Recurring Nightmares

    I love horror movies. If you didn't know that, shame on you. Pay some goddamn attention. Ahem. Most of them don't actually scare me though. There are a few that do for reasons I cannot fathom. Who knows why certain things scare the shit out of us as children and stick with us for our entire lives? The thing that I still think about at night when I go to bed is Zelda. In the book and film, Pet Sematary, Zelda is the sickly sister of the main character's wife, Rachel. When Rachel was young, her older sister was confined to her bed due to a serious (when is it not serious) case of Spinal Meningitis. This illness killed Zelda and Rachel routinely has flashbacks of her sister that she cannot separate from her day to day life. Zelda is grotesque. Terrifying, really. In the book she is described as crouching in Rachel's closet and watching her sleep through a crack in the door as her black tongue dangles out of her mouth. Fucking horrific, no?! In the film, the image of Zelda was burned into my brain. Every single night of my life from age 7 to 15 (no exaggeration), I would dream about Zelda sitting in the corner of my room and smiling at me. I used to watch cartoons until I fell asleep with the hopes that it would keep my mind off of her. I still watch Pet Sematary, but it wasn't until I was 16 that I could stay in the room during the scenes with Zelda. Bitch tormented me. And still does.
    The other recurring nightmare I had as a kid (3 to 10) was about something unexpected. I watched Cat's Eye once. Just once (until recently). All I could remember about it was the little troll that lived in Drew Barrymore's wall. He wasn't particularly terrifying, but as a very young child my brain turned him into something disturbing. This dream always started with me walking out of my parents' bedroom (my parents' bedroom in the crappy trailer we lived in in 1986, mind you). I walk to the living room because the T.V. is blaring with only snow on the screen. There is a severely ominous feel. I push the power button the T.V. It stays on. I feel slight panic. I unplug it. It stays on. More panic. And then I see the troll on the screen. He's not tiny like in the movie. He comes to the edge of the screen and proceeds to "escape" the T.V. Holy fuck, y'all! So, I run out the front door and just as I leave the edge of the porch, he gets me and I wake up. That dream, every night, for years and years. I can't really explain why this one scared me so badly.
    As an adult, my recurring nightmares are much more unusual. They aren't about monsters. It's like my brain plays tricks on my while I'm half asleep. I hear noises that sound like banging on the kitchen table or kids crying. Sometimes, I'm positive there's a person standing next to the bed. What's strange is once I have some illusion in my sleep that scares me awake, it keeps happening. My mind sets some sort of alarm in my head and not only do I repeat the same experiences every night, but usually at the same time of night. Last night I sat up in bed and listened to what I was sure was a screaming baby for at least a full minute. In my daze, I thought it was coming from my husband's clock radio. It will most likely happen again tonight. Strange how your mind can make you see and hear things.