I'm Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf
I'm not one that likes to be scared.
As a child I always avoided haunted houses in favor of harmless Halloween parties with their bowls of candy corn and playful games like 'touch the eyeballs' [which were really just grapes with the skins peeled off]. I hate scary movies, piercing screams, the sight of blood, hate empty spaces under beds, the darkness in closets, and shadows lurking around corners. The Blair Witch Project scared the bee-jesus out of me and I couldn't sleep for a week after watching Poltergeist. Even now, I get freaked out when the t.v. loses reception and that ominous fuzzy screen appears. Oooohhhhhhhh....
So why would I, in my right mind, agree to go to a haunted house that claimed to be the best in New York? Maybe it's my need to challenge myself or my new desire to step into the things I fear or maybe it was for the open bar. Even now it's hard to decipher. But let me tell you something, alcohol and fright, they don't mix well. Oil and water my friends, oil and water...
Upon entry to the party, my eyes immediately fixed upon a giant projection screen. The film was of a naked woman lying on the floor, her arm was strapped to a table while a man proceeded to cut her hand off with a saw in front of an adorning audience. Torture and mutilation, voyeurism and sadism...my stomach turned. I felt hot and upset inside. My friend ordered me a cranberry and vodka.
Why, why watch such sick footage? What purpose did it serve 'cept to make one feel woozy and light headed and altogether disheartened with humanity. Humanity. I tried to justify it. Tried to think, maybe this is some cultural social statement on women in America, women sacrificing themselves for the pleasure of others, a gory interpretation of 'Susie Homemaker' who destroys herself and her needs to please everyone around her. I tried to imagine a Women's Studies Seminar in which the professor runs this video and it sparks discussions of the degradation of female, the dehumanization of femininity and the masochist spirit. But no. It really was just a disgusting image of some one's hand getting sawed off. This shit's just not for me.
I had another cranberry and vodka. And then another. Costumed ghouls walked around, bloody butchers and the escaped insane mingled with guests, pointing knives at us, telling us we were going to die. Well, we're all going to die, I slurred to one who wouldn't leave me alone. Fear is for the birds, my eyes grew heavier and heavier...by the time I actually labyrinthed through the haunted house, I was so full of liquor, that everything seemed funny and trivial. Oh look, guts on the table...hee hee, I slipped on that blood on the floor, oh hey Mr. Chainsaw Man, hey, you're funny....
Now would I say I'm proud that I went through the haunted house unnerved, unafraid? Of course not, I'd taken myself out of reality to deal with the fear I had lurking within and I can't take credit for that.
And was I a coward for not being able to come face to face with the horrifying images? Perhaps. But at least I realized I'm just a big softie. I don't get pleasure from other people's pain, I don't want to see people killing, people dying. I'll stick to Halloween parties where Thriller is bumping in the background. I'll stick to toasted pumpkin seeds and Hamburger costumes. I'll stick to the sunny side of life where you can eat candy bars and carry pumpkin baskets, where you can sleep with a night-light and there's no dark spaces beneath your bed. After all, whose not at least a little afraid of the big bad wolf?
Filed under //
holidays
personal reflection
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