Ride
Panic attack tonight. Hyperventilation. Could not catch my breath however deep I breathed. Opened the window but no relief. I have not experienced this since the wierd day at the movie theater, that stale-airerd theater in which air did not circulate and I felt my throat closing — and I was at that theater to see a movie about cemeteries! What a way to go.
Tonight it happened in a livery cab. Friends and I en route to a steakhouse in Elmhurst when the driver took a wildly unexpected route through dirt roads and alleys, places with steaming garbage cans and crowds of individuals milling about right in the middle of the intersection. Those people glared at us, who the fuck are you?
When we reached a 2-way avenue the driver passed other cars Interstate-style, accelerating to 80mph (on the Interstate he would accelerate to at least 110mph) as the headlights of oncoming vehicles raced suddenly close.
He casually tossed off comments and salutations, stating that the back-alley routes he took were the best and that the cars he passed were driven by “dumbasses.”
I did not used to get panicked by these situations. When I sat in the back seat of a cab I closed my eyes and let the person in charge guide me on my journey. If I died on that journey then who cares? I’d be dead!
Christ, I grow tiny. Incidents like this give me headhurts and mental exhaustion where they used to be a hilarious adventure.
