Being In Your Own Head

My daughter is sharing with us the latest instalment of her parking tribulations.

“I just can’t park, even though I know that I can.”

“You’ve got into your own head. Your conscious brain is getting involved where your unconscious can already cope.”

“I know, but if I keep scraping the kerb like I do at the moment I’m going to need new tyres every couple of months.”

To distract her from the dismay I start a conversation in which we debate at length the best type of cheese from which you could make a usable spoon.

As we discuss this important topic I recognise that the only way in which it would be possible to have such a ludicrous exchange is if we were both in our own heads.

It reminds me of the time in supervision when my supervisor told me,

“You’re always in your head. When I ask you how something feels I can see you moving it into your brain to find out.”

At the time, it felt like a criticism but, through understanding my own neuro-diversity, I began to accept that it’s just the way my mind works.

I encounter emotion and understand what’s going on by processing it intellectually.

But not everything can be dealt with like this so, when it isn’t a blessing it’s a curse.

Having recently repaired my lawnmower it broke for good this week prompting me to research and buy a new one before the grass grows above the line of the raised beds.

When I bought and put my chosen model together there was a piece missing which, having spent half an hour assembling it, made me angry.

I called the store only to find them decidedly unhelpful. I got a bit angrier and, when the conversation finished, I was left feeling as if the customer service person I had been talking to was irritated at my annoyance.

This made me both angrier still and strangely upset.

Then the window seat arrived that I had chosen for the bay where the dogs like to sit. It was narrower than I had anticipated meaning that the dogs had to perch precariously on it when barking at unsuspecting passers-by.

“Why can’t I get these things right?” I asked myself, falling into a hole of self-recrimination and pity concluding that I would be better off leaving purchasing decisions to someone else.

That night, I wake at 3.30 am as the puppy scrambles into the bed, tunnels under the duvet and settles into the shape of a croissant near my feet.

There is an audible sigh and she is immediately asleep again.

I am not.

I turn things around in my head, wondering if I should have a window seat made or whether that might be an extravagant luxury just to allow two dogs to stare at strangers.

I think too about the reception I will get at the store when I go to collect the replacement lawnmower. I wonder whether the irked customer service lady might have deliberately taken a piece from the box just to teach me a lesson.

The constant cycle of thought is stopped only by tuneful early morning birdsong and the dawning realisation that you can’t think your way through everything.

I fall back into sleep until the dogs insist on simultaneous belly rubs as the milky, early light seeps through the blinds.

I’m ready for an uncomfortable experience when I arrive at the store.

The customer service lady disappears into the back and returns with the box.

“Shall we just check it’s all there?” she says with a distinct absence of attitude.

It is.

“There you go. You can cut your grass now,” she says with a jaunty smile and a cheery, “Bye”.