hanky-twist

From the image of an anxious person twisting a handkerchief in the hands.

hanky-twist (third-person singular simple present hanky-twists, present participle hanky-twisting, simple past and past participle hanky-twisted)

1. To fret; to worry ineffectually.
   • 1993, Stephen L. Nugent, Amazonian Caboclo Society: An Essay on Invisibility and Peasant Economy:

     There must in other fields be analogous forms of the brow-knitting and hanky-twisting which have accompanied the more narcissistic aspects of the 'literary turn' in anthropology (of which Writing Culture is least typical) and cognate fields.

   • 2011, Jack Walker, The Extraordinary Rendition of Vincent Dellamaria: A Political Fiction, →ISBN:

     After years of hanky-twisting, here we are, irreversibly committed to this thing.

   • 2016, Lionel Shriver, Paradise to Perdition:

     Cinema's standout bad guys didn't hanky-twist their lives away whimpering “Gee, am I doing something wrong?”