FRUSTRATION

I can feel it bubbling inside me. I'm a volcano: a hulk of silent rock on the outside, with a swirling mass of molten anxiety boiling within. I feel the pressure pounding as the frustration grows, belching and broiling, burning and bursting from the deep. The time is ticking.

This is not good.

I'm not an angry person - far, far from it! I'm not easily riled and I am afraid of conflict. I am passionate though, and it's in those tiny hidden passions, buried metres beneath the surface, that my frustration begins. But what should I do? Should I continue to bubble, slowly boiling like a pressure cooker? Should I find a way to vent my frustrations in a controlled way that doesn't hurt other people? Let off steam? Find a punchbag? Write about it... in my blog?

That way lies danger untold.

So for now I find myself swallowing my disappointment, rather like I had to swallow a difficult cough in a company meeting the other day. Our new glorious leader was giving a speech which involved picking on people, and I knew that if I lapsed into a coughing fit, I'd be toast. So I focused on the clock, closed my eyes tight and swallowed the scratchy, tickling pulse that was trembling in my windpipe as my muscles tightened and my torso shook. This is like that.