Freddy vs Jason vs Mr Chuckles

I've had a long term fear of Freddy Krueger.

Similar to my long term fear of Jason, IT and E.T. (yes, E.T.). Fears that are to my core and originated in my childhood because my older sister was mean and thought that just because I had to tag along didn't mean that she couldn't watch whatever movies she wanted.

My phobia of the paranormal and it's traumatizing effects remain intact.

Halloween is coming up and since the Saw movies have had their finale, Matt and I are probably going to be looking for a new scary movie to dive into to celebrate this most sacred of scary holidays. Thinking of new scary movies actually reminded me of one of the scariest Halloweens ever.

I was about seven or eight years old and only months earlier my Grandmother had a stroke following heart surgery. Everyone was already on edge, and despite not understanding what had really happened, the tension was palpable even to a child.

A few days before Halloween, my Grandmother and aunt had already gone to bed for the night and my sister was given the charge of keeping an eye on me since I had begged to stay up and watch movies with her. Undeterred by the fact that I was at least ten years shy of the approval rating of the movie, she slipped a Nightmare on Elm Street VHS into the VCR and watched as I cringed, cried and crumpled into my blankie, too afraid to stay awake and finish the movie, and much too afraid to fall asleep lest Freddy slash me to bits and pieces.

Close to the end of the film, we heard an earth shattering scream come from the back of the house.

Grandma!

The scream was so loud it brought both of us to our feet and my aunt Debbie rushing up the stairs. We funneled into the doorway of Grandma's bedroom, each of us fearing the worst. That's when we saw her, curled up on her bed in her satin, purple mu-mu, with her legs pulled up to her chest, screaming and crying at the same time.

"What's wrong?!" Debbie shouted as she moved to take charge.

Grandma pointed toward her bathroom, the shimmer of a nightlight creeping out of the cracked door.

I hid behind my sister, fearing that we'd all fallen asleep and Freddy had made his way into our dreams and he was going to kill us all, right there in my Grandmother's bedroom, and possibly clean his knife like hands on blankie, which was tightly clutched in my hand.

We did not see Freddy. No.

The culprit of terror was Mr. Chuckles.

My recently escaped hamster.





We all burst into laughter, except Grandma of course who proceeded to take her frustration out on the three of us, waving her hands in the air and yelling, mostly at me for not keeping the cage properly locked. It was a good laugh, and worth the punishment I received.

It was almost as funny as the time when my rabbit, Bunnicula escaped and burrowed his way into Grandma's mattress a year later. 





Update: Obviously that's not a picture of my actual hamster. I don't even think cameras were that good back then. When I found the picture I was like, "OMG how cute! It'll totally make my point that my Grandma was just being weird about being scared of the hamster." But seriously, that hamster looks like he's plotting something. Or possible having a seizure. Either way, suuuuper creepy.

Update x2: My hamster's name wasn't actually Mr. Chuckles. It was like Amy or something really generic and stupid for a rodent. I wasn't very creative as a child.

Update x3: Except I did have imaginary Care Bear friends and once used a sock to make a sand stuffed Thanksgiving turkey. Screw it, I was totally creative and not at all sad and lonely.

Update x4: Hamsters are actually really big assholes. One of mine ended up murdering the other. How's that for a Halloween story?