Worry

I think my grandmother truly enjoyed worrying.

My grandmother, after we (her grandchildren) had grown up securely and her bank accounts were drawing steady interest, needed something to worry about.

The weather worked nicely as a source of worry.  But when the long-term forecast promised only good weather for the next week, she might invent things over which she might fret.  Grandmother might take up worrying about a neighborhood dog if nothing weightier emerged in a timely fashion.  She might stew about a lot of cars coming and going at the rented rooms across the street.

Upcoming televised baseball games were something of a pleasurable worry for Grandmother.

The older I get, the more I notice that I am similarly saddled with a mind that flies around looking for vexatious places upon which to land.  What about ozone deletion?  Who will take up worrying about that, if not me?  What will be the final outcome with knapweed on the whole of our continent?  Is my bear spray out-of-date for the coming huckleberry season?  Is something nefarious causing all my ink pens to run out of ink at once?  

Sometimes I reach out in my worry.

What about all the debris—the bolts and booster rocket parts and satellite gizmos we have left belted in a zero G junk stream high above our blue planet?  What if my neighbor has grandkid who becomes an astronaut?  What if NASA decides to shoot him up through all that crap on his way to Mars?

—Mitchell Hegman