Every now and then I get this Tony Soprano anxiety thing in which you can’t stop scratching your arm or your leg. No matter how hard you scratch it still itches. You have to use kitchen knives to make it go away. It happened again last night. I used Tony Soprano’s name because when I saw him constantly scratching his arm during the first or second season of The Sopranos I recognized myself.

What I realized last night is that the scratchies can be (or perhaps always are) specifically linked to something you’re nervous about but have been suppressing. I used to think they just happened when they happened because they felt like it.