Are you afraid of the dark?

Are you afraid of the dark? I think everyone is to some extent. When I was a child, I was afraid of the dark...just like most little kids. I remember having to sleep with some sort of light on near my bed, quite possibly one of those little nightlights that plug into the outlet. Sometimes, my mom would leave the hall light on just outside my bedroom, then close my door part way. That usually worked for me. My father didn't really go for that, but he "allowed" it. "What are you scared of? There's nothing different in the dark from the light. Watch.", he would say while switching the light off and on, "See?". Well, I couldn't really see, especially when the light was off. Even quickly switching the light on and off scared me a little. Those things that live in the closet are ready to come out at any time!

Of course, every child knows there is a difference from the dark to the light. In the dark...there are monsters.

I remember one night in particular when I was 8 or 9 years old. My parents went out for the evening and us kids stayed home with my grandmother. Of course, we went to bed early...grandmothers do that...make you go to bed early. When my grandmother stayed with us, she would sleep in the bottom trundle bed in my room, just below mine. We were all tucked away, including grandma. She went to sleep immediately. I laid awake, hearing strange sounds inside and outside of the house. I think I laid there for an hour or so listening to what sounded like someone walking up our driveway (my room was in the front of the house, the driveway just outside my window). It wasn't a hard shoe clicking sound, but more like a step...and then a drag. A step...then a drag. A step...then a drag....getting louder and louder. This went on for what seemed like forever. I had the covers pulled up tightly over my head, with just a small hole for one eye to peek out. Of course, I never looked out the window. I just peered out through my little blanket opening into my darkened room. That step...then drag sound went on and on...getting closer and closer. Whatever it was, it must be real close now, coming up the driveway, just outside my window. I imagined that step...then drag sound belonged to some crippled maniac roaming the neighborhood in the middle of the night. And he had finally chosen our house to terrorize. He would come up to my window and start banging on it...until the window broke. Then he would crawl in the window and be in the house...right over where I was sleeping. Step...drag. Step...drag. Then something else happened. Between the step...and the drag...there was a cough. And then another cough. And that cough was coming from right inside my bedroom!

I would have screamed bloody murder right there, had it not been for that fact that I realized the cough came from my grandma sleeping just a couple feet away. A few little coughs in between her breathing...her wheezing breathing that sounded like a step...then a drag of someone's foot. The sound of the maniac outside my window, creeping up our driveway was actually my grandma's breathing cycle. And since she smoked a couple packs of unfiltered Pall Malls every day...it was quite an unusual sound at times. Couple that with my rich imagination, paranoia, and fear of the dark...and you have the makings of one helluva scary scene for a 9 year old.


I'm not real concerned about the dark now, as a middle aged adult. In fact, it really hasn't bothered me for a long time. Although you will never catch me staring into the dark from my bed for long periods of time. My imagination is way too rich for that!

As I got a little older, say my early teen years, my biggest fear was staying in a house alone at night. Now that was frickin' spooky. It really didn't happen all that often as I had two younger sisters, and I was the babysitter when my parents went out at night. But, when my sisters went to sleep...I was pretty much in the house alone...sort of. On those nights, I would turn on all the lights in the house, make sure all the curtains and blinds were closed, curl up in front of the television...and freak out! The only really weird thing that happened was when a friend of mine came up to the house and started tapping on the window outside our den. When I realized who it was, I was relieved of course. "Hey, come on in. Want something to eat? Why don't you stay for a while. The Rifleman is on. I'm scared shitless!"

I finally realized later in life that I wasn't the only one with these fears. Obviously other people had these same concerns as children, and as adults. Most of them became screenwriters I think. It's probably good therapy writing about your fears, bringing them out in the open...into the light so to speak.

As I sit here in front of my computer at 3:30 am, in my dimly lit office, writing this blog...I can still hear some of those same sounds that gave me chills as a child. I guess I just process them differently as an adult. They don't concern as much as they used to. "What was that noise out in the kitchen?" Just the icemaker in the refrigerator. "What is that strange sound...the one that sounds like someone slowly walking by, just outside the window?" Oh, that's just one of our three dogs snoring...or is it Loretta snoring? No matter. "What's that screaming sound off in the distance?" Probably just the neighbor's cat. "And what is that dark figure standing at the end of the darkened hallway...slowly walking toward me. The one with the bloody knife in his hand?"

Step....drag. Step...drag.