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| Krusty the Clown from "The Simpsons" |
I was 13 and had just been given the key to Pandora’s Box
when my dad took me with him to the college library while he was doing some
research for a paper. I sat cross-legged in the floor on the second story of
the NEO library and read excerpts and passages of a seemingly endless supply of
horror novels, creeping myself out, page by page. I had never had access to
such a collection of “grownup” books and I was ecstatic. The book I settled on
that night – my very first scary read – was “The Bachman Books”. It was a
collection of Stephen King’s first stories when he was writing under the pen
name Richard Bachman. And just like that, with those four short novels, I was
hooked. Between my scary book obsession and my best friend and I watching
low-budget horror films (rented from Showtime Video – anyone remember that
place?) virtually every weekend of our adolescence, I developed a bit of a
fascination with the horror genre. I love to be scared.
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| Pennywise. Eek! |
I have read virtually every Stephen King book ever published
– most of them more than once. I got Mr. King’s book “It” in all of its 1,138-page
hardcover glory when I was 14 and began reading it as the family took off for a
Branson vacation. I can’t tell you much about our trip to the Country Music
Capital of the World that go ’round, but I can probably tell you anything you
would want to know about Derry, Maine, where the story took place. I read it so
feverishly and incessantly that I ended up carsick on those Ozark Mountain
backroad hills. I was also reading it late one night (when I was supposed to be
sleeping) by the light of a flashlight while covered up in a blanket. My mom
came in to put up some laundry not having a clue that her opening my bedroom
door would shave about 47 years off my life. As she stepped into my room, all
she saw was a flashlight, a giant book, a blanket, and her daughter shoot
straight up into the air followed by a round of nightmarish screams. When I
realized she wasn’t Pennywise the clown coming to drag me into the sewers to
kill me and she recovered from the heart attack I had just given her, we both
busted out laughing.
I have a short list of phobias: water, spiders, heights,
sewer grates, and clowns. The last two items on that list are directly because
of the aforementioned book. It is the most haunting of Mr. King’s novels in my
opinion and has stuck with me well into adulthood. Now, this might seem a bit
oxymoronic – the girl who loves to be scared is phobic and terrified of
something, but call it what you will. All I know is: clowns really freak me out. Really. Spiders
freak me out, too, but after having been bitten by a black widow, I think
anyone would be slightly scared of them. But clowns…..man. *shiver* Ronald
McDonald is one scary dude in my opinion.
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| *shiver* |
There are different schools of thought regarding phobias.
Some say immersion therapy is the most effective way to overcome a phobia or
fear. Immersion therapy simply baby-steps a person into different levels of
contact/experience with a particular phobia until they have overcome their
fear. I’m not 100% convinced. Although I guess I shouldn’t scoff at something
that is regarded amongst the psychiatric community as successful.
I guess if there’s a doctor out there willing to set up a
scenario regarding a clown who jumps off of a skyscraper into a body of deep
water where he water skis on a sewer grate to a pit of spiders, I’d be open to
watching that and see where things go from there.
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| Twisty the Clown from "American Horror Story: Freakshow" Dude is seriously messed up. |
On second thought….nah. I’m okay avoiding clowns for the
rest of my life. I’m not a big fan of McDonald’s food anyway.
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