Seven Minutes

No, not in heaven. But it was a little heavenly I suppose...

There's a lot of crap going on right now and my anxiety level is quite high. Normally, I don't consider myself an anxious person. I can be a very stressed out person. I can be a very depressed person. I can even have some very manic moments (Usually premenstrual - it's not a bipolar thing.) where I laugh so hard I start crying or cry so hard I start laughing. (Seriously, I'm not bipolar.)

But I don't think I'm a particularly "anxious" person.

But lately....lately...yeah, pretty anxious. I keep having to remind myself to breathe. And I keep doing this thing where I lean my head back and close my eyes repeating, "Breathe Rachel. It'll be okay Rachel. Deep breaths Rachel. Think of good things Rachel. RELAX RACHEL!" and then my head springs back up, my eyes fly open and I'm all anxious again.

Last night, I was flipping through the channels and came across The Hills: A Look Back With Lauren Conrad on MTV. I've already confessed my obsession with The Hills so I don't feel the need to get into that humiliation again here. (If you'd like to read about it you can look back in the August archives under "There's Gold In Them There Hills!" )

Anyway, I stopped surfing and sat there staring at the TV and became totally engrossed in the drama. Lauren and Steven, Steven and Kristen, Lauren and Jason, Jessica and Jason. I was mesmerized. Suddenly, an obnoxious commercial break came on and I was snapped out of my trance. I looked up at the clock then looked over at Greg and said, "For the last seven minutes I didn't think about one single problem AT ALL for the first time in almost two weeks. For seven whole minutes I thought about nothing else except for Lauren and whether or not she'll get her shit together with these boys."

First, he laughed pretty hard. Then, he strongly encouraged me to keep watching. (Which he never does because he feels the need to pretend that he hates The Hills. And yet...he always makes his way upstairs on Monday nights around 10pm for some reason....hmm. Odd.)

I did continue to watch, and while I don't think it's any real solution to all that feels wrong right now, I do believe that mindless shows like that - if kept in perspective (I know it's not going to win a frickin' Emmy) - can be a gift. An escape. And at this point, I'll take whatever I can get.