Childhood Fears

Oliver is afraid of owls.  At least, he says he is.  He talks about where owls are, and how he would rather not be in the same places.

I'm not afraid of owls, but I do have complicated emotions when it comes to the dark, coyotes, and bugs.  Just a few minutes ago, I was relaxing in bed.  I guess I was trying to watch Seinfeld, but it's hard to do with a pack of coyotes outside the window.  An ambulance broke things up for a few minutes, but once whatever the fuss at the other end of the street was dealt with, the yipping and howling rose up again.  And then I remembered my first real fears.

When I was little, 3 or 4 years old, we lived out in the country.  In the summer, we'd sleep with windows open and screen doors letting the night breeze fill the house.  We also had dimmer switches in a few rooms - my bedroom being one.  I was terrified of the dark, and slept with the light dimmed about half way.  Moths and what I assume to have been all forms of winged monsters gathered on the ceiling of my room, right above my bed.  If I slept (or tried to sleep) on my back, I would see the bugs.  That didn't work for me.

I tried sleeping on my stomach, but my bed was right under the one window I had...overlooking the front yard.  On a clear night when the moon was full, it was a massacre.  The coyotes would gather to eat our cats. They'd roam the lawn in silence.  It was chilling.

So those were my choices: the bugs on the ceiling, or the coyotes on the lawn.  I vividly remember many a night hiding under my sheet, swatting at things that I thought were crawling on me, doing everything I could to keep my eyes closed.  After all, when you're a kid, the dangers are less real if you keep your eyes closed.  Sometimes I'd cry.  Sometimes I was too scared to sleep, and instead, I passed out from exhaustion.

I'm the grown-up now, and I protect my little one from the owls... he says, "there's nothing to be scared of" as he walks down the dark hall to go to bed.  He talks about the ghosts and the owls and the bats.  He's a tough kid, but I wonder if he'd tell me if something really scared him.  I never told my parents about the bugs or the coyotes.