Nervous Goth

I am of the Woody Allen or Jon Stewart School of Jewish Hypochondria.  It mostly doesn't interfere with my day-to-day life, but I tend to assume the worst about throat tickles and sciatica.  When I was pregnant with Milo and started having heartburn for the first time, I suspected it would never go away, although, of course, it did.  When I make the bad decision to read the Medical Dispatches articles in The New Yorker by Groopmans or Guptas, I always have the sinking feeling that, later in life, some horrible health issue will befall me or members of my family.  Which, let's be honest, will probably happen, although I'm not doing anybody any favors by anticipating it.

Having these crazy fleeting fears was fine when I was single and could indulge in the Bridget Jones-style fantasies of dying alone, half-eaten by an Alsatian, but now that I'm married and have a child, it seems wrong to project my weird "nervous goth" onto my family.  Ben's itchy throat is allergies, possibly a burgeoning cold.  Milo's red cheeks are from teething.  Such is life. 

Part of my recent spate of hypochondriacal fears probably comes from the untimely demise of Desmond the cat.  It made me feel so acutely that danger and heartache lurk around every corner, and that, as much as you try, you can't control the wrath of the Furies.  Far more likely to happen is that my son will use his spazzy baby super-powers to topple out of his crib, or that he will bonk his head on something when my back is turned.  There will be small boo-boos and boo-hoos, and, yes, there will also be big ones, ones that seem unfair and unfathomable. 

It reminds me of the first summer I spent at a rented beach-house with Ben's family.  It sat on a little marina, and there was room to swim from the pier at the back of the house to the pier of the house across the way, which I did one sunny day.  When I swam back and got out of the water, my mother-in-law said to me, "Oh, now I have someone else to be nervous about!"  Which I took as the warm welcome it was, and as the sign of a kindred spirit.  The more people you love, the more people you have to worry about.  I'll probably fall and twist my ankle on my way to pick up my Apprehensive Jew Award.