Written by Nandini Sethi
The loud whirring of the blender transports me back from my dreamland,
To the frightening realities of the real world:
Like the feeling of having your heart in your mouth,
Or the irrational fear that it might just stop working from how loudly it was beating.
Palms sweaty, mouth dry,
There is only one thing that can make me feel like this –
A chemistry exam,
Or worse, audience participation.
One day I watched a man’s hand come in between two elevator doors,
And I’ve never been the same since:
Always testing doors,
Fearful they will close on my nose.
Sometimes I wish to cover myself in bubble wrap,
So that I don’t bump into people I know,
Wearing tattered clothes, looking a homeless wreck –
A nervous stride everywhere I go.
Who invented microwaves?
With their rules and noises,
Ready to explode any minute,
One wrong move and your house will be on fire.
I don’t think it’s irrational to be afraid of silly things,
Like losing hope on a hopeless day,
Or coming face-to-face with grief once again,
Or even missing a train, watching it slowly fade away.
Whatever makes your heart jump and your eyes well,
It doesn’t have to be rational:
It can be just the thought of trauma, or the very brunt of it,
The whole point of a point of a phobia is to remind you that you’re human at the end of the day.
