At the car wash we sat waiting for the cogs to turn and the parts to twist. I felt a wash of hyperactivity. My heart was beating double. I couldn't put my finger on why. I was starting to squirm and sweat. Then it dawned on me. As a child, I had an irrational fear of car washes. Ridiculous, I know. This familiar feeling was an involuntary response. The memory was long gone, having been pushed aside to clear space for new ones, but the phobia had sat there dormant. It astounds me how much human conciousness can store. Boundless, unfathomable depths of knowledge and memories.
I would imagine the huge, spinning cylinders would roll us out flat like pastry. I would close my eyes and try to forget the monstrous din that would make me rattle and shudder.
My response to diggers was the same. In my naive little world, the digger would surely scoop me up and bury me alive or take a swing at me, like it was self aware.
There was one occasion when my father walked me home from school. I hadn't noticed the digger at the top of the road until I reached the lolly pop lady. I begged him to walk with me the long way around, as we had done so many times before. He was not going to budge and neither was I. He slung me over his shoulder like a firemen and made a dash for it. I thumped his back and kicked my legs, screaming bloody murder. I honestly believed I would die right there and then. The general public, including my father, found this to be hilarious. I couldn't understand why they were laughing. I had just had a near death experience.
Everything meant everything at that age. Only that precise moment of existence mattered. It was all there was. I wonder why we grow out of that. I'd give my big toe to be that passionate about anything again.
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