My pique has peaked...

Emotional messages whether on email, voicemail, or blogs always look a little overwrought the next day once you've had some food, sleep, and pleasant conversation. Companies or people don't seem quite as incompetent, they are less annoying, almost bearable. It's hard to mentally put yourself back into that frustrated frame of mind you were in just 24 hours ago.

Emotions are mysterious things. When they come upon you or arise within you, they just consume you, body and mind. It is not that you are "irrational", it's just that you are completely focused on one particular thing...the person you're in love with, that jerk that cut you off on the highway, the delicious food you are eating, or the inability to take advantage of an advertised service that you expected to be able to use.

Strong emotions are not bad or good, they are just unbalanced and that can lead to powerful action--Kiss me! Or, give us justice! Or, pay attention to me!--but you lose all sense of perspective. Small annoyances can make you feel like you're beating your head against a wall. Someone not returning a phone call when expected can make you feel alone and unloved. A lover's arm brushing against yours can make you feel ecstatic. Ones reaction is out of proportion to the action or object that elicited it.

I tend to be embarrassed by my emotions, they seem messy and over-the-top, they make me feel out of control. But I'm going to leave my Starbucks/AT&T diatribe partially because they never got back to me and partially because I don't think we should walk backwards with brooms to erase every trace of where we have walked. I went ballistic, expressed my frustration, and now I'm over it. New topic tomorrow!