When I Was 10

I was afraid to go to sleep at night, because an ogre-thing was trying to kill me.

My bedroom window didn't lock. This came in handy since I was a latch-key kid and sometimes forgot my key. Sometimes I remembered my key but while getting it out to unlock the door, I'd think, "I hope it doesn't slip from my fingers and fall down in between the boards of the porch!" The next thing I knew, the key was under the porch. How did it fall so perfectly vertically and fit right between the cracks? That's one of the mysteries of a childhood fear of Under The Porch -- of course the key falls right down there every time.

Poor Dad would have to crawl under there AGAIN to retrieve it. He hated that!

In the meantime, it would be hours before my parents would get home, and I could hear the dog whining inside. She had to pee! So I'd get a lawn chair and lug/drag it over to my bedroom window. I'd climb up, take the screen off the window, and put my palm flat on the glass and then push as hard as I could to the side, to make the window open a little. Then I put my fingers in the crack and pull it the rest of way open. Now to just hoist myself up and through the window, and I was safely inside!

Or was I? First of all, a neighbor could have seen me climb in. Or someone hiding in the cornfield behind our house. They could follow me in. Someone could have seen me do it last time, and already be inside waiting, having replaced the screen and closed the window. Would my parents ever hurry up and get home?

Surely if I pretended that everything was normal, it would be. Let the dog out, and carefully don't think about what might be under the porch along with my key. Look around casually to see if anyone was watching me put the screen back and drag the chair back to the patio. But don't look too closely at the cornfield -- if something was in there, I didn't really want to know.

Anyway, at night I couldn't have my bed next to the window because, besides real-life burglars, there was this ogre-troll guy who was going to get me. He had a shrivelly face and a big, hooked nose. He wouldn't need a chair to climb up, either. He'd leap right up to the window sill and hold on with his yellow claws until he could pry off the screen and slide my window open. He'd stand triumphantly in the window, arms spread and a big, yellow snarl on his face. I'd be paralyzed with fear and unable to cry for help!

But my bed couldn't be too close to the closet, either, because there was a trap door in there. During the day, it was all fun and games to try to find it and imagine the wonderful world that lay beyond it, and how much fun it would be to run away and be independent and not have to follow any stupid rules. But at night I knew that the world on the other side had just as much bad as it did good -- it had to balance out. AND that if I ever found and opened that trapdoor, it went both ways. Not only could I go through it, but things could come back after me, especially in the dark.

So I'd sometimes sleep with my light on. I'd surround myself with dolls and stuffed animals as a method of protection. A little girl surrounded by toys couldn't possibly be murdered in her sleep by an ogre-troll or something that crawled out of her closet! I'd stay awake as long as could, reading.

And for a while I just slept in my sister's room, on her floor. Man, it was uncomfortable, but I was safe. Her window locked. Her closet had no trapdoor. And her presence kept my imagination in check. Plus, that little ogre-troll wasn't quite clever enough to find me in the room next door.