Saturday, September 06, 2003

Thunder and Lightning. When I was young I taught myself a lot of things. Some might say I was self taught even. Okay, so I taught myself how to whistle, how to curl my tongue, how to swistle (whistling your esses through your teeth) and how not to be afraid of certain things. Thunder and Lightning. What I believe to be two of the most powerful natural things in life.
When I was young I was afraid of them both. But for some reason I don’t remember the being afraid part. I just remember how I taught myself how to NOT be afraid.
My bed was set up between two windows. So if I was laying down, my head would be against a wall and on either side of me was a window. One night there was a large storm and I was scared. At least im pretty sure I was because otherwise I don’t know why I would have tried to calm myself down.
I was getting to the age where I knew calling mom in wouldn’t make any of it go away so it was time to take some action. I decided that thunder and lightning weren’t things, but living creatures who needed love and affection.
As the thunder would crack I would look to the window on the right and say something along the lines of…”Oh! You have a crush on lightning? I’ll tell her!” and then look to the window on the left and wait for the lightning to flash and say “HEY! Thunder has a crush on you! Do you want to go out?”. This continued until I had successfully made the two a pair and they settled down to a dull roar. Im serious, I really did this.

Sleeping with ghosts was always a problem for me. In fact, it down right freaked me out. I needed to find a way to create some sort of bubble around my bed that would deflect these evil creatures from seeping into my dreams. Sometimes I would close my eyes and refuse to open them because that was the wall between me and them. If I opened them I was sure to find some slithering transparent creature staring me right in the face. This would never do, how could I possibly go on living without opening my eyes when I wanted to.
My brother gave me this ring for christmas once. I still have it to this day, but the prize wasn’t in the ring. It was in the box that it came in. A teeny little flip top box just big enough to hold the red stoned ring. It had a clear plastic top and and black plastic bottom with a little piece of black foam inside with a slit to hold the ring. One night I was looking at this little piece of plastic with a flip top lid. I looked at it closed and peeked inside at the foam. I opened it and pushed the foam down with my finger to watch it instantly come back to life when I pulled away. THAT’S IT! It’s a button! The answer to all my ghostly problems.
From that night on I would pretend there was a button next to my pillow that was exactly like that box. I didn’t use the actual box because I didn’t want to roll over on it in my sleep. Or maybe I did use the box for awhile, but if I did, I don’t remember doing so. In the beginning the design was simple. Open the box, press the button, close the box and whammo!…a transparent force field was instantly surrounding my bed. At first this barrier was simply covering up to the top of my mattress. This wouldn’t do of course because the ghouls could pick it up from the bottom and sneak in. I needed a new design. A wrap around force field would do well! So now it would begin it’s shape by forming over my bed and wrapping all the way under it to create a bubble.
WAIT! What if when the field was created a ghost or a witch or a goblin got stuck in side of it. I had to create yet another new effect. In order to rid my little bubble completely of evil doers there had to be a vacuum. And so there was. A vacuum that sucked out any evil spirits that were stuck inside my little bubble.
Still to this day, if Im about to fall asleep and I suddenly remember that button, I use it. Not out of fear, but out of the fact that I decided whenever I remember that button, I MUST use it because there must be a reason. And so, at age 25, the button is still there. But only when I need it most.