Peggy Noonan is apparently freaking out. Somewhere (probably in her Upper East Side apartment, probably chewing a piece of Nicorette) she is sitting in front of a computer screen, staring into cyberspace, thinking she has done something catastrophic. And really it's unfortunate, this dilemma she finds herself in, because she'd been on an uninterrupted tear of late.

This spring, her Wall Street Journal column, "Declarations," has generated more Internet traffic for Rupert Murdoch than any other regularly scheduled feature in the paper. At the end of April, NBC anchor Brian Williams wrote on his blog that Noonan deserved to win the Pulitzer Prize for her musings on Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. The staff of The New York Times has been buzzing with speculation that she's about to get a column there.

And the attention is nice, even if the rumor might not be true, even if a recent lunch with Times' editorial page editor Andy Rosenthal was just that (lunch), and even if the job might not actually be in the offing. Certainly no one was talking about a Times column as a possibility for Noonan two years ago. Then, she was midheap in a pile of conservative pundits when patience with the breed was running thin among readers.

But now, right when things are looking up for her, Noonan claims to have made a mistake: She has given an interview. And for four weeks since the meeting, she has replayed each and every "silly" thing she said that day and wished she had declined the offer to be profiled.

But maybe it's not too late. Maybe she can get the reporter to kill the piece.

And so she types a plaintive e-mail, attempting to extricate herself from this self-generated drama.

"Please don't be mad at me. I don't mean to show disrespect for your time, or for you. You are a doll. I have to admit to second thoughts, none of which are connected to you. What I have been thinking each day is this: I really want the column to speak for me. Because it's better at speaking for me than I am. The thing about writing is that, as you of course know, it requires — and allows — reflection and consideration and figuring out what you really think, what you really want to say. And each week I try to get to that, sometimes getting there and sometimes not. But when I talk I find myself more inclined to pop off, or go for a joke, or attempt to entertain, or fill silence lest silence be misunderstood....In the weeks after we spoke I sort of winced at things I'd said. (That would be just about everything.) I feel I was babbly, nervous, and in general...wanting. And I felt, Oh, don't be a noisy person, be quiet and write. (I was hoping you found me sufficiently boring not to go forward.) This is not in any way your fault as I'm sure you know or have a sense of, but mine. Could you allow this to just pass, and not do the piece? I would be so grateful."