Scary Corners

Skylab's falling - will it fall on me or my house?

There is something called the Son of Sam out there, and lots of people are scared of it - will it come for me?

A place called Three Mile Island has many people really worried - will it explode, and hurt me?

In the jungles somewhere a man named Jim Jones has people drink Kool Aid - what will happen to me if I drink the Kool Aid in our refrigerator?

My mother cries as the important man on the TV screen talks to reporters - why is she crying?

Legionnaire's disease is making some people very, very sick - will I start coughing and be taken to the hospital?

They rescue a planeload of people, also in the jungle, from very bad people, and lots of people get shot - I hope they don't shoot me -

Something is creeping into basements in a strange place called Love Canal making many people sick - will I get sick down in my basement?

Some lady is kidnapped and they make her rob a bank - they won't take me in the middle of the night, will they?


I watch my almost-four-year-old daugher as she watches the television, and I wonder what goes on inside that inquisitive mind of hers. Or I catch her on our perimeter, a bunch of adults discussing / complaining / sharing worst-case-scenarios about current events, and I wonder what she must be thinking. I want to protect her, to shelter her, and though I know I can't, I can at least delay the day when she becomes aware that the world we live in has some very nasty corners. I can console her, and assure her, that those scary places are very few in number and very far away, much fewer and farther than the media or even a bunch of dumb adults shooting off their mouths wants so very badly to make it seem. I hope.