The Sine of the Wave

Have you noticed that people seem to be on edge these days? Over the past week I've twice found myself in the middle of a shrieking group of people hugely worked up in a dispute over something that mattered very little. One was at a poker game, the other in a restaurant. Both times I was surprised at what seemed to be some mysterious doubling of pugnaciousness in friends of mine.

I'm not sure what's causing the acrimony, but I'm feeling something, too. Is it that our "leaders" have been adding to the already harsh yellow, orange and red states of terrorist fear by telling us that if we don't immediately do something drastic and expensive about our banking world then the economy itself will surely crash around our shoulders. All this, of course, in the midst of all the brouhaha of the presidential election -- compounded by the frightening thought that roughly half of America seems to think that a person like Sarah Palin is the kind of person we want to have one step away from power.

The sky is not falling. Most of us have jobs and homes and food. Everything really is OK. But the psychological atmosphere is highly charged. It can be easy to disregard, or not even notice in the first place, the stress all of this brings. After all, there actually is no flashing red light. But it's probably a good idea to set aside a bit extra quiet time for meditation, or exercise, or cuddling or prayer or whatever it is that you do.