Childhood Memories

One of my most vivid childhood memories I have is how I used to be afraid of my alarm system when I was younger. This was while I was still living in Sands Point in my house on West Creek Farms Road. At the time, I was about five or six years old. I am not really sure how I originally became afraid of the alarm system, but my fear eventually manifested itself into a reoccurring dream that I would have quite often. I would often wake up early before my parents were up and go to the kitchen in search of something to eat. On one occasion, I opened the drawer that was in the little desk area of the kitchen with the sewing machine underneath it. I am nor sure why I opened the drawer exactly but I must have been looking for something. By accident, I closed the drawer a little too hard and the alarm system must have thought that someone was breaking into my house. A second later, the alarm went off and I was stuck in the kitchen all by myself. I do not know why, but the alarm frightened me terribly and I ran into my parents room crying.

On the way to my parents’ room I had to run past the alarm itself. The alarm was a small whitish box that was located in the upper right hand corner of the hallway that led to my parents’ room and was right outside of my room. Whenever I looked at the alarm it sent a strange chill through my body and I remember thinking how evil and dark that alarm was. It seemed like that alarm was always covered in a shadow no matter how nice and bright the rest of the house was. After jumping into my parents’ bed, they easily realized what had happened and why the alarm went off since it happened so often. They quickly turned off the alarm and helped to calm me down. I never told them that I was afraid of the alarm because I knew that they would never understand.

            In the following months, the same thing occurred many times. I would wake up early in the morning, go for a walk around my house, and I would eventually do something, by accident that would trigger the alarm. Every time I ended up running into my parents room crying.

One night shortly after this occurred, I remember having the nightmare for the first time. It was and still is probably one of the weirdest dreams that I have ever had. In the dream, I would see myself from a third person view. The dream would start off with me sleeping soundly in my bed while it was raining and thundering outside. All of a sudden, I would hear a loud crash and a second later I would hear the alarm go off. However, the alarm during the dream was quite different from the real sound that the alarm made. In the dream the sound of the alarm was much more frightening and evil sounding. I would then jump up from my bed and run out of my room. I could see that I had a terrified look on my face as I ran through the hallways of my house. I would always try to reach my parents room but for some reason I could never make it in. The alarm would start to talk to me in the most evil and terrifying voice you could ever imagine. The voice would tell me to run over to the stairs that were located across from the alarm. All the lights in my house were off and the whole area just seemed much more creepy and evil than usual. The alarm would demand me to, “lay down on the third step from the bottom of the stairs and stay there.” I have no idea where this came but every time I had the dream, I was forced to lie down on the third step from the bottom of the stairs.

 The staircase was a weird place in my house because no one ever really went up there. The upstairs of the house had two big rooms in it that were going to be my brother’s room and mine when we were old enough. Since we were still very young then, our rooms were downstairs near our parents’ room so they could get to us quickly if anything happened or if we needed them. Anyway, in the dream even the staircase seemed very cold and evil. I would run over to the staircase and lie down as quickly as I could, facing the inside of the stair so that I could not see outwards towards the alarm. I would curl myself up as tight as possible and just remain there motionless. The alarm would continue to talk to me but I do not remember what it said anymore. After what seemed to be forever, I would finally wake up. When I awoke, I would usually be crying and I would be very hot and sweaty. The dream terrified me as a little kid and afterwards, I would run into my parents’ room and usually sleep with them for the rest of the night. This dream must have occurred at least five times while I was younger and it was so strange and frightening that I still remember it very clearly today, over ten years later.

            I am still not exactly sure where my fear of the alarm originated and why I had these constant reoccurring dreams. This was probably the one thing that really bothered me during my childhood. It was like my childhood phobia, a fear of the alarm system. Now that I look back on it seems totally irrational and just plain strange. I guess children are just like that though, they can get scared very easily and since they are so young they really have no experience in dealing with things like that. Since I was so young the fear became overpowering and I had no real way to deal with it besides running to see my parents. Obviously if something like this occurred now I would be able to tell myself that it was a dream and I would get over it in a second. When I was a child though, I was very afraid of many things, not just the alarm system. I remember watching a movie once in which a man had a heart attack and after seeing that I swore to my dad that I would need eat a hamburger again since I thought they caused heart attacks. However, I was eventually able to overcome these fears as I gained more life experience and realized that it was silly to be afraid of such things.