[Noodlefox]

I have never been a very motherly woman. I don't dislike kids, but I honestly have no idea what to do with them. My natural inclination is to treat them like I would any other adult, but I'm always afraid I'll say something that the parents will take offense at and get angry at me so I try to avoid situations with kids altogether. Thankfully my parents are more then happy to call my dog granddaughter (literally).

~

As far as nightmares go I've had some interesting experiences with them. I have two reoccurring nightmares that I've gotten since childhood (they're not all that scary now, but when I was a kid they were awful), and then I had this really weird series of nightmares that all tied together, but it was over a period of years that they occurred (that's somewhat long story though).

The first reoccurring nightmare I have is pretty simple. I'm a little girl standing with my parents at this old wooden building that I think is supposed to be a train station since there are train tracks that pass close to it, but the whole place looks completely abandoned save for this one really old man that my parents are talking to. The entire landscape looks like something out of Courage the Cowardly Dog with nothing but dirt as far as the eye can see.

So I'm standing with my parents when I suddenly hear this strange noise coming from the other side of the tracks. I look over and the camera (which is the only way I can think of it since the me in the dream doesn't move from holding my mom's hand) starts to pan across the landscape, moving to the other side of the tracks and across the barren dirt until it finally gets to this small shed. Just sitting there with nothing else around it.

The shed door opens and the "camera" moves inside looking over a bunch of old boxes, pictures, furniture covered in sheets. There are rats running around and the whole place seems like it's far to large for how small the shed appeared on the outside. As we're moving through I keep hearing strange sounds. Things scuffling, people whispering, I see things moving in the shadows or just out of view and I get this panicked feeling. Like I want to turn back, but the "camera" just keeps moving forward. I usually wake up before I get to the end of the shed.

With the other nightmare I'm at my parents house before we did renovations to expand the dining room. It's my birthday and there are a bunch of people there I've never seen before, but are apparently my classmates. I'm walking around trying to enjoy the party, feeling nervous from all the strangers, when suddenly I see these large clown pants, like the clown is invisible except for its cloths, running towards me.

I scream and start to run all through the house trying to escape them. I keep calling for help, but everyone seems to ignore me. Finally I try to run downstairs and rather then our normal sitting room it's like this... giant black void with a thick mist making it impossible to see the floor. The whole room is filled with pipes (kinda like the default computer screensaver?) and there are people climbing all over them in bathing suits jumping into the mist. But rather then hitting what appears to be hard ground they just fall right through like it's water.

I've seem to have gotten away from the clown pants at this point, but I know they're still searching for me. I try to get the other kids to help me, but all they want me to do is go swimming with them. They finally encourage me to climb onto the pipes as well and one of them pushes me off, but instead of hitting solid ground like I had been standing on I, as I said, dive into what seems to be water except it's perfectly clear. I can look up and easily see the pipes and the layer of mist right above the surface.

Quickly I swim back up and start trying to make my way to the stairs. I decide to try and find my mom since none of the other kids believe me or care that I'm being chased. It's like trying to slog through tar though and I can't seem to stand on the surface anymore like when I had first come down.

When I finally make it to the stairs I'm exhausted and out of breath. I head into the kitchen form the stairs and make my way to the dining room when suddenly the clown pants rush out from the hallway that leads to my parents bedroom.

I swear it's the loudest I have ever screamed in my life and right before they can reach me I see myself passing out from being so scared. As I'm collapsing there's this horrible laugh that seems to be coming from the pants before they deflate and fold themselves on our dining room chair.

At that point I always wake up. As I said these dreams started when I was a kid, but I've always had them. They're gotten less scary with time, but I still wake up feeling anxious.