Sep. 24: Scaredy-cat

Today’s topic for the September Blog Challenge is:

A story about a time you were very afraid.

Seriously? You might as well ask me to describe in graphic detail the worst nightmare I’ve ever had. When I’ve been afraid in my life, I try to get past it with my eyes squeezed shut and never look back. I can’t even begin to pick one moment, so I’ll give a few in which I was really, truly frightened. In no particular order:

• I was in a car accident while pregnant with Jack. It wasn’t a terrible one, but a friend practically forced me to go to the ER to get checked out. I was embarrassed to make a big deal about a small accident, but the ultrasound showed a big weird thing on the placenta that kinda made the tech freak out. She left to get a radiologist and THAT’S when I got scared. They scanned some more and apparently it was just a dirty screen or something—there was nothing wrong.
• I went to pick up Katie from first grade one day and she wasn’t there. No one at the school remembered seeing her leave. I drove all over the neighborhood, hoping maybe she had decided to walk home—a decision for which I would definitely kill her. I finally went to her friend’s house and found her. The girl’s mom said Katie had come up to her after school and said “I’m going home with you,” so she assumed I had given permission. Katie got a veeeery long lecture. I think it was the first time she’d seen (noticed) me cry and she was totally freaked out. I sprouted eleventy trillion new grey hairs that day.
• A few years ago I was driving down I-205 and a car flew up from the other side, over the median and my car, and crashed onto my side of the freeway. It happened in a split second and, as I was moving at highway speed, I was beyond it before it even occurred to me that I was supposed to stop. I was so glad to have been in the far left lane instead of the far right, where I would have definitely been landed upon. I couldn’t stop shaking for hours.
• Vic and I were in a plane landing at SFO and just as we were about to touch down, the pilot pulled us up at the last second. On the second attempt, the entire plane was absolutely silent. I hate landings anyway—though I do realize they’re occasionally necessary—but that one was terrifying.
• I’m not a fan of the close calls, and don’t recover from them quickly.
• A recurring nightmare I had as a kid was Cruella DeVil trying to grab me while I played in our driveway. Pretty much all the Disney villains scared me back then. They seem so much less frightening now, or maybe it’s just that I’m an adult.
• Every time I’ve seen a spider.
• In high school, a bunch of us were staying over at April’s house, and we rented Terminator. It was horrible! I hated that movie so much; I mean, he just would. not. die. I finally went to the other room, which was really not any better because I was by myself and still scared to death. Although Terminator’s nothing compared to pretty much any horror or suspense film (which I still avoid), it was probably the scariest one I’d seen up to then.
• I think I can speak for a lot of people in the world when I say watching the events of September 11, 2001 unfold was one of the most frightening days in history.

I’m done. That was not fun. I’m not even going to ask you to share a story about when you were very scared. I don’t want to know. Do not tell me. Thank you.

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If you’re a blogger and want to do our blog challenge with us, let me know and I’ll send you our list! Otherwise, tune in here (and on Sherilee’s happy little blog) every day in September.