I am living within the pendulum of worry and regret.

Lost my temper with people. Say things I really didn’t mean to say.

The cold bitterness of regret settles in my stomach. Curdles my perceptions.

Why can’t time spin backwards?

Why can’t time snap me to a halt before I speak. Or act regrettably?

I can hear you now. I’m human. This is what humans do.

Yes. But that doesn’t relinquish the handcuffed emotions. Or the frustration I feel at myself. At the person who provoked me.

I want peace. I want the pain in my throat that is not from me crying but the stress is my throat’s muscles due to a lingering, hacking cough to ease.

To stop aching.

Just as I wish I had never raised my hand and flashed a rude gesture. I wish I had stayed my anger instead of sinking to ordinary humanness because I love the person who I insulted and was angry at for merely telling the truth.

Albeit an uncomfortable truth.

But a truth I had built one stupid mistake at a time nonetheless.

And now I sit in a comfortable chair and listen to actors struggling to be funny while I curl in regret.