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When I was 16 I told my therapist that I was afraid to turn my back to the darkness. That when I entered a dark room, I ran for the light switch because I feared being attacked from behind. This was something I had experienced for years. He told me he knew the source of the fear, but refrained from sharing it with me because he said I needed to discover it on my own. At the time I was learning about my family’s history of abuse, about the real impact of my mother’s death on me, about how I was not fucked up, I just wasn’t being heard. I couldn’t decide then which was making me bolt for the light switch, what was making me certain evil was lurking in the darkness of my own home. Was it sexual assault I feared? Death? For years I always wondered and wished that he had just told me.
Recently I realized that the fear was borne from my childhood learning of the truth of human existence. I guess being young, I didn’t know how to intellectualize it and deal with it consciously. I was learning the pain of loss, learning about being alone, but I was also learning that there is no such thing as baseline security - there is no guaranteed tomorrow. This fear was a manifestation of that lesson.
I used to have dreams about nuclear apocalypse. It was the 80’s and all those stupid movies like The Day After profoundly affected my pre-adolescent psyche. The most vivid dream kept me in my bed where I learned that the Soviet Union had launched warheads toward us. We had only hours until impact and where I lived, Puget Sound, was excessively targeted; there was no escape. I lie in bed in the bedroom in the old house looking out the window to see missiles accelerating to the earth. Then I woke up. It was the most terrifying dream of my life. Around that time, I was so afraid of imminent nuclear war that when jets flew low overhead, I ducked in fearful anticipation. I actually ducked.
Somehow that all passed. I don’t recall when I stopped thinking about nuclear war, but I’m sure it had something to do with the reckless courage that was part of the package called "teenager." When those years were used up the fear returned, only it was different this time. I’m no longer afraid of dark spaces. Somehow, finding comfort in living spaces I chose constructed security there. This time, I’m afraid of the obvious: death.
It is always running in the background for me, taking up precious space that could be used more efficiently for positive and productive endeavors. News of others’ dying affects me profoundly because I am connected to them - I could be them. That I am not surprises me sometimes for I wonder how I could be lucky enough not to be picked off by a drunk driver, or not to have been born into poverty in a country where thousands die yearly from natural phenomena or hostile governments. Why not me? Why them? When will it be my turn? I feel like I’m wearing special glasses that reveal shadows of potential death. I’m the only one wearing them and I can see it lurking among those who are oblivious to its presence. I want to lose the glasses; I want to be oblivious too.
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