Scariest things
I recently asked my 8-year-old son, Ken, what his scariest thing was. I was surprised by his quick response. He already had a list of four things:
1) Number one is Black Holes. He is afraid of black holes;
2) Next, he is afraid of Supernova stars, exploding stars;
3) Third, he is afraid of ghosts, especially zombies;
4) After that, he is afraid of his baseball coach, Mr. Ota, or Coach Ota, who is also the father of one of his friends, Yoshiki Ota.
I said that when I was his age I was afraid of the alligator living under my bed and the Bigfoot in my closet and lurking outside the kitchen at night. When I said that about Bigfoot, he immediately said that he is afraid of Bigfoot, too, even though he doesn’t know what a Bigfoot, or Sasquatch is.
My daughter said that her biggest fear is cockroaches (“gokiburi” in Japanese).
More recently, I have said to the kids that my biggest fear is the invisible man living in our apartment. There he is over there! Can’t you see him? He is wearing a long, brown raincoat and his hands are stuffed deep in the pockets. He has a fedora hat pulled low over his eyes. His face is a little downcast, so I can’t see it clearly. He’s looking at you right now! Can’t you see him? Oh, now he moved! Emma used to hate when I talked like that, because it creeped her out.