We’re almost there, boys! The candy is bought, the decorations are up, the costumes are ready. We’re closing in on Halloween like a vulture circling a battlefield. In this spookiest time of the spooky season, I thought it would be fitting to examine the beginnings of my own fear.

Some people like to discuss childhood nostalgia, citing examples of shows and movies that give them a serotonin boost as an adult. Today, I’m flipping the coin to the other side.

I’m going to talk about the things (both media and experiences) that terrified me as a child. I’ve seen a lot of Youtubers do this, and I’ve always wanted to do my own version.

In no particular order, we begin.

Monster House (2006)

I think this is a pretty universal scare for my generation. I don’t remember much besides that this guy lives alone in a creepy house that everyone thinks is alive, and it’s revealed that the man’s dead wife has been inhabiting the house. Creepy as hell for a kid’s movie, and I specifically remember the hair-raising scene where we see his dead wife in the basement. Who thought this wouldn’t traumatize kids?

Courage the Cowardly Dog (1999-2002)

This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone. This show was notoriously creepy as hell, and it wasn’t even coy about it. I guarantee most horror fans my age got their start in love for the unsettling from this show. The whole show was a consistent spook-fest, but the one I always remember (and you probably do too) is the “return the slab” guy. I don’t know what it was- his voice, the way he said it, I don’t know. That shit still creeps me out.

This level in Rugrats in Paris: The Movie video game for N64/PlayStation (2000)

Have you ever had a recurring nightmare that you revisited for years? This level, a warehouse which my brother and I called “boxworld”, gave me a nightmare that I had for about 5 years. I would be in this level, a warehouse full of boxes, but it would be dark and all of my family and friends were usually there with me. If anybody spoke above a whisper, police cars would burst in and arrest everyone. Look, I was a kid. The police were like the scariest thing to me back then.

The ”Mosquito Man”

This is very oddly specific, so feel free to call me weird. But living out in the country in a river area, my neighborhood would get visits from the county Mosquito Control truck every now and then in the summertime. It was this truck with a little orange light on top that would spray mosquito repellent as it drove slowly up and down our country roads. I can’t put a finger on what made that so creepy to me as a kid; maybe it was because he always came at dusk, or maybe it was the way he drove so slowly down the dirt road that ran by our house. But he gave me nightmares. Sorry, mosquito man- I’m sure you were a nice guy.

The Hayloft

If you’ve read my post from the beginning of the month, you’ll remember that I’m afraid of heights. Well, when I was pretty young, my parents built a hayloft in our barn. You might imagine this would be a wonderland for an imaginative child to explore, and it was. We spent tons of time up there playing among the bales, hunting for chicken eggs and climbing as high as we could up the stacks of hay bales.

The problem wasn’t being up there; it was getting down.

For some reason, I could go up fine, even though the stairs were the kind without backs (the acrophobe’s nightmare). But I always became absolutely paralyzed with fear when it was time to go back down those stairs. The hayloft itself was probably only, like 15-20 feet high? It had a railing on one side, and the other side was open, the only other thing over there being the hay elevator, which I honestly did have a reason to fear. It was basically a treadmill with spikes that we would use to bring the hay bales up there.

My parents (hi!) can attest to the many instances where whoever I had been playing with had to go and get one of them to come and carry me down. That was the only way I could get back down those stairs. Cute now, terrifying then.

Cow Prison Break

I asked both of my parents if they remembered anything that really scared me as a kid. This was my dad’s contribution.

“When that herd of Black Angus got out from Barker Ranch and were out on the road when we were driving into town one evening. That seemed to be upsetting for you.”

For context, we lived in the country, about a 15 minute drive from the nearest town. Between us and town was the sprawling Barker Ranch, which had a rotation of cows that could almost always be seen from the road that led into our neighborhood; the road cut right through their land. A few times, if you were lucky, you could catch them moving cattle across the road to the pasture on the other side through big gates. That was always exciting.

I don’t remember this instance of cows breaking out of their confines and wandering that road, as my dad claims I was probably about four years old. But like, I get it. Especially since it was the evening, likely dusk. Cows definitely have their place in the creepy spectrum. In fact, one of my novel projects features creepy zombie cows. Must have been a subliminal fear implanted in my brain that night when I was four.

Toasty from Spyro the Dragon (1998)

This guy was the first boss in the very first Spyro game, a series my brother and I played constantly. As soon as you load in, your ears are filled with the most dread-inducing, sense of doom music you’ve ever heard. The whole level is bathed in shades of red and orange, making you feel like you’re in the middle of the apocalypse. The minor enemies are these creepy-ass dogs that jumpscare you and take two hits to kill, so you flame them the first time and think you’re safe, then they come back and get you.

Toasty himself is just a jack-o-lantern in a robe, but on top of the rest of the level design, this was definitely your first “oh shit” moment of the game. Check out this video if you want to hear that unsettling music and see what I’m talking about.

The Basement

This was certainly a universal experience for anyone who ever grew up in a house with a basement. As a kid, you’re 100% going to be afraid of your basement. This was my mom’s answer to my question about my childhood fears. I still won’t go in there when I visit. It has 1. Stairs without backs 2. Spiders hanging from the ceiling 3. Probably monsters.

The Upstairs Bathroom

I actually just had a nightmare about this the other day. My bedroom as a kid was on the second floor of our house with one of those accordion access doors leading directly into our half-bath. There’s this really small space, maybe two feet wide, that goes behind the main part of the bathroom and is fully dark and just always had some random junk or something back there. I almost never used that access door in my room (except when ultimate stealth was needed when I wasn’t supposed to be up late), purely because I’d have to walk past that ominous dark space to get to the toilet. I have dreams all the time where I find dead bodies in there.

BONUS: I Asked My Brother

For fun and since we shared our childhood, I asked my brother, Michael, if he remembered anything that scared him as a kid. He gave two fantastic answers.

“An episode of Goosebumps at my friend’s house, I remember a haunted book rising out of a swamp and levitating before I ran away. I was like 5”

This cracked me up, and I did some digging to try to find this episode or even a clip, but I had no luck. His next answer was actually really unsettling, and it’s eerily similar to the weird atmospheric nightmares I used to have about our house.

“My scariest dream was when Dad was in the bathroom and I was standing outside of the door, everything was pitch black except the staircase was dimly lit.” [Context: the downstairs bathroom sat right at the bottom of the stairs] “Then I started hearing an organ playing from upstairs and it kept getting louder and louder but I was afraid to look up and Dad wouldn’t respond or open the door. Eventually I looked up and this shadowy figure with big eyes came rushing down the staircase but I woke up right before it got to me.”

This is quite eerie, and again, I’m struck by the similarities it has to several of the nightmares I remember growing up. A lot of them involved that staircase, and call me crazy, but even into my teen years I would often find myself rushing up those stairs as if something was behind me. I also remember a nightmare featuring organ music. I don’t know. Our house was built in 1890, and my mom even has a spooky story about it. So you never know.

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What are some weird spooks from your childhood that have always stuck with you? The things that gave us our first jolts of terror as children, I think, create the foundation for what we’re most afraid of in the horror genre.

The next time you hear from me, it will be after Halloween (big cry), and I’ll have a nice roundup of all the horror media I’ve consumed over this October. See you then!

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