If you were to demonstrate the word upset with a table, tablecloth, and set of plastic tea party dishes, you'd have the cloth laying neatly on the table, and the dishes 'set' neatly and nicely on top, minding their own business. Then someone (or multiple someones) would come along and grab the tablecloth and toss all the contents within the tablecloth in the air...hence the "up" portion of the word. The table is no longer set. The set of dishes, the placement of the dishes, and indeed everything that was on the table itself is literally up in the air, ruining the 'set' of the table: upset.The thing about upset is that it might mislead someone into thinking that because the tea service is "up" things might be "looking up" - it might attain new heights, new spots of grandeur. The tea party is literally going somewhere - so it might not be a bad thing, right?
Oops. Whoever thought that did not take into account gravity. It's a real force, folks. With it, the dishes crash (thankfully they don't shatter because whoever set the table was thoughtful enough to provide plastic ware), the tea streams in a delightful fountain everywhere, the cucumber sandwiches artfully fall to the floor in an indelicate state of messiness, and what was neat and nice is suddenly NOT neat and nice and work needs to be done to clean it up.
Poor tea set.
Poor feelings that are like the tea set - scattered and dismantled. It's too bad that when feelings are upset, the only thing that is "up" is hormones/emotions. It's all downhill from there.
