NCC2012 said:

Cliff Richard sang a song about it.

I was afraid of being alone and seeing things -- ghosts, angels, dead people. I used to stay up literally all night sometimes thinking how horrible it would be if some ghost walked into my room.

Matches and lighters and, once in my life, my mother. My grandpa was a smoker who had heart problems because of it. He didn't want me to ever smoke. He always had this certain chair at "his table" in the restaurant he and my grandmother owned. I'd sit in his lap and pass the day away with him there... listening to stories. But...

He would send me with a nickle over to the cigarette machine to grab him his cigarettes. I would tense up. I knew what would happen when I got back. I'd skip over to the machine... happy and pleased to be doing something for my grandpa, but on the way back I would walk as slow as I could, weaving in and out of the other tables, to try and find the longest route to him.

Once I'd get there, he'd have a pack of chewing gum sitting on the table beside him. I'd pass him his cigarettes and climb up on his lap. He'd smoke his cigarette, then, when he was done, he'd unwrap a stick of the gum, pop the stick in his mouth, wad the outer paper of the gum up and throw it in his ashtray and save the inner wrapper, the foil one. He'd then wrap my thumb up in the foil wrapper and light it on fire! He'd let it burn enough for the flame to just touch my finger and then he'd snuff it out with his fingers. This was to teach me to never smoke.

I couldn't go near matches or lighters for years. It wasn't until I was 15 and decided to smoke that I actually ever lit a match or a lighter, because if I wanted to smoke the thing, I had to do it myself... no one else knew I was smoking, so I couldn't ask anyone. It would take MANY tries for me to even get it lit, because I'd strike the match and quickly throw it, or I'd flick the lighter and do the same.

So, I guess it really didn't work out the way he had wanted it to... all it really did was make my grandma have to light her own trash on fire in the fire pit, because I'd go thru an entire box, never having lit it once. She eventually stopped sending me out to do it.

Oh, and the part about my mom... the very last time that my grandpa lit my thumb on fire... it burned down a little too much. He yelled for my mom, who worked there, and she came around the counter and reached down where the silverware were kept. She came back up with a knife in her hand and started walking towards me. I screamed and started crying, saying, "Nooooo, NOOOOO MOM, NOOOOO!" I thought she was going to cut my thumb off. She was heading to the aloe (we called them burn plant back then) and was going to cut off a piece to put on my thumb. I thought for sure she was going to hack it off.

Sorry so long... I guess I'm chatty today.

CLOWNS

SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy said:

Why? MISbehaving?

NCC2012 said:

OMG That doll is really scary!!! I am sure to have nightmares tonight..

I wish I never saw that pic now...and I am in the house, alone, in the dark... and it is haunted....

charlottegelin said:

Dinosaurs.

But then I introduced Clause 2800BC and stamped them all out.

Other kids
My dad
Snakes
The principal
Priests
Seeing anyone on a ladder ("Ma! You'll hurt yourself!")
My godmother (I'd welcome her by hiding under the bed)
That woman across the street... and her boys.

JDINTERACTIVE said:

LAWL!

REDFEATHERS said:

You think that's bad? You should have seen the episode!

Sex.