Worrying Be Gone!

As of a few hours ago, I got all of my visa extension paperwork figured out and dealt with. This means two things: A)I am definitely here for at least one more year B)I can stop worrying about being deported. The last thing was a stupid worry of mine that started as a small grain in the back of my mind and snowballed itself into a full-blown issue that I have thought about non-stop for the better part of a week.

I am a worry wort. I always have been and probably always will be. I have mentioned this before, how I will worry about tiny things and obsess about them to the point that I make myself literally sick. I cannot concetrate on anything, I lose weight, and I am not the happiest guy to be around when I get into these moods. Ninety-nine percent of the time, all of my worrying is for nothing and whatever studid thing I was worrying about gets resolved. This puts me in a very chipper mood, like I am now.

How everything started this time was while I was on vacation in Takaoka, my postcard giving me permission to extend my visa came in the mail. When I returned from vacation, I read the postcard and it basically said, "Your paperwork for you visa extension came through and was approved. You can come back to the immigration office starting on X date and get your stamp." I had read all but one part the last sentence correctly, the part I goofed up was the "starting on" part, what it actually said was "by". Well, the date that I was supposed to go by was the following day and I did not get my translation corrected until the day after that, on the way to the immigration office. When I got to the office, I found they were closed for the holidays and would not be open again until the 4th of January, which is today. Maya was the one that took me to the office and told me that my reading was off a tad. She also told me that the bottom of the postcard said that if I were to try to go after my date I would not be granted permission to stay. And so my worrying started.

It would have helped had my company's main office been open and I could have talked to someone about it but that was too much to ask. I was able to talk to one person but he was not overly helpful and pretty much left me to my own devices. Today, I called the company again and had them call my immigration office to make sure that I could get my stamp still. They immediately called me back and told me I could get my stamp today and everything should be alright, and it was. So now I am not worrying anymore and it feels spiffy.

I hate obsessing and worrying about stuff and I used to do it a lot but haven't since I have been here. I just can't get over how I can turn the smallest things into very large monsters. I think part of it was the fact that I am not ready to leave here yet. There are still things I want to do and need to do before I leave, one of them being to amass a tidy nestegg with which to start a new life with when I leave here. This last year was about getting to that point and setting everything up so that I can live quite cheaply in 2007. I can now start that phase of my great scheme.

Anywho, I am done worrying for the time being and I feel great once again. Now maybe my stomach will get back to normal.