Little Girl Fear
Not having been a paticularly anxious child, but rather of the generally phlegmatic, often stubborn, sensible temperment, there were few fears or phobias that plagued me. Spiders and snakes (even still!) were fascinating, not scary. Animals of all sorts were respected but certainly not feared...I always had pets of several kinds and was a confident and sometimes foolhardy horseback rider (until I gained some common sense and exposure to statistics as an adult!)so anything anemable to hugging and petting and feeding got just that. Thankfully though, I've always had a focused sense of their individual boundaries and knew when to back off, too, which serves me well in my work even now. The dark? Hm...not so scary. Water? Growing up in Central Florida, we almost literally lived in water from dawn til dusk when the weather warranted. Storms? Thunder and lightning? Relish them, even now. There was a time, being graced with a metalhead brother six years my senior who loved horror films and death documentaries, when after getting a few glimpses at parts of "The Exorcist" or "Faces of Death" on the ol' VHS, I had some minor nightmare issues...decomposed bodies and/or evil supernatural stuff do get me a teency bit nervous. But, yeah. Not a big fraidy cat.
Possible explosions (no idea why?), helicopters and angry yelling men were about the only things that would give me physical symptoms of fear. But, I'm 36 now. I don't frighten easily. A very small, involuntary pitter patter will happen when a helicopter flies close overhead....remnant of having lived next to a hospital as a toddler. What toddler wouldn't be freaked by the sound of the Medevac hovering practically overhead at 1 in the morning? Angry yelling men will cause the same, simply because now I've seen enough news stories to think of the possibility that a semi-automatic could be whipped out at any time, in any place, drawing CNN to any store parking lot to do interviews and construct memorial photo montages. You know? I recently was at a stop light with a friend and saw my first up-close road rage throwdown between a hotheaded Nort' Providence guido in a 'beater and a BMW....and a shaggy-haired teenage boy in a little SUV. It was freaky and ultimately uneventful. But still, just being in the near vicinity of an irrational, macho man is a bit anxiety-provoking. I did have a little adrenaline action there...shaking afterwards, etc. It was 15 feet away! I could've been next!
Anyway, the Point....and yes, there ultimately is one: that day we went canoeing (a few entries back), which was so wonderful and lovely....there was one little weird freak-out I had. It was interesting because I consciously knew that I was being ridiculous, but still the subconscious physical reaction and base, involuntary emotion that came up was a little startling. There was a part of the river that passed under I-95 down in Southern RI. Big, busy, major national artery, 6-8 lane I-95. I knew it was going to, according to our guidebook. But I hadn't pictured what the underpass would look like. A big, airy, stilty bridge, I'd assumed. But no. What rose before us, as we came around the bend was a solid concrete mass, several stories high, puntured by three unlit, dungeon-esque, arched tunnels. They ran a couple hundred feet long to the other side of the highway. There was a bit of grafitti here and there, which only give the unnerving impression of lurking unsavory types. The rush of the cars could barely be heard way up at the top. And there was not a soul around...it was an otherwise pastoral area. Slowly we drifted up to the arches..."Which one should we take?" said the boy from the back of the canoe. "I dunno...uhhh...er....(heart racing)...do we hafta?," I said. "It'll be fun!" he insisted. And part of me agreed...it was pretty intriguing. But for some reason, peering into a tunnel that looked EXACTLY like the descriptions of near-death experiences you always read and hear about, floored by black, black water of mysterious depth and contents, walled and ceilinged by dirty concrete supporting millions of pounds of rushing weight overhead....well, it gave me a touch of panic. The swimming pool scene from "Poltergeist" came smashing, unbidden, right into my mind...as did scenes of floating, bloated drown victims... But, we sallied forth. And it was actually kind of cool. The boy enjoyed the acoustics, which took my mind off thoughts of arms reaching up from the murk.
On the way back, half as scared and mostly self-patronizing, I even participated. It was just fascinating, from a weird, objective distance, to watch and feel a part of myself react to this situation in such a primeval way. Maybe we're all just little girls once in a while?
Possible explosions (no idea why?), helicopters and angry yelling men were about the only things that would give me physical symptoms of fear. But, I'm 36 now. I don't frighten easily. A very small, involuntary pitter patter will happen when a helicopter flies close overhead....remnant of having lived next to a hospital as a toddler. What toddler wouldn't be freaked by the sound of the Medevac hovering practically overhead at 1 in the morning? Angry yelling men will cause the same, simply because now I've seen enough news stories to think of the possibility that a semi-automatic could be whipped out at any time, in any place, drawing CNN to any store parking lot to do interviews and construct memorial photo montages. You know? I recently was at a stop light with a friend and saw my first up-close road rage throwdown between a hotheaded Nort' Providence guido in a 'beater and a BMW....and a shaggy-haired teenage boy in a little SUV. It was freaky and ultimately uneventful. But still, just being in the near vicinity of an irrational, macho man is a bit anxiety-provoking. I did have a little adrenaline action there...shaking afterwards, etc. It was 15 feet away! I could've been next!
Anyway, the Point....and yes, there ultimately is one: that day we went canoeing (a few entries back), which was so wonderful and lovely....there was one little weird freak-out I had. It was interesting because I consciously knew that I was being ridiculous, but still the subconscious physical reaction and base, involuntary emotion that came up was a little startling. There was a part of the river that passed under I-95 down in Southern RI. Big, busy, major national artery, 6-8 lane I-95. I knew it was going to, according to our guidebook. But I hadn't pictured what the underpass would look like. A big, airy, stilty bridge, I'd assumed. But no. What rose before us, as we came around the bend was a solid concrete mass, several stories high, puntured by three unlit, dungeon-esque, arched tunnels. They ran a couple hundred feet long to the other side of the highway. There was a bit of grafitti here and there, which only give the unnerving impression of lurking unsavory types. The rush of the cars could barely be heard way up at the top. And there was not a soul around...it was an otherwise pastoral area. Slowly we drifted up to the arches..."Which one should we take?" said the boy from the back of the canoe. "I dunno...uhhh...er....(heart racing)...do we hafta?," I said. "It'll be fun!" he insisted. And part of me agreed...it was pretty intriguing. But for some reason, peering into a tunnel that looked EXACTLY like the descriptions of near-death experiences you always read and hear about, floored by black, black water of mysterious depth and contents, walled and ceilinged by dirty concrete supporting millions of pounds of rushing weight overhead....well, it gave me a touch of panic. The swimming pool scene from "Poltergeist" came smashing, unbidden, right into my mind...as did scenes of floating, bloated drown victims... But, we sallied forth. And it was actually kind of cool. The boy enjoyed the acoustics, which took my mind off thoughts of arms reaching up from the murk.
On the way back, half as scared and mostly self-patronizing, I even participated. It was just fascinating, from a weird, objective distance, to watch and feel a part of myself react to this situation in such a primeval way. Maybe we're all just little girls once in a while?
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