The Only Thing We Have To Fear...

When I was in college, we had a couple of bomb "scares." People found suspicious packages on campus and the police were called to blow them up. One turned out to be a duct tape ball left in a one of the "cubbies" at the bookstore. Another was an unattended book bag left outside of the library. Both required that huge section of campus be cordoned off so the bomb squad could come in and blow up the suspicious objects. I still wonder if some poor schlep had his dissertation blown up

Our campus experienced some bomb activity in the 70's but I can't remember exactly why we were suddenly afraid of found objects again in the 90's. If anybody reading this was at UCSB in the late 90's, remind me what we were so afraid of.

Anyway I don't think I'm appropriately fearful. When I was a kid I wasn't afraid of monsters. To be clear, I wasn't afraid of monsters that required special techniques to be killed. Why do you need a silver bullet to kill a werewolf, can't you just blow it up? And wouldn't a vampire die if you crushed it with a steamroller? I was afraid of ghosts and el cucuy but not monsters qua monsters. And now pfffttt- I'm not afraid of ghosts since Ghostbusters showed me they were susceptible to nuclear accelerators and now that I know El Cucuy is a diminutive radio host on 97.9 I'm not really afraid of him either.

I also didn't have... or maybe listen to, that little voice that says, "This could kill you." My best friend and I used to tie each other up and push each other into the pool to see if we could escape. We'd do the same thing in boxes. I also tried to make blank rounds using pliers and a screwdriver. I exploded bullets in the garage with a vice and hammer. My brother and I blew a glass fireplace enclosure from the hearth by throwing lighters in it. I made a water rocket using gasoline instead of water so I could ignite it at lift off. What else... I don't remember. Point being I should've been afraid of a lot more stuff than I was or am.

I may have gotten this far in my life not being a big baby, but I don't think I'll last much longer like that. Consider stories like these:

Anti-terrorism detectives escorted a man from a plane after a taxi driver had earlier become suspicious when he started singing along to a track by punk band The Clash, police said on Wednesday

Reuters

Five teenage girls from Portage County face potential criminal charges after attempting to play a real-life version of Super Mario Bros.

Beacon Journal

The times they are a'changin.' It might be time to start being more afraid. I'm not going to enter into this fear willy-nilly though. I want to be thoughtfully fearful. My fears need to be terrorism related but topical. It won't do to just be afraid of actual terrorists so I'm compiling a list of things to fear and notify the authorities about.

1. Clearly I should be afraid of people singing songs by the Clash, but I wonder if that fear should be transfered to English bands from the late 70's in general. You can't be too careful- If someone has "become comfortably numb," they're probably not keeping a sharp enough eye out for terrorists. Okay I'm over-thinking this- that's not gonna work if I'm trying to be afraid. It's all suspect: Pink Floyd, Queen, Styx, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Sex Pistols, The Who, whatever - even AC/DC, they're close enough to English. If "I'm sailing away..." comes out of your mouth, I'm calling the cops.

2. Video game power ups. That was a smart move by those Portage County authorities. If terrorists are going to strike anywhere and with anything, it's Ravenna Ohio with shiny boxes marked with question marks. With that in mind, I'll be afraid of chickens, helium balloons, floating coins, glowing orbs, pills, multi-hit combos, mushrooms, flowers, wooden chests, and question marks.

3. With all the talk about our leaky borders I figure I'm supposed to be afraid of Mexicans these days. That's going to be tough for me. I guess Mexicans represent how permeable our borders are. Every Mexican we do see is a bomb or terrorist we don't, but I'm still not afraid of them. I know all the talk these days is about "immigrants," but I think we know that means Latin American immigrants. And even though Latin America is a diverse land of different languages, ethnicities, cultures, and colors, everyone just thinks "Mexican." I'm probably not going to be afraid of Mexicans so I'll be afraid of Reggaeton instead. That should be easy, I don't understand it all. If I hear Reggaeton I'm calling DHS

4. Muslims... obviously.

5. Sikhs, because they don't do enough to not look Muslim.

6. Prince, because his new album title looks Arabic.