Please bless that i won't get kidnapped by aliens

I was reading this post on Angie's blog a few minutes ago, concerning her many ridiculous habits, rituals, and quirks revolving around her irrational fears. I think that I, for the most part have gotten over the vast majority of my child hood fears. Well, except for bugs of course. But for goodness sakes, those are tangible, real, creepy-crawling-buzzing-biting-stingingly real. Her fears made me laugh, due to the fact that I had many similar fears while growing up. And also a plethora of distinct, though probably similarly irrational ones.

Of course the movie It totally ruined my life from the age of 9 until at least 17. When I first saw it, I had intense nightmares for at least 3 months. I had to make sure that I went to bed and was asleep before my parents were asleep, or terror would overtake me. That however, wasn't even my worst fear.

Effing aliens.

When I was young, I saw some supposedly true story about alien abductions and impregnations which utterly scared the hell out of me. I was absolutely terrified of getting kidnapped, and then probed. I would lay in bed each night, going through this absurd ritual in my head. I would tell myself, "Okay. There are 7 continents in the world. If the aliens choose my continent, then they have a bunch of countries to choose from. If they happen to choose the USA, they have 50 states. If they happen to choose Utah, there are like 29 counties. If they choose mine, there are a whole bunch of cities. If they happen to choose Orem (eventually Nephi ((even more pathetic, as I was at least 14 once living there)) then there are 10's of 1000's of families to choose from (((quite a bit fewer in Nephi, which made things a bit more scary.))) If the effing aliens so happen to choose my family, there are 6 people to choose from. Soooooooo, the odds aren't really that likely that I will get abducted." Every damn night, I went through this ritual. Followed by, "Dear heavenly father, thanks for this day...Please bless that I won't get kidnapped or murdered, or kidnapped by aliens tonight." Seriously.

Kidnapping was another one of my great fears. Whenever I had to walk anywhere alone at night, I was always constantly terrified. When walking across the cul-de-sac at night from Grey's house, I would sprint the whole way, imagining the villains in the bushes were thinking, "Damn! We must have spooked him!" I would dash like the wind, because I knew they were right on my tail.

So the saddest part of all, was when I was 17. I remember one night saying my evening prayers and saying, "And please bless that I wont get kidnapped or murdered, or kidnapped my aliens." And I recall pausing, and thinking "Wtf did I just say right then? Did I, a 17 year old man, really just pray not to get kidnapped or murdered, or abducted by aliens?" And it's funny, because even now, almost 10 years later I still find myself almost slipping that in. It still pops into my mind whilst praying.

Now, my imagination really only gets really out of control when I am camping alone. That is still scary as hell. And aliens. Give me a break. I will punch any alien in its bulbous head, and cave in his skinny little chest with a well placed drop kick. Unless of course they have lasers. Seriously, who can even stand up against a laser?