"I have a number of irrational fears," as the great Rivers Cuomo once said, "that I'd like to share with you." No rules about goats though, and no comparisons to goats, but I'll let you in on a secret: I love goats.
Because we humans tend to be the tip-top of the food chain, we sometimes forget how fragile and impermanent our lives are. Or at least I do.
OK, except for when I am stressing about how everyone and everything I know and love will die eventually, and how that could be tomorrow AND OMG whatifitistomorrow, and then I'm squeezing my cat hoping she'll make me feel better and it's all just this ugly mess.
So, yea, I personally only forget about death for small bursts between long periods of being fixated on mortality.
But my best guess is that other, more normal folks, don't necessarily spend a lot of time thinking about all the things that could kill, maim or otherwise harm them.
Allow me to enumerate (some of) my fears, circa the California Era (1985-2011)
1. Anesthesia: I know that once I go under, I'm not coming back.
2. Mountain Lions: I've never seen one, but I know that hey have bloodlust, and it's for my blood in particular.
3. Being on a Bridge During an Earthquake: Self explanatory. I know the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge is just waiting to collapse it's ass on my car, trapping me. OR WORSE … somehow knock me into the water, where I WILL DROWN SLOWLY inside my car.
4. Ticks: They all carry Lyme's Disease, and they all want to share it with me. Also, I NEED ALL MY BLOOD, which brings me to…
5. Having Blood Drawn: I NEED ALL OF MY BLOOD. Plus, I start to imagine the needle being *inside* my vein, and then I think HOLY HELL NOTHING BUT BLOOD AND BODY STUFF SHOULD BE IN THERE.
Now, those fears have not gone away in the year (!!) since I moved to Baltimore, MD.
Living out here has, however, changed me.
I am now terrified of a variety of NEW and DIFFERENT things that I never before realized I was terrified of!
1. Trees: Particularly large trees. Particularly large trees located near buildings and cars. In California, our natural disasters come in two basic forms: earthquakes and wildfires. The former are relatively infrequent, and are very rarely large enough to do much more than jostle the wall-mounted dildos you decorate your home with. The latter is likely to warn you that it's coming by sending out smoke signals (HA) and also BURNING HEAT and FLAMES of FIRE, so you have ample time to escape unscathed.
Out here though? WEATHER HAPPENS. 50 plus mph winds happen. Lightning strikes (a lot). Torrential rains pour (so much rain). And all the while? IT IS 114 degrees outside. It's the temperature of Satan's ASSHOLE and it's RAINING and BLOWING and the old man is SNORING and A TREE JUST FELL DOWN AND CRUSHED YOU BENEATH IT'S MAJESTIC GNARLED BRANCHES. Terrorist trees.
2. Power Outages: Apparently A/C is necessary to survival. After NEVER HAVING IT for 26 years, I just kinda didn't expect it to be such a BIG DEAL. But it turns out that, when it's the TEMPERATURE OF SATAN'S ASSHOLE, and a TERRORIST TREE falls and knocks down power lines, and your POWER GOES OUT… you die. Because human's aren't meant to sit around boiling in that kind of heat, period. Let alone for DAYS ON END. So, at the end of that weird Drogo or Dingo or whatever that storm was, I definitely tongue kissed the little box where you adjust the room temperature. Later on, we had a civil ceremony performed by a lesbian officiant from the Unitarian Universalist Church, because I'm from CALIFORNIA and that's HOW WE ROLL.
3. Poisonous Water Snakes: HOLY FUCK PEOPLE. THERE ARE SNAKES IN THE WATER. You know that movie, Snakes on a Plane? Well, it's like that, BUT WORSE. Fresh water snakes. Ocean snakes. Have you heard of this Water Moccasin motherfucker? It's a swimming, poisonous viper, and it's the CHUCK NORRIS of reptiles. It has one purpose: kicking your ass. OK -- so apparently this particular snake doesn't exist in MD -- but it DOES in VA and that shit is RIGHT NEXT DOOR. I'm going swimming in a steel wetsuit.
The moral of all this?
Just don't go outside.
Or be in your house.
Or car.
Or on a bridge.
Or in the wilderness.
Or near or in water.
Basically, you should probably just give up.
EDITED to add:
4. Oil Fires: Today I did something that few people will ever be able to say that they have done. I almost lit my shit on fire while trying to cook popcorn. Luckily, I escaped with just a few singed arm hairs and none of my dignity. The whole reason I was cooking popcorn on the stove top was to a. save money and b. avoid processed poison popcorn. Because I am a vain person and would rather die of cancer from microwave popcorn than lose my face in an oil fire, I will no longer be cooking popcorn on my stove top. Or anything on my stove top. I think pop tarts have all essential vitamins and minerals...right? Shit...I'll just take 2 multi vitamins and live on ice cream.
