Scary Stories

When I was in elementary school, we had these fantastic little booklets printed on the worst quality newsprint that would come every month or so. It was an order form that had all kinds of books that we could buy on them. All kinds of books!

I loved to read. When I was in kindergarten, I was one of the first kids in the class who could read. This meant avoiding every other kid in library class. They'd beg for me to read to them, and I couldn't have been less interested.

My friend Brian (also a reader) and I would hide under one of the tables with our books, and the teacher didn't seem to mind. I think he understood.

I was happy to get into somewhat thicker books, too. By second grade, our teacher had introduced us to The Boxcar Children books. He would read a chapter to the class here and there and we slowly worked our way through the series. Most of us started buying those books or checking them out of the library. I would still read one of those books for fun if I had one, but The Boxcar Children aren't a part of this one.

For some reason, in addition to reading, I thought that being scared was fun when I was at that age. I don't know why. Surely I'm not cool with it now short of a zombie movie. I downloaded a demo of "Amnesia: The Dark Descent," (a very scary game), walked maybe 16 steps, and decided "nope."

In any case, I was delighted to see a book series that I had only heard about appear on our order forms one month - "Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark," by one Alvin Schwartz. This sounded awesome. There were so many times that our little neighborhood posse would sit around on someone's porch and tell poorly conceived ghost stories. This would make me a scary story CHAMPION! No one would match me!

Mom approved, the form was sent, and the waiting began. Finally, a few weeks later, the books were in. "Scary Stories" was a fairly smallish with a black border and a pretty horrifying picture on the front. Awesome.

That night, armed with a flashlight, I began to go through this book.

Thinking that reading the book was a good call was my first mistake. See, it wasn't just a scary cover on this book. No, every illustration was horrific, grusome, and scary as anything my little mind had ever imagined. Here, I'll show you what I mean:

WARNING: THOSE WITH WEAK CONSTITUTIONS SHOULD NOT BY ANY MEANS LOOK AT THIS PICTURE, THINK ABOUT LOOKING AT THIS PICTURE, OR SPECULATE ABOUT THINKING ABOUT LOOKING AT THIS PICTURE.

OH GOD OH GOD KILL IT! KILL IT WITH FIRE!

What on earth was that about?! This is a kids' book? Don't get me wrong, the stories themselves were tame (for the most part) and required a suspension of disbelief that even my young mind could scoff at. But the pictures, OH the pictures! I couldn't handle it. They were grusome, grotesque, grisly. They haunted my nightmares, my daymares, and other mares that I was previously unaware of.

A few months later, because I suffered the same manic behavior I've found that all small children possess, I ordered the sequel from the book orders. Mom was a little skeptical this time because she noticed my avoidance of the first book, but I convinced her that it was because I had finished it and that it was my favorite book and that I had to, please mom, I HAD TO have the next one!

What on earth was wrong with me?

Well, that book came. I opend it up. The pictures were even worse. Ready?

WARNING: DO NOT LOOK. NO ONE SHOULD EVER LOOK AT THIS.

NO! NOT AGAIN! WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF?!

Just for good measure, perhaps to prove my insanity, I did it again with the third book before I wised up. The three volumes sat in our game room in the basement untouched for years. And because those books were there, with those horrible pictures, I was scared of being in the basement for years, which was hard for me because that's where the Sega Genesis was hooked up.

This lasted until my dad told me we were going to donate books to a place, and wondered if I had any I would be willing to part with. I picked up those books the way you pick up a dead rotting animal, dropped them in the box, and ran away. They were gone. I was safe.

In order to ensure that I qualify for "fair use" of these pictures from this book series, I am going to rate the books as this post was obviously a review of my experience with them. On a scale of one to ten, I give all three volumes that I owned a negative eleventy seven for screwing me up as a kid.

I am a puppy kicker.

As a sometimes-teacher of small children, I've learned many helpful things. For example, it only took two days of student teaching an elementary music class before it was immediately apparent that each day was completely different from the last because all small children are manic in a way that I'll never quite understand.

Now, working on my own, I've quickly learned one very important lesson that trumps them all:

I should make that into a poster and put it in my classroom. It would be the most accurate teacher poster I've ever seen. Let's set the stage here for the events of this fateful day.

It's a day like any other in my music class with the four year old kindergarten. We're doing a circle activity about Valentine's Day using a very cutsey song about love and caring. One of my students who is usually incredibly well-behaved decides that it is vital at this very moment to ask her friend on the other side of the circle a question. We'll call this little girl "Allie," which may or may not be a result of my watching a rerun of "Everybody Loves Raymond" while writing this post.

Me: Allie, did you raise your hand?

Allie: No...

Me: Then was it your turn to talk?

Allie: No...

Me: Well, I know I can trust you to make the right choice and raise your hand next time.

Allie: *nods*

I was confident that I did this the right way. I still am. My tone was very gentle. I made sure to let the student reason out their behavior and decide on its appropriateness. I moved on from the situation with a compliment to her. I was right! Score one for my classroom management!

And yet, all that rightness didn't stop what was to come, for this is what I was met with about two seconds later from little Allie:

I was kind! I was nice! I didn't scold or chastise. I told her that I trust her to be good! And how does she repay me? With tears?

See, I'm convinced that one of the worst things you can do is make a four year old cry. Especially when this is one of the best behaved students in the entire grade, never one to make a scene. If you leave a legacy with your students, you want it to be a positive one, not one of psychological scarring.

This is the opposite of what you want.

So that's it. Today, I've killed a spirit. I'm as bad as someone who kicks puppys for fun. The lowest of the low.

I had to register on the Puppy Kickers "Benji's Law" website too.

Alright. Time to salvage the situation. I do my best to assure her that she isn't in any trouble! She doesn't even have a time out! Still, the tears are flowing and she's doing that thing where you're crying and you suck in air over your lower lip and hyperventilate. Wonderful. It's bad enough that she's crying, now I'm going to make her pass out.

Me: Allie, come here.

I'm sitting on the floor as a part of this circle, so I'm down on "their level." In college, we learned that it's a great way to avoid intimidating small children. Now before me is this sobbing mess of a four year old and I'm trying to figure out how to stop it.

Me: Allie, you arent in any trouble. At all. You're always so good in here and I know you'll make the ri-

Allie: *Throws arms forward and falls around my shoulders crying harder than ever while hugging me*

I'm flabbergasted. Not only did I make her cry, she's hugging me. Here's a kid who cares so much about being a good kid that she not only becomes hysterical when she realizes she's fallen short, she feels so bad about disappointing me that she's hugging me. In my head, I'm slipping BELOW puppy-kicker.

Ok. Enough is enough. I need to get her attention.

Me: Allie, look at- Look! - Allie! Allie? Look at me! At me! Look!

Finally she stands up, still red-faced and sniffling. I tell her again that she's not in any trouble, and that I'd love it if she'd go get a drink of water and come back to our circle and be a part of the activity. This time, the message somehow gets through and she sits down.

In hindsight, I'm absolutely positive that this was more scarring for me than it was for her. She'll grow up like a normal kid. In 20 years, I'll wake up in a cold sweat remembering the time that I was worse than a puppy kicker.