I Live Thirty Minutes Ahead of Myself

Dear Delyara, I am always mentally entering the next room before my body gets there. Anticipating the next question before the current one is finished. Hearing a problem in the tone before the words arrive. Planning my reply to the school email before I’ve even opened it. Walking into tomorrow while still brushing my teeth tonight. That’s what anxiety has made of me: a woman who is rarely in the same place as her own body. It makes life feel blurry. Half-missed. Like I’m always trying to outrun discomfort instead of ever fully living the hour I’m actually in. I don’t know how to stop time-traveling into my own stress. I only know I’m tired of arriving late to the present.