Growing up in the ’50s, there was plenty of “schlock,” locally produced television programs. The special effects usually included strobe lights, the off and on button controlling the lights, recorded clasps of thunder, and an occasional high pitched shrill, from some UNSEEN female voice. Add plenty of deep-throated moans, a few growls, and tons of Halloween styled costumes with eerie intro music and suddenly it was time to be SCARED. Even with ALL of the attempts to encourage the strange and supernatural, the added element, was the imagination, of the viewer, motivated by the host of some horror show, asking simple questions such as: “Did you just hear some noise from your basement?” “Have you locked your doors?” “Are you certain, that was not just a shadow, look again, if you dare to,” I remember to this moment, even as I write my Blog, just how terrified, my little sister and I would become, hiding under an afghan, with pillows hand just in case we needed to quickly close our eyes. I recall, half an hour, before watching that scary television show, going through the rituals of tightly shutting the curtains, walking to the back kitchen door, locking and unlocking it than locking it again, making sure the door to the basement was firmly shut…it was Saturday night in the 50’s and we were not getting ready for SNL, but better yet; ‘Chiller Theater’, on channel 11, with its host Chilly Billy Cardilli! My little sister was prepared, even with warnings from our parents we might have nightmares, and with instructions, that no matter how afraid we might be, we had to make sure the lights and television were turned off before we walked a dozen steps to the second floor. And after watching ‘Chiller Theater’, those dozen steps, and the mere eight feet from the light switch to those dozen steps seemed endless, and my younger sister and I KNEW SOMETHING was waiting to GET US, maybe not this night, but SOON!
There are fears we all encounter, some with lasting effects causing a disruption in our formative years, or those which still haunt us from childhood to adulthood. Then, of course, there is that momentary imagined fear, of IS the monster watching us, only to fall asleep and having forgotten, that is the monster had been near IT to must have fallen asleep and forgot to do IT’s job.
I long for the days of ‘Chiller Theater’ and the “schlock-shock.” Those were times when I knew I could seek safety and comfort. My gut hurts, it hurts, it turns, it shakes and it constantly connects with my brain, making me wonder, will this fear, I feel, as an adult, the fear that our nation HAS indeed reached a no turning back point in its brief history, and that in fact history is repeating itself, and we ALL of us have a real MONSTER, named Trump, who will only be satisfied when two things happen…he sucks out our souls and turns us into flesh-eating creatures at the ready to devour our own. If this IS a nightmare, I want to wake up! If this IS that shadow moving closer and closer, I am as afraid as I was when I was a kid in the ’50s!
