Graham: I don’t know.

Me: In the next two months maybe?

Graham: Probably not. Why do you ask?

Me: I have a horror book I want to read and a movie to watch. I want to make sure you’re going to be around while it’s still fresh in my head.

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Most people probably outgrow their childhood fears, but I still have severe existential hang-ups and paranoia of the paranormal. In all fairness, I really do it to myself. I grew up watching horror films with my grandmother in her bedroom. Since my grandmother spoke almost no English, horror films provided an unlikely way for us to bond. Visual suspense and fear bridged successfully across the linguistic divide. I’ve grown desensitized to some subgenres (slashers, monsters, zombies, etc.), but then there are the ones that burrow into childhood fears and metastasize into my imagination.

I’ve always lived in close proximity to other people. Family, apartments, roommates/housemates, and now, husband, so even if my paranoia choked back sleep, I at least felt some comfort knowing that there was only a thin wall or door that separated me from other people, and sleeping with your significant other in the same bed eliminates the dilemma of whether to sleep facing the door or the closet. In the end it doesn’t matter since your S/O’s logic brainwaves will drive away the boogeyman.

However… panic always sets in when Graham has a business trip.

Once upon a time though, when we first started dating, I asked Graham that if we were ever living together.. and I suddenly got bad vibes about a place, if he’d promise to let us move. I’ve seen The Omen, Rosemary’s Baby, Insidious.. and in all of those movies, Lee Remick, Mia Farrow, and Rose Byrne are never taken seriously and then all hell breaks loose as their fears are proven. Graham promised we’d move.

Last night, on a whim, I asked him if he remembered that promise.

No.

Shoot. Now I have to add “Pod People” to my list.

Stacy

When I was a kid, I loved Reading Rainbow. Even now, whenever Graham and I work together to solve a problem, I burst into the chorus of “Teamwork.” For some reason though, when I watched the episode when LeVar Burton visits the New England Aquarium and reads “Louis the Fish,” I was horrified during the “Sea Living” song interlude because of THIS fish:

I couldn’t figure out just why this fish evoked a queasy response from me. I thought maybe it had something to do with the similarities the fish’s pattern had to a hideous dress my grandmother owned.

Fast forward to 2014, and a podcast from Stuff To Blow Your Mind solved the mystery for me.. I’m trypophobic.. for those of you unfamiliar with the term:When Graham and I bought our house this past winter, the last thing I suspected was that it would grow goosebump inducing… things. I don’t mean the centipedes, worms, slugs, or snails that have I’ve unearthed while weeding in the garden, stifling my startled screams so the neighbors don’t snicker about the former Center City girl who’s afraid of nature. No, I’m talking about things like the fern leaves with the patterned undersides that make me squeamish.

See?At least they’re not in obvious view unlike some other offending plants…

When I first discovered we had asiatic lilies growing the backyard, I took great care cultivating them and guarding them every time Graham went outside with the weed whacker. “Mind the lilies!” I’d yell, pointing them out. I’d never grown lilies before, and was determined that we’d see these bloom. One day, I suddenly noticed something about the lilies that had grown past my waist..WTF? No, I mean… WTF?! No, no, no, no. I panicked under my trypophobia for a moment, then sought a quick Google education which taught me that these were actually asiatic lily seeds.. and scattering them around would give me new lilies for next season. I braved the goosebumps the mere appearance of these things had given me and began plucking them off the stem and tossing them all over the yard while an amused Graham watched. I was going to see these babies through to bloom!ARGH! Just typing about these things is giving me gooseflesh again.

And earlier this week.. it finally happened.

From the kitchen window, while pouring my morning coffee, I could see the back of one of the lilies.. the petals had unfurled. I could make out the orange tips curled back. Excitedly, I headed out with the dog, ready to enjoy the payout of weeks of nurturing and overcoming my trypophobia.

To my horror… this is what met me…

THE BLACK SPOTS!! I had to look away. If the triggered trypophobia hadn’t left me feeling so disgusted, I would have found the humor in nature’s irony. That’s when the gravity of the situation hit HARD.

I HAD THROWN THE SEEDS ALL OVER THE YARD!

Graham has specific instructions for next year.

Take No Prisoners. Weed whack EVERYTHING. 

That’s how it goes. I create the problems, and Graham provides the solutions.

Teamwork!

Stacy

I can’t blame him.

So one night, while he was on the first floor.. I did some window dressing in the bedroom:I made sure to prop up the marionette Graham brought back from Mexico for me when I asked him for “the creepiest doll you can find” as a souvenir.And now, Graham knows that you can’t leave me alone for too long because when boredom sets in, I’m just going to look for ways to antagonize him.

I now want to see if I can hunt down Polly Pocket figures and line them up on his nightstand so just as he’s about to turn off the lamp.. SURPRISE! New friends!

Oh yeah… in a hypocritical move, Graham deported the marionette last night and demanded that a wall be built around it.

Stacy