I remember as a child I was always terrified about one phrase mom used to say. The phrase was short We’ll talk when we get home but it almost never involved talking, and sometimes I didn’t even had to wait to get home. I was also scared of horror flicks – there was this show Twin Peaks that absolutely petrified me. And dare I even mention needles and doctors or dentist? Obviously – as we grow up we tend to be appalled of more refined things and situation. A good-old fashioned butt-kick does not look so bad compared to the freight I get when I look at the ghostly bills, blood-sucking debts and monstrous Monday mornings. But still – what does scare us nowadays? Here’s what really scares me:
To start with I am really scared of whatever starts with the letter M. Money, mnegative people, mhands washing, motivational speeches, mzero money, my mwife’s memory, mwaiting in lines, mgeopolitical issues, mtraffic, mideology (especially if it smells like msocialism or mneo-nazism), masks, mgoogle&mgates, mystical mistrust of mice, men* in generally (yeah – they really creep me out sometimes), mpseudo medicine and mpseudo science, mvegan food, media and mfake news, mairplane& mstockechange crushes, mreality shows, mbanks & minsurance companies, mosquitoes, maths, minternet, m5G, mretail discounts, mcar mechanics and last on the list (but by far not last as meaning) – the mighty mcovid!
Also I have a visceral fear of trust. It is a scary thing this trust – it makes you feel safe, secure; but in reality it’s a vicious monster, ready to rip you apart and devour you. You left your trust unattended, think you can put your faith in it; you believe it will not deceive you – but slam! it pops out from beneath a smile or under an apparently helping hand and it can utterly put you on your knees, leave you with no confidence in good deeds – and terribly fearing of putting your trust in someone else again. Trust can wear many disguises – and you can lose it one by one – be it in institution, organisation, neighbours or even in your local butcher. But obviously – nothing is scarier than I might be a disappointment, and make people (family/friends/colleagues) lose their trust in me… That is what makes me feel uneasy…
Besides, I fear the humans when they say you should believe in yourself. I am inclined to be afraid of this statement – not only because by myself it is quite difficult to achieve something; but I fear it because it is the ultimate remark of solitude. In an environment where we are slowly beginning to praise the immense benefits of distancing from one another, believing in yourself is synonym with a lone gunman cry, a call for avoiding social interaction – and immerse in our own praise and glorification. It’s seldom that we hear believe in friendship and loyalty – act for the better good of many individuals – surround yourself with kind, generous people! Oh – but what we hear is you are your best version of yourself, you can achieve everything, you can do it, you can lead and you make a change… With all these people that are such perfect specimen of mankind – we should live in a world full of powerful leaders in a top-notch self-achieving top-performing hi-quality bordered community, where every member is strictly isolated but overly self-sufficient.
Numbers also bring panic. I used to be a good friends of numbers, and even paired attention to the small ones – although I liked the thousands and tens of thousands. My life tends to be inexorably linked to numbers and their worth – the car is 20k, the apartment is 100k, distance to work is 3 km (aaa negligible), gas is 1.002 €/l (what? that much?), working hours are 8 h/day and 5 days/wk (still?), distance to the Sun is 1504645068840 million mile, I need to eat 7000 calories/day to keep fit… But slowly numbers start to give me a serious fright. Adding up minutes after minutes and days after days – you end up adding years – and all of a sudden I find myself old! And I heard age should just be a number – but I tend to be afraid of this number!
This may come as a surprise, but I fear fruit. Any kind of fruit – not just a specific one. I deeply believe their plan is to conquer the world – and they actually succeed. Think about it – human race is their slave! Fruit are devious – they make us labour for them in the heat of the day, they make us care for them in lovely little orchards, they make us fight their battles against fungi and pests, they make us clean their leaves in autumn and trim their hair in spring, they make us feed them when they are hungry and quench their thirst when they need water, they make us carefully pick them (we don’t want to drop them by any cost!) and arrange them cautiously on their thrones, they make us pay for them enormous prices – while they sit and look at us from the height of the supermarket shelves. They are so deeply rooted into our minds – that even on winters we miss them so much that we have to have them close in jams or cans… We tend to worship fruit – not realizing that they have become our master – surrounding us from every corner of life – fruit cake, fruit ice-cream, fruit flavoured dish-washing detergent, fruit patterned clothes, fruity shaped toys – because they raise their slaves from kindergarten, don’t they?! Can’t you see what they are doing to us? And they make us think we owe them – but oh, how wrong we are! Fear, FEAR the fruit I tell you
Do you fear all these? (If not you should – especially the fruit!) It is only reasonable that we live our lives governed by fear – it is the one trait that keeps humanity going! What would have happened if we did not fear our fellow humans? Would we have ever developed nuclear weapons and sophisticated means of torture – were we not driven by fear? Fear it is the one thing that moves our civilization – featuring such a wide and overwhelming display of shapes and emotions… Let us benefit from and embrace the fear around us – let us fear going out of our homes and visiting our friends and relatives – let us fear social interaction. Why living in a boring and safe environment, when we can panic instead? Show no courage, allow no bravery and you will experience no failure. That is the true ladder to experiencing and spreading your inner fear. And don’t worry, there is no mask for that, you can seed fear from the safety of social distancing.