Anxiety Farm

As we sat and waited for my doctor for over an hour in a windowless exam room, R and I discussed the feasibility of commoditizing my anxiety. It was early, I hadn’t had much sleep or any coffee, I was waiting for a painful injection in the joint where my first rib meets my breast bone, and I’m claustrophobic, so the longer we waited in the closed room the more anxious I got. Good times.

At the hour mark, R, ever the entrepreneur, suggested that we put my anxiety to good use by bottling it as a spray. Turns out by “good use” he meant “weaponization”: you could spray it on someone – say, a mugger, or your tax auditor, or an argumentative boyfriend – and their resulting panic and sense of general unease would distract them long enough for you to a.) run away, or b.) make your point.

I’m down with this plan except that it would require me to keep producing anxiety to meet market demands and, I’m guessing, once I made a few million dollars I would be considerably less anxious and might want to leave the anxiety business altogether. What about long-term business continuity?

The answer is simple: anxiety farms. Small plants would sprout upon exposure to regular abuse –

“Nobody likes you!!”
“Your ideas are puerile and unimaginative!”
“You do not meet expectations!”

The plants may have to engineered as root vegetables, come to think of it, preferring the warm dark and downward growth. Anyway, whatever: the fruit would be harvested and voila! Anxiety serum!

I like this idea – particularly the offloading of anxiety part and the millions of dollars – but I have to admit I’m starting to feel bad for the plants.