at home

When I was a little girl about 4 yrs old, I had (as most children do) the occasional accident in bed at night. The next morning, my mom would have to strip the covers and clean the vinyl mattress coverings with a water/vinegar solution. I thought I was such a lucky little girl because I had a 'water' bed. I told everyone until one day I heard my mom explaining the truth to my grandmother.

My bed lay along one wall of my room. I was convinced that there were little people underneath it, who could climb up the wall and into my bed. My teddy bear was always beside me and the wall, and I thought that, if I went to sleep with my back to it, the little people would come up and steal him. For years I could only sleep on my left side, for fear of impending teddy-theft.

Once when I was about seven, a babysitter had a friend over who brought the video "Planet of the Apes". Of one or another reason I was allowed to watch it, which made me think there were apes under my bed, apes under the stairs (so they could grab my feet), and apes in closets and behind doors. I`m over the bed-thing now, but I still run the stairs. I`m born in 75.

I used to believe that if I looked in the mirror, exactly on the stroke of midnight, the devil would appear behind me. If it was anywhere near midnight, I would keep my eyes tight shut as I passed a mirror.

I used to believe the sump pump at my friend Pete's house would cut off your hand or foot or what ever else you put in there (at least that's what his dad told us).

I used to think that the dog-thing from Ghostbusters was hiding in the closet across from my bedroom door...oh and that Big Foot, in the course of his travels through Washington state, would somehow stumble across my house, and make his way into my bedroom... I'd always freak out right before I went to sleep, imagining what it would be like if I woke up in the night to see him towering over me in my little room!!!

I used to believe that all old houses had secret rooms. So, when we moved into an old house I was overjoyed and spent days searching for that secret room. I mean, the house was small and there was obviously no room for a secret room, but I just knew there had to be one. I still live in that house, I never found a secret room, but I still really wish there was one.

I too had the belief that monsters would come to get me while i was sleeping but if i hid under my blanket, they wouldnt see me. But then i realised they could see the hump that was me. From then on out i imagined that the monsters were really dumb and didnt comprehend that.

I thought our old furnace (which bumped, clicked, whistled and groaned even when off) was going to come get me some night. I used to keep a glass of water by my bed to throw on it and put out the fire in it if ever I awoke to find it in my room....

When my family and I moved into a new house, I picked my bedroom for one reason and one reason alone. I was in love with this white canopy bed and , at the time, believed that if you moved into or out of a house, all of the belongings that were there had to stay in the same place forever. Unfortunetely, for me, I was horribly mistaken. Hey, give me a break! I was only three years old!

I used to believe that someday my parents would turn our dirtly old basement into a roller skating rink and charge admission. To prepare for this, I tried to hang a Christmas tree ornament that looked like a ball from the basement ceiling.

I used to believe that my Kermit the Frog doll would crawl under my bed at night and wait for me to hang a leg or arm over the side so that he could grab it and attack me.

In the medicine cabinet of my childhood home, there was a small slot at the back that was designed for disposing of used razor blades. My sister and I discovered it one day and were amazed. We thought it was a coin slot, and that if we put pennies in it, gumballs would come out from somewhere. We put tons of coins down it, and ran to various places such as the heating vent to see if a gumball came out. Then we started putting hand writted notes down the slot. Somewhere in the inner wall of that bathroom is a lot of money and funny messages, wonder if they will ever be discovered?

In my grandma's basement laundry room, there was a pipe that came out of the bottom of the wall at an angle, and went straight into the floor. It was white and looked exactly like a hoof. All my cousins and I would dare each other to go look at it, and get freaked out imagining it was a goat or monster in the wall!!

my grandparents had a dark, unfinished part of their basement. their washer/dryer was there and a cupboard where they kept cleaning products. my brother thought mr. clean was a real man and that he lived in my grandparents' basement. it terrified him. he was three.

I used to have a pillowcase which featured superheros on one side and supervillains on the other. I believed that if I slept with the supervillains side turned up, I would be attacked and killed by the supervillains, especially the dreaded Joker.

I saw "Halloween II" when I was around 9, and the image of Michael Myers will forever be burned into my brain. I used to cover myself completely with my blanket, fearing that if ANY part of my body came out from underneath the blanket, that Michael Myers would kill me. I finally got over that after I got married.

I saw a Sherlock Holmes movie which had people being killed by a pigmy who climbed up the drainpipe outside their rooms and shot them with a poison dart from a blowgun. I was convinced that the pigmy would eventually find his way to kill me but I could protect myself if I slept with lots of blankets because the dart would not be able to penetrate through the blankets and into my skin. To this day, while I no longer believe the evil pigmy is after me, I cannot sleep without many blankets even in the middle of summer.