Cats and Crosswalks

Tonight I realized something: I am a pathological scaredy cat.

My mother taught me well; in fact, she taught me too well. I can always remember her jumping to my defense whenever my dad asked me to go get some drill or rope or chain or any other odd tool from over at the barn. She'd say, "Oh, Todd, it's too dark!" He'd always counter with questions of why that mattered asking, "Does the tool disappear if it's dark?" I always loved it when my mom did this because I was usually spared the annoyance of running over to the machine shed, fighting off the ever present dog at the door, hoping in vain the light wasn't burned out, fumbling around in the dark for some obscure tool either on the massive table, our old kitchen table (which I always rather liked), the old truck seat, or in the fridge that stood as a medicine cabinet/Diet Coke stash. By the time I found it and returned home, the job was either finished without whatever I'd spent too much time trying to find, or, and most often this was the case, I came back with the wrong something-or-other. If my mom jumped to my rescue my dad would usually just go get whatever he needed himself, which would leave me safely at home and out of the dark.

This was how I was raised.

If it was dark, you stay inside. If you don't, you end up locked inside a dark, old, run-down, milk barn with a crazed and angry raccoon who can see in the dark whereas you're painfully rooted in rubber boots and over-sized gloves holding a horseshoeing rasp and trembling with fear as you hear the little rodent scurrying around you, but that's a story for another post.

Point: Be scared. My mother was very good at teaching me to be scared.

I think that's what I've learned the most in Boston this summer is that I'm scared. I'm scared of the buildings, the subway, the people--definitely the people, and even crossing the roads outside of a crosswalk.

So, why did the chicken cross the road? Well, maybe it was trying to get over its fear and cross the blasted road!