It's in My Head #19 - An Irrational Fear

It's OK to be afraid. It's a very common thing. Ask the people around you right now - what are you afraid of? If they are completely honest, they might reveal their true fears. But most likely they will keep their real fears hidden and unsaid. But why is that? Why are people so leery of disclosing their fears? Everyone is afraid of something. Fear is as common as happiness, anger, sadness or any of the other emotions that you humans feel. Fear is defined as "a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined." That last word is where my fear comes into play. The thing that I fear the most is Dinosaurs. I kid you not. I wouldn't joke about this shit. But how can you fear something that doesn't exist? You fear it by convincing yourself of the possibility that it does exist.

I've been fascinated with dinosaurs for my entire life. When I was a kid I studied them. I wanted to be a paleontologist when I grew up. What kid didn't? Here were these colossal beasts that ruled the World and then - BAM! Gone from existence. All they left behind were these mysterious bones that we put together like some big ass puzzle without the front of the box as a guide. But what is so scary about dead animal bones? Nothing really. But what scares me is the possibility that there are some live ones out there hiding, waiting for the day when mankind forgets that they used to be the the dominant species on this planet. They were here first. And humans, the whiny little sacks of skin that they are, couldn't do a damn thing about it if Dinosaurs ever came back. 

I know that you are calling bullshit on me right now. I can hear you say, "But Scott - isn't death more scary?" Nope. We're all going to die. "How about wolves, tigers and bears?" I stay out of the jungles and forests. "But what about guns?" I don't get involved with that nonsense. "But what if you lost your job?" Shit, I wish I was unemployed. Imagine what I could do with all that free time. "You have to be afraid of heights." Nope. I don't put myself in perilous situations where I'm dangling on the edge. "But everyone is afraid of rats, bats and spiders." Nah. That's what poison and traps are for. I don't like those creatures, but that doesn't mean that I fear them. But why dinosaurs?

Have you ever seen a dinosaur? Well, technically I haven't either, but Jurassic Park gave me a pretty good idea of what it would be like if they lived in our World. When I close my eyes and think about it, I would probably lose my fucking shit if a dinosaur was staring me down. I don't care if it was Baby Sinclair from the TV show Dinosaurs or an animated Littlefoot from The Land Before Time standing in an open meadow; dinosaurs are my #1 fear in life. It doesn't matter that those assholes aren't real. I don't care. They scare the shit out of me. But how much would it mess with your mind if they were real?

Imagine your life as it is. That's not hard. You live that every day. Now imagine your life as it is only now Dinosaurs are real and living among us. How much does that change your day to day activities? Oh, I was going to go over to my friend's house for a barbecue, except that a pack of velociraptors disemboweled and ate my friend. So now there's no barbecue this weekend. Honey, did the mail come today? Nope. Sorry, the mailman was crushed by a herd of stampeding Brontosaurs. We'll have to wait until someone else takes a chance and applies for our route. Seeing as that we live close to the watering hole, it's very unlikely that anyone with a sound mind is going to apply for that open position. So don't expect the mail to come anytime soon.

If that was the World that we lived in, I would never leave the house except to get the essentials. And when I did, I would only do it in the tank that I stole from the US Military when they weren't looking (they were too busy firing surface to air missiles at some Pterodactyls that attacked our soldiers when we infringed on their territory. Don't blame them. They were protecting their nest). I would never walk outside without protection. And I'm not even talking about owning a handgun. What is a pistol going to do against a T-Rex? It would only piss him off. You need to own a tank or a rocket launcher if you are going to go toe-to-toe with one of the greatest predators to ever walk the Earth. You can't even use "run" as a backup plan. What good does running do you if you don't have any life-ending weapons? Running will only engage the primal hunting aspects of these prehistoric creatures. They would give chase and your life would be over. So fuck running.

I'm ever thankful for the meteor that killed the dinosaurs. I owe it a debt of gratitude. If it didn't kill those creatures, then life as we know it might not have existed. It may have been dinosaurs and not humans, that were the dominant species on this planet. If that were the case, I probably wouldn't have existed long enough to write this article. But I am here, so fuck the dinosaurs. I can be afraid of something that no longer exists. If John Hammond can recreate them for entertainment purposes, then someone else in the real world could also recreate them for nefarious purposes. That's when dinosaurs get their revenge upon the human race. If that ever happens, then I'm out. I'm jumping ship via suicide because I'll be damned if I'm going to exist in a World that contains dinosaurs. Fuck that. Dinosaurs and humans were never meant to coexist. This is why The Flintstones is bullshit. I would have never trusted those prehistoric bastards to help me move rocks. If one of those terrible lizards would have come near me, I would have dropped one of those giant rocks on their walnut-sized brains. I would have done everything I could to destroy the dinosaurs, even if I had to do it one dinosaur at a time.

The only way to defeat your fear is to face it head on and destroy it. Unless John Hammond or some other old bastard recreates my #1 fear, I'm in a whole lot of trouble. That's because my #1 fear does not currently exist. And it may never. So I need to somehow figure out a way to rise above my fear. I do live in a World without Dinosaurs, so Dinosaurs live in a World without me. That's messed up. My head hurts. But it hurts because of my thoughts and not because of the Dinosaurs. I will never let Dinosaurs hurt me. Not as long as I have a single breath left in my body. I will kill any Dinosaur that moves. I will kill any Dinosaur that doesn't move. I will kill them all. I won't fear you any more. You motherfuckers have to fear me.

 - pookon -

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