Henry is angry.
He is more than angry, he is livid. Angry at his job, at the train, at the jerk next to him who won’t turn down his crappy girlie-pop that he recognizes, angry at the fact that he recognizes this, angry at the trash on the floor, angry at the lady whose kid keeps bawling, angry at the kid. He knows he’s being irrational, that his anger is destructive. Henry wishes it weren’t so, not that he weren’t angry, but that there would be a good reason for his fury. That pisses Henry off even more.
Henry woke up at the wrong time this morning. In addition to sleeping just not enough, in that confused space between total exhaustion and full ability to function, he was rousted out of his slumber by a combination of jackhammers, honking cars, stomping neighbors, barking dog, and the need to pee. He knows he shouldn’t go drinking on a week night, and he’s sworn time and time again to abstain in the future. He also should go to bed earlier. But he just can’t let go of either winning that stupid online argument with that stupid stupid jerk, and there’s just one more episode of whatever show he’s currently addicted to, just one more, maybe he can still get seven hours of sleep.
Of course he can’t. He tosses and turns, knowing that he’ll be barely conscious tomorrow, that the fatigue will be painful for the eight hours he’s expected to produce something or other at the job he doesn’t particularly like. And yet, maybe if he just turns off his alarm clock, accepts being a bit late, he’ll still get enough sleep to have a good day. Except for the jackhammer, the car horn, the neighbor with her high heels, the dog, and his bladder. He didn’t bargain with those.
And so Henry got up this morning, determined to have a good day, trying to force himself into a state of borderline enthusiasm while showering away the grogginess. To no avail. And so, all day, small things have been nagging at him, chewing away at his tolerance for adversity, testing his patience, until Henry just decided that today would be a day of anger.
Stress, the risk of hypertension or even a heart attack, incomprehension and hostility from coworkers and others around him, failure to plan and carry out even basic tasks, all these serve to drive Henry into ever deeper fits of resentment at the world. He is aware that, to his fellow humans, he is an utter pill, a neurotic whiner on par with a Holden Caulfield, albeit without that character’s literary merits. To hell with Holden Caulfield, Henry never liked that book anyway. Why would something that…irritating…garner universal praise? It just pushes his button even more.
Henry doesn’t know what he want. Maybe he should have a drink, or go running, or meditate, but this is not the kind of nothingness-induced rage that lends itself to self-medication, nor is it the red-curtained choler that drives some to excel at sports, with the theme from Rocky playing in the background, or to create something of marvel. Rather, the closest thing on Henry’s mind is putting his fist through a window or destroying some thing. And he knows that this would make him even madder.
Nobody had better mess with me, he scowls to himself as he stomps homeward. I’ll show them. Yeah, you, looking at me, you son of a bitch. You can’t imagine how wound up I am. And he is. But nobody dares.
Tomorrow, Henry will be content again, a productive, agreeable, funny, relaxed man, the kind of guy who irritates his co-workers with his smiling, sunshine-ridden “good morning!” Thrown into the room of sullen office drones in a way that hovers in the air with an enthusiastic exclamation point. For at least one of them, it will be the trigger that turns a bad night’s sleep into a genuinely awful, infuriating day, full of small defeats and perceived injustices. But not for Henry. Tomorrow will be a good day. He is angry today.
