NEW FOUND FEARS

I had a dream last night that Dear Husband was taking me to the airport because I was finally going to visit home (yay!) and on the way there we realized my passport had expired - a recurring dream that I always wake up from feeling frustrated and sad :'( - and my suitcases for some reason went flying off the car onto I-95. Dear Husband then proceeded to jump out to go get them and then had to fight with an alligator that came out from one of the canals on the side of the road and was intent on eating my clothes and shoes (nightmare!). I woke gasping because in my dream Dear Husband proceeded to jump into the canal to wrestle alligators! As if the loss of my shoes wasn’t enough now I had to witness my hubby getting munched on by a 10 foot pre-historical ultimate predator.

As I flat ironed my hair in the bathroom this morning I was struck by how much of a pussy I’ve become! I used to be fearless! I used to be the girl who rollerbladed down a mile-long 90-degree steep hill without a helmet or pads and made it safely down in a pure rush of adrenaline. I used to go down the stairs on rollerblades (I almost killed myself once doing that with my twin cousins) I used to climb walls, break into people’s houses (my cousins were a bad influence! Ok?) I remember one of them“borrowing” her boyfriend’s motorcycle and we going on it for a spin that ended taking us to the highway even though neither of us had any idea of how to drive it. I remember us graffiti-ing another boyfriend’s wall (I know is bad for the environment but I was a dumbass then) and running away from the HOA when they caught us.

Sigh. Those were the days.

Now I am afraid of everything! I don’t know if age just caught up with me or what, and I can say I usually don't worry about much, I don’t worry about the state of the economy, or my health, or my legal situation (which is always changing) or my marriage or my weight, I don’t worry about my family or my pets (they are all healthy and generally happy). I worry though, about staying alive. I have an unreasonable fear of dying before I get everything I ever wanted and I am also afraid of a painful death. Can't I just go in my sleep? Pretty pleaaaaaase?!

All of the sudden in the past 8 years I've become afraid of flying. I used to LOVE flying and to look out the window to the land bellow. Now just the thought of looking down the window makes me queasy. Although my fear of flying is not a crippling fear (I still fly if is a long distance and I have no other choice and I do it without getting hysterical) I hate doing it. My fear is not even limited to myself! Even the thought of Dear Husband flying, or my sister (or any other love one) flying makes me nervous! I live in a state of mild panic until I get a call telling me they landed. And when I'm the one flying I spend the time in the air praying for the minutes to fly by and don't breath easily until we are about to land in which case I feel confident enough that if we crash, we are close enough to land to make it (I'm a glass half full kinda gal)

I am suddenly terrified of alligators. I love animals! I do, I could spend hours watching Animal Planet and I am an avid supporter of the ASPCA but ever since I got to Florida I am scared shitless of alligators. It’s ironic because people who don’t know where Venezuela is (there are a lot, believe you me) sometimes ask me if I kept cattle, or if I lived in a jungle and the first wild animals I’ve seen were here in Florida, because this place is a fucking jungle! I lived in a city for Christ’s Sake! The extent of my contact with the Wild Kingdom was limited to the birds flying overhead, the pigeon’s that shit on us and the occasional stray cat or dog.

I remember when I was driving with my aunt and uncle from one end of Florida to the other and I reaaaaally had to pee (my bladder is tiny) and I asked my uncle (who was lost and will deny until the end of time) if we could stop. It was dark out and we couldn’t see shit and he told me “I don’t think is safe because of the alligators” I was frozen to the chair filled with equal amounts of fear for my life if I stepped outside and fear that I would pee in the van.

I miss walking in the rain back home and being surprised by a warm sweet shower or a downpour on my way home from school. It was so nice and refreshing to play in the rain and jump into puddles and make my white school socks brown with dirt and act like I was a little girl. Now when is raining I squeal like a chick (uhg) and try to get inside before I get struck by lightning and I can't help but think further into it and be scared that if for some reason I survive the electric jolt (an amazing amount of people have) I will forget who I am or how to write or start replacing the word “Yes” with “Duck” or some shit like that.

Fact: Florida is almost the Lightning Capital of the World (to those of you rolling your eyes)

I am afraid of Hurricanes and the possibility that if one strikes hard enough I would have to leave my Max (cat) and my Zoey (dog) behind and that they will be forever lost. I am afraid the house would fall on our heads I would die and they will find my naked body floating somewhere, half eaten by the alligators (double whammy!)

I am afraid of going to a public place and get shot in the head by some bitter whiny emo teenager with anxiety problems because the world won’t like him (insert waa-waa here) and that I will die just because the little bitch was picked on by the high school jock. See, back home if people have a problem with you, they’ll shoot you in the head, have your ass kicked, steal your girlfriend/boyfriend, jump you in the parking lot of the shopping mall and steal your shoes or something like that. People back home take out their aggression on the person that pissed them off. There is no fear of going to Wendy’s and getting shot at when you are hanging out with your wife and kids for no other reason than being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I'm scared of random, senseless violence because I can understand crimes of passion (holler at my girls from Snapped!) back home there are plenty of crimes of passion, and crimes over money and food and gang problems and crimes for the sake of feeding the families that depend on the perpetrators. So for the first time I am being presented with the possibility of being the victim of a violent act to a person I have never met before, I have done nothing to but who feels the need, nevertheless to erase me from the planet. We have regular murderers, rapist and thiefs, we don’t have any of those psychos who kill children and then eat soup out of bowl made of their heads.

My Dear Husband mocks me but I am so afraid of the crazies that I walk the dog with my pepper spray in hand and I live in a place so safe that one armed robbery becomes news for the next 3 months. I don’t know if all these fears developed after being shoved in a plane to come to a place against my will and that experience ruined flying forever. I don’t know what happened to the fearless me. I miss that me a little.

Now I have to go, Dear Husband is walking the dog along the canal and I’m having the cold sweats.