am aware that it's natural to be startled when, well, we're caught off-guard, but lately, the intensity of the pounding in my chest whenever it happens has made me notice that it has, indeed, gone from natural to too much. A friend and I talked about it after the 7-Up episode and he agreed that it can't all be just the coffee (I like mine light on the caffeine, anyway, I mostly order mocha-flavored ones, except for those occasional really drowsy times when I have to force myself to be on the go, then I'd request for an extra espresso shot).

Perhaps I've built my wall piled too high with rocks that when it crumbles because I forget to stand guard, it crashes really loud and hard?

(clip art from clipart.com)

2 comments:

cat with the fiddle said...

i am naturally jumpy. because i have hypertension. i was firt diagnosed with it at 24. i may have had it earlier, that's why i used to always feel tense.

CHANSONATA said...

I've been having that nagging thought, too, for quite some time now. Maybe I should have myself checked.