I Read Banned Books

Today’s guest blogger is my real world friend, digitalrob, from All of Us. He is both a gentleman and a scholar.  Thank you for helping me keep my vow to the Cult of Insanity.

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I’ve been reading the new Will Wheaton book, “The Happiest Days of our Lives,” which is essentially a collection of memories. Since he’s about my age, I connect closely to most of his experiences.

My mother has been bugging me for years to start storytelling my life, so here’s a story, maybe the first story.
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High school kids are invulnerable. I teach, so I know; but I also remember being invulnerable when I was younger. (It lasted a lot longer than one might think. I remember being pretty superior and invulnerable into my mid twenties.)

Despite my invulnerability and possibly the result of my crazy parents who didn’t think such things were mandatory childhood experiences, I never saw a horror-slasher movie until the summer after my sophomore year in high school. I was 15. It was A Nightmare on Elm Street III: Dream Warriors.

As slasher flicks go, this is still my favorite. Just sitting here typing I can vividly remember my favorite parts: as soon as a red-shirt (the common term for any actor who’s only purpose is to die gruesomely) falls asleep (obvious, I know) his veins and sinews rip from shoulders to hands from both arms, then from groin to feet from both legs. Freddy turns the boy into a marionette, making the Puppet Master look like an amateur. I don’t even remember how this guy died, just the terror I felt trying to see as much as possible through my fingers. Eww!

My teeth got itchy and I actually shuddered while writing this.

One might think watching deep, well-rounded characters gruesomely mangled for 90 minutes would be enough terror for one night, but guess what dear reader: I still had to ride my bike home.

Robert and I had rented the Beta Max version, so we could watch it at his house. We’d had to wait until his younger, groin-punching siblings went to bed before we could put it on, so I headed home, riding through the Las Vegas suburbs, about one o’clock in the morning.

The streets were well lit and I didn’t even think about being scared as I hopped on my ultra-cool black 10-speed and headed home. About two blocks down the street, it suddenly came to me: “Hey, I’m alone, in the dark, and really tired. Shit.”

Despite repeating the phrase, “It’s just a movie… It’s just a movie,” at the front of my brain with every pump of the pedals, the night noises of suburbia started to haunt me. “I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell.” Well, maybe not, but it sure felt that way.

I had a headlight on my bike. The kind that has a little generator that runs on friction from the back tire. The faster the tire turns, the brighter the light. I think that headlight started to melt my front tire by the time I got home.

I dropped my bike off in the back yard and bolted into the house. I don’t remember if my mother was waiting up for me. She usually did, so I’m sure I tried desperately to look calm as I came through the sliding glass door: “Everything’s fine mom. Had a great time. Oh, you’re going to bed now. Are you sure you don’t want to stay up and, um… um… watch a movie?”

Nope, I had to face the music and go to bed. Crap.

I remember not sleeping a whole lot that night, waking up every time I dreamt that I’d fallen asleep. Crazy.

Since then, I’ve seen all of the Nightmare films. I love them, even the later ones, which for some reason have a lesser reputation than the others. I remember going to a Nightmare-a-thon the next summer for the release of the 4th movie. (That’s a story for another time.)

I still love horror flicks, not so much gore, but definitely a movie that makes me watch the shadows or define those subtle and harmless background noises in the house.

(That’s just the dog’s collar banging on the water dish, nothing to worry about… really.)