I have been away from the blog-o-sphere for more than two
months now, and that is the longest hiatus I have taken since starting my blog
over five years ago. I still often
have the thought, “I need to write about that!”, but with life being
uncomfortably busy lately, and with my tired self choosing to do easy things
like read Hawthorne or pin high calorie recipes on Pinterest, I have chosen the
easier path of not posting. However, I think my little vaca has been long
enough, and I am going to attempt to get back in the saddle again. I thought maybe it would be easiest to
start with lists. Lists don’t
require an excess of brainpower and will help me ease back into this writing
thing. So here we go:
10 Things that Scare
Me
1. Shredding cheese. I know that shredding my own cheese
from a big ol’ hunk is cheaper than buying it pre-shredded, and that the
pre-done stuff often has additives, but doggone it, the whole shredding thing
scares me to death. I am so afraid
that I’m not going to notice that the cheese is down to the absolute nub and
then I will shred my fingers to the bone.
Does this freak anyone else out?
2. Getting stuck in an elevator. I have actually experienced this once
and lived to tell about it, but the whole time, I was saying to myself, “You’re
a big girl. You can do this. You
probably won’t die in here.” The elevator, which I was temporarily detained in,
was in the city of Rome and I was in the 5x5 metal box with 9 other
people. It stopped between floors
two and three because we had overloaded it apparently, and it was 110 degrees Fahrenheit
inside. Not only was I sweating
profusely and praying out loud, I was on the verge of fainting—no joke. After
trying to pry the doors open to get some cool air, we again pushed the buttons
like madmen and miraculously, the static metal box began rising. I think it was a miracle. But if it happened again, I’m pretty
sure I would die.
3. Mean check-out people. When people are
mean to me in stores, they make me want to cry and run away from them as fast
as I can.
4. Stepping on and off escalators. Is it
just me or does it stress anyone else out when they have to get on or off an
escalator? What if I make the
slightest misstep? Will my pant
leg get caught in the step that is disappearing? And will people just trample on me as I lay on the
floor? Will my leg get shredded by
the little teeth on the stair? I think my blood pressure rises about 50 points
every time I am forced to ride on one of these contraptions.
5. Revolving doors. Is there really any need for
these? I always feel like I have
to rush into the opening at just the right time—and when is that???—or I might
get caught between the doors and become flat Tori. And then school children will read a book about me and send
me in an envelope to their friends and family telling them to take me with them
on little journeys and take pictures of me.
6. Cruise Control. I know that I can press the brake and
all if I feel like I am speeding along a little too speedily, but cruise control
scares me because I think, in an emergency, I might forget which one is the gas
and which one is the brake, ‘cause I’m not a real clear thinker in chaos. So, when I do risk my life and choose
to use the cruising’ control, I keep my foot right at the base of the brake
pedal to increase the odds of my survival.
7. Flying around in a fiberglass capsule in
the sky. My husband seems to
think this is fun and so sometimes, just to be nice, or because I want to get
somewhere fast, I acquiesce. I
have told myself just to relax during the flight and to see turbulence as just
bumps in the “road”, but the road always looks really high up to me. And, also, I am afraid of heights.
8. My bald spot. Seeing that I have only had like maybe 4 good hair days in
my entire life, this one seems pretty reasonable. I have a strange cowlick in the back of my hair that makes
me appear to have a bald spot. So,
I spend inordinate amounts of time trying to make it appear that I am actually
not bald and that I just have really bad hair. This usually doesn’t work and I am always secretly hoping
that I am too tall for you to see the top of my head with my bare scalp
exposed.
9. Yeast. Is this stuff truly alive? And what happens if this live stuff gets into my live body
as I put it into the bread I am baking?
Will it take over and make me look all muffin-toppy?
10. Numbers—but
mostly ones with lots of zeros.
I have bad dreams of someone writing a really large number on the
blackboard and asking me to tell everyone what it is. I’m being completely serious. My hands start to sweat when I have to figure out if
something is in the thousands, or millions, or billions. In my dreams, I usually say it wrong
and everyone laughs at my stupidity.
Everyone, that is, except my cat, whom I hug while I am crying. If you really love me, never ever ask
me to read a large number out loud—especially if I have no animals nearby.
So that about covers it folks. The only frightening thing that I neglected to include was
going on roof tours on slanted roofs of
cathedrals in Spain. This situation
is sure to send me into hysterics even if I have mentally prepared myself
beforehand by saying, “You got this thing!” and “Ain’t nothing gonna bring me
down”. Even with my Rocky-like
mental gymnastics, I would probably still hyperventilate near the gutter. And as I am trying to be all like “I’m
just taking in a bit of the scenery down here”, the tour guide might shout, “Are
you OK, lady?” in Spanglish. And I might, while trembling, smile weakly and say
“Yep. I’m fine” knowing full well that I am lying through my chattering teeth. Of course, this is all hypothetical,
but I think I would do well to avoid such things in the future.