Let’s face it. We all have fears. Some are justifiable fears. And others? Not so much.
As most of you know, I am absolutely terrified of Spiders, because I’ve already told you that story. And, as most of you know, I am petrified of Bridges, because I’ve already told you that story too. But, I am not sure if I have ever shared my crippling fears with respects to: Fire, and, Public Speaking, and, Heights, and, Flying?
Let’s start with Flying. Shall we? Seriously people, I need to take a Xanax just thinking about boarding an airplane. Don’t even get me started on the story that involved: extreme and violent turbulence, causing the oxygen masks to drop from the ceiling, and the luggage to fall out of the overhead compartments, which led me to think WE’RE ALL GUNNA DIE, because I believed at that very moment gravity could reach right up, grab a hold of my plane, and rip me from the skies. And how one man’s chronic halitosis inevitably sent me into uncontrollable heaving and hurling for a seven-hour flight. Let’s just say it wasn’t pretty. And I kissed the tarmac when we finally landed safely.
When it comes to Heights? I suspect this particular fear has something to do with the day my younger brother Adam convinced me to get on a roller coaster, and one that had no floors, and proceeded to spin me upside-down, until I threw up. Which was really unfortunate for the man sitting directly behind me. Because my vomit? Landed all over him. To this day, I practically suffer from a case of vertigo if I am higher than three feet off the ground.
Now, I can’t really explain where this next fear comes from, but I can assure all of you, if I ever had to Speak In Public? I would faint and collapse. And, there wouldn’t be enough voltage in this world to electroshock me back into coherency.
Which brings us to my last fear.
My fear of Fire stems way back to my childhood when I was about five or six years old. Now, I have never been in a fire. [Thank God.] Nor have I even been close to a fire [outside of a controlled environment]. But for some reason, I have spent my life overly concerned with the threat of a fire. And I have no idea why.
When I was a little girl, before I could go to bed, I packed up all of my favorite things and placed them neatly inside of a milk crate. And, I am not even joking when I tell you that I slept holding onto that milk crate full of my beloved items. I performed this ritual every single night – just in case – there was ever a fire and I was forced to run out of the house. I had to be fully prepared to save my most cherished belongings.
Maybe my fear of impending fire comes from all of those ‘Smokey The Bear’ commercials that used to be on television? Or maybe it’s because of all the ‘Fire Drills’ we used to have in school? Or maybe, I am just weird?
But whatever the reasons may be, I am STILL extremely cautious when it comes to an open flame or anything remotely fire-related. And it’s kind of becoming problematic.
I don’t like to leave my bedroom when my candles are lit, because I automatically imagine a huge gust of wind will magically blast through my room and somehow tip over the candles, and ignite everything. Of course, this has a very little chance of ever happening. But that doesn’t stop me from blowing out all of my candles every time I leave my room, only to re-light them upon entry. And I do this, even if I am just going to the bathroom. [Did I happen to mention my bathroom is conveniently located all of three steps away?]
As a smoker [and as someone who is afraid of fire] I am perpetually compelled to make sure my cigarettes are completely extinguished. I do not smoke inside my house, but I do smoke in the garage. Because yanno, it’s a whole lot ‘safer’ to smoke cigarettes while sitting next to paint cans, and chemicals, and All Things FLAMMABLE. And of course that makes me extremely nervous. As such, I don’t trust leaving any cigarettes in the ashtray. Instead, after I smoke, I carefully wrap each cigarette butt up in aluminum foil. Because that is the only way I feel comfortable leaving the garage after having smoked.
The other day, after smoking a cigarette, I couldn’t find any tinfoil. I searched high and low on a mission to locate even the smallest scrap of aluminum. I rummaged through every single cabinet and kitchen shelf. Sadly, we were totally out of tinfoil, and it was far too late for me to take a trip to the store to purchase new. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any other trust-worthy product to wrap-up my cigarette butts. I simply had to leave my cigarette in the ashtray.
And even though I knew with utmost certainty my cigarette was thoroughly extinguished? That didn’t stop me from running back to the garage every fifteen minutes to make sure my cigarette didn’t spontaneously start to smolder. And, that my garage was not ‘Engulfed in Flames’. I could not stop my wild imagination from conjuring up worst-case-scenarios. After incessantly ‘checking’ for two hours in a row, I finally realized that if I just flushed my cigarette butt down the toilet bowl, there was no possible way my house would set on fire. At least not from my cigarette.
So now that ya’ll think I am totally out of my mind, before I start feeling like I am the ONLY crazy person on the face of the earth, please tell me…
“What are some of YOUR fears?”
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