Experiment #3

Experiment #3 in E-Squared involves wire coat hangers. You have to unbend the coat hangers, and I was reluctant to sacrifice 2 hangers for the sake of science. I was thinking about it all wrong, of course. Instead of thinking of the cost of replacing two coat hangers, I should have been thinking, "I am prosperous and can afford to buy two new coat hangers. In fact, I am rolling in dough and can afford much nicer coat hangers."

It was after midnight when I reshaped the hangers into Ls (okay, they looked more like squared off Cs). I had some fat straws hanging around from somewhere (what? Do you throw stuff out?). I put the straws onto one end of the coat hangers to make handles. I held onto the straws so the hangers could swing freely and tell me my mood. My cat, though, had other ideas. She saw the ends of the coat hangers swinging in midair and thought they were cat toys. So it was late, I was tired, and the cat wanted to play. I soon just went to bed.

I tried again with the wands in the morning. I was supposed to think of something bad or sad, so the wands would swing inward, their ends touching. I thought of something from about 12 years ago that usually still gets me upset. No dice. Both wands swung to the right, then to the left, then settled wide open. Wide open is what they are supposed to do when I am calm and happy and thinking positive thoughts. I thought happy thoughts, and the wands stayed open. I guess I was just in a good mood and nothing was going to get me down. That’s not so bad, really.

I put the wands away for another day. Maybe if I use them on a day I feel anxious, I'll get a different result. Maybe there is a way to use them while meditating, a kind of homemade biofeedback machine. It's worth a shot, anyway.

So … it was a few days later. I awoke early – too early, but that’s what I usually do. Maybe I should manifest a good night’s sleep. I had a headache and a dull, creeping anxiety, nothing major, just a lot of things to remember about work. So I remembered the wands. The left one swung all the way to the left, while the right one took its time, first going left, then all the way to the right. I suppose that means I have nothing to worry about. Or am open to new ideas. Or the wands just like to be all the way open. Or maybe - just maybe - the biofeedback thing works and when I hold the wands I calm my mind enough to make them wide open. It may not be such a crazy thought.

And the being prosperous and rolling in dough thing? Well, I need to be careful what I wish for. Just last week, I was talking with "Linda," a colleague about how she has the best desk in the office, because it is in the back, in the corner. This week, she resigned, so not only will I get her desk, I'll get to run one of the houses she runs in addition to the one house I currently run (and Linda's other house will go to another colleague). With a second house comes a little more salary. (Though in human services, "rolling in dough" is a bit of a stretch."