confessions

Quick, someone turn on Usher.

Here's the truth: I am afraid of being outside in the country in the dark. I know, I know. I’m 27 years old. I shouldn’t be afraid of such trivial things. But I am. And now that the time has fallen back an hour, I’m daily confronted with my fear of the dark when going out riding. The horses are in a big pasture, requiring me to walk around, getting close enough to each horse to see if it’s my horse – in the pitch black darkness. Sometimes Baron helps out and meets me halfway… but most of the time he doesn’t.

So, what am I afraid of in the dark? (This is where it gets a little weird. Don’t think less of me, please.)

I’m afraid of skunks, foxes, coyotes, bears and slipping and getting trampled by all the horses. Obviously some of these fears are irrational. Most of them are irrational. (I’m hoping that my public confession will help me overcome them.)

Many of these can be related to my childhood in Deer Lodge. Skunks and foxes were always getting into the chicken coop and destroying all of the chickens (a regular bloodbath). If they did that to a chicken, what would they do to me? There was a rabid coyote that got too close for comfort one day in Deer Lodge, too. The bear fear comes from watching Night of the Grizzly at a young age – an age when I couldn’t tell the difference between poorly constructed mechanical grizzlies and the real thing. And the whole slipping and getting trampled must have something to do with an icy slope and resulting broken collarbone in kindergarten.

The silver lining? Once I’ve actually retrieved Baron and made it safely back to the light of the barn, the adrenaline high lasts for a good 10 minutes.

I know; it’s a dangerous life I lead.