You cannot prevent destiny or the funny incident with the soap.

Any reasonable person knows, one cannot prevent destiny. Being a person with anxiety, however, I must remind myself daily that I can only do so much to prevent trouble. I am often swimming in worst case scenarios. I get sick and tired of trying to convince myself they will not happen. And when I chase them away, new appear. I am battling with a few of them right now. Yet, I do not want to share them, for I am afraid they could trigger anxiety in my readers.

Except the funny incident with the soap. I can share that much, I believe. I am too aware of viruses and bacteria, so I wash my hands too often. I use the old-fashioned hard soap. The soap is my friend. Every time I hold it in my hands, it protects me. It washes away germs, but also worries. Yet, not for long. Very soon I am back to receive solace from a white bar. Finally the soap gets sick and tired of me bugging it all the time. And it does something really funny. It starts turning liquid. It dissolves slowly due to too much moisture applied to it. Oh boy, what now? There are little patches of soap on my hands that I must rub off with care, otherwise they stay there and I cannot go touching things and applying soap all over the place.

Being a problem solver by nature, I think of a way of tricking the soap. I stop rubbing soap on my hands under flowing water. I do the silliest thing: I take the soap, water tap closed, and rub it on my hands. You would think there would be no effect, but there is actually some soap on my hands afterwards, for the piece of soap never really has a proper time to dry. Then I put the white bar away and spread the soap on my hands under running water. It works! I actually manage to keep my soap dry enough not to dissolve.

You must think to yourself: why does she not buy liquid soap? Well, I guess I am old-fashioned. On top of that: a liquid soap cannot fight back and I need that fight to remind me of the necessity for reason to prevail.

Take care,

Helena Smole, author of:

– a fantasy novel with romance Vivvy and Izzy the Dwarf: A series about relationships

– Balancing the Beast, a book offering a bright view of schizoaffective disorder ˗ bipolar or manic-depressive type