The stress of life

I am flying back from a business trip. Not an ordinary business trip, mind you, but a high stress one. My company was just acquired by a very large organization and I am giving some of my new peers a tour of some of the facilities. All the time realizing that they are sizing up what has to be sized down. I try not to let negative thoughts about the future creep into my thinking. After all, I am good at what I do, I am marketable, and I would also be an asset to the new overlords. But that does not mean its not incredibly stressful.

So, I am leaving the restroom stall at the airport and I notice... (how do I put this delicately), that my excrement is bright red. As I wash up and exit, dark thoughts swim through my head. Has my career stress finally gotten to me? Did I stress myself into cancer? Should I panic?

Rational thought tells me to dismiss this all, but very recently I had an uncle die a year after being diagnosed with massive colon cancer. The first time he went to go see a doctor (which was long overdue) was due to a similar event.

I try reading on the plane to keep my thoughts elsewhere and additionally rationalizing that tomorrow, when no repeat occurred, that it was all my imagination. A trick of the light in the room. But I finished my book early. Possibly due to an unconscious attempt to read faster than normal. Back to pondering and thinking...

As the plane prepares to land, I had a TV moment. A scene played out as if I was in the closing scenes of a movie. I am sitting on a quiet plane, waiting for the gear to touchdown, and I start to laugh. It must have seemed to anyone watching that I thought of something funny, or I had an epiphany. And I did...

The day before I left, while in an online tournament, I ate an entire bag of RED pistachios.