Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

My very first distinct childhood memory (all the previous ones being fuzzy, literally) was my mom pointing off in the distance somewhere and asking, "Do you see that mountain?". I answered, "What mountain?". Then we went to the eye doctor the next day. I was four. I thought everyone saw the world as I did, fuzzy shapes, warm but indistinct lights, and I could read, but I had to bring the book very close to me. Then a little later I got my first pair of glasses. I put them on and the world was very clear suddenly. It scared me. I took them right off and it was 3 days before my poor mother could get me to wear them. I was happy in my blurry world.

Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

In Mark Haddon's award-winning novel "The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time", the narrator, Christopher Boone, an autist with Asperger's Syndrome, finds himself in a busy train station. He experiences sensory overload and is unable to cope so he takes a sheet of paper, pokes a hole in it, then holds it up in front of his face and peers through it, taking in one thing at a time. By this method he is able to make sense of his surroundings.

Your observation about glasses reminds me of that. It also reminded me that when I was about nine, I suffered a head injury which left me concussed for the best part of two days. Then for six months afterwards I suffered excrutiating migraines which often came on at night-time, and often heralded by the bad dream that I was being slowly crushed to death. My parents and GP decided that it was eye trouble and that I needed glasses, and I was made to wear them for about a year, even though in hindsight it was clearly linked to the head injury. I remember hating the glasses because they made the headaches worse, and they also distorted my vision.

Vision is a strange thing. You take what you have for granted and learn to adapt to it very quickly. A few days ago I took some kids to see the 3D version of 'Up' and because the graphics were so effective, my brain began to feel like it was suffering from sensory overload, and I felt a little sick and dizzy. And I wasn't alone, one of the children with me felt the same, and spent the first quarter of the film not wearing the 3D glasses.

Having said that, the new 3D version of 'Scrooge' looked simply stunning. The depth of vision was astonishing. It made me wish I could see 3D versions of my favourite films. Imagine being able to watch '2001: A Space Odyssey' in true 3D............!

JK

Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

A park I used to play in when I was a child had a large red brick building at the bottom of a steep hill with no apparent windows or doors. In reality I think it kept the lawn mowers and other devices used for the upkeep of the park property, with a large door on the side that wasn't obvious from the front. But when I was very young it looked so strange, like a red brick house with no windows or doors. I used to think someone lived there and never left, or they were trapped there, bricked in as some sort of punishment. I remember asking my father what was inside when I was very young. He told me they kept a giant octopus inside and not to go near the building or the octopus would get me. He liked to joke with my brothers and I about outlandish ideas like this that we more often than not would believe.

Well the vision of that gigantic octopus, I imagined its skin being a deep black with mottled rust colored spots, sneaking out of the red brick house with no windows or doors has remained one of the most powerful and haunting memories in my mind. I would picture it sneaking out at night when the park was empty to feed on squirrels, rabbits and fish in the stream. I remember looking for the tracks of the octopus leading back to the building but would never find them.

Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

That is wonderful, Aeron!


My father had a similar sense of humor.


"It's good to be king."

Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

Perhaps your father had a calamari fetish!

[Ta-dum-busssshhhhh......]

[Tumbleweed rolls across the road.]

[A lone cough in the back of the auditorium.]

Erm, I'll just get my coat........

Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

The giant octopus in the red brick building was my first boogyman I suppose but I was subjected to a wide array of horrors in childhood, thanks to my father, heh. There was the flying creature whose wings resembled curtains which would hide in the window. If I weren't truly asleep, the creature would be able to sense that I was still awake by the sound of my heartbeats. For one reason or another it would leave me alone so long as my heart beats were set to the rhythm of being asleep, a fun and horrifying way to make me go to bed! Heheheh.

Then there was the Knuckle Man. We would drive through a small stretch of thick forest on the outskirts of town where my father said the Knuckle Man lived. You could hear his approach by the sound of him cracking his knuckles. I don't know why but I imagined his entire body being made up of hundreds of knuckles that would snap crack and pop as he moved his body. His face, in my mind, was made up of hundreds of bumps, his facial expressions contorting in weird ways as the knuckles cracked across the face. If you were caught by the Knuckle Man, he would strangle you to death while popping his knuckles. There were also the monkeys that lived in buckets hanging from the ceiling of the skating rink my family owned. I was warned they would come out at night and eat children if caught on the skating rink floor. That was a fun one, no wonder I make the strange art that I do today, heheheh. I have a lot of these strange tales my father told me when I was young that I plan to illustrate into a book in the future.

Re: Your First Scary Childhood Memory?
 

Most excellent!


It sounds like your father could spin a yarn.