Not that I’ve ever really doubted it, but I’m pretty sure I have anxiety. Like, generalized anxiety. It’s anxiety when the crazy thoughts happen and they keep you up at night and distract you significantly at work but you can pretend you’re not debilitated by them and most people believe you, right?

Well, right now, I think it’s more like acute anxiety.

As I sit here at work, thinking about how my daughter is at the in-laws’ in Tualatin and my husband is on the road to Redmond, I look up and see a helicopter head across the river toward downtown Portland. Images of alien invasions, nuclear warheads headed this direction, and Godzilla-like creatures erupting from the Willamette start filling my head. As I ponder my escape plan, I am conscious of something my mother once told me about how if something catastrophic happens, Hometown is one of the safest places to be (out of nuclear range, apparently).

Then I remember that my family is scattered throughout Oregon at the moment, and I’d have to head 15 miles south during traffic to retrieve my daughter before heading back north–again through traffic–to Hometown. In the meantime, I have to hope that GTB has cell phone reception wherever he is between here and Redmond and that he can meet us somewhere on the Washington side, all while the shit is hitting the fan here in Portland.

The only thing that brings me some solace during this terrifying train of thought is that I no longer have to worry about stopping at the house on my way out of town to get Niles.

Probably, this is just some insecure part of my subconscious telling me that I don’t like having my family scattered around so much. If Signe is with the grandparents, usually GTB and I are together. Or if GTB is away, Signe and I are usually together. It’s not often they are both far away from me.

I was looking forward to girls’ night in with my book club ladies tonight. Now I’m just trying to get through the next few hours at work until I can drink enough wine to fixate on something else.