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On The Grassy Knoll
The Blue Pootle cannot believe that the Earth is in the grip of a sinister cult.
It’s quite easy to scare me. I don’t know when you last came across the Mr Men, but I bear an alarming metaphysical resemblance to Mr Jelly. Internally, I’m made up of wavy pink lines. This is because I’ve had a lot of practice at feeling nervous.
It all started when I was on the cusp of puberty.
Legend has it that puberty is a powerful time. Poltergeists can be manifested by young ladies with hormone imbalances. Female teenagers can attend perfectly innocent parties and turn them into pig’s blood orgies with screaming and Oh Godding and crispy death by fire. I’ve never accomplished such feats, but I have certainly ruined a few family gatherings with my sulky expression and refusal to play Twister. I was a very grumpy, gawky girl and my racing emotions led to some embarrassing moments. For instance, I refused to make eye contact. With anyone. People commented upon it. Teachers wrote in my school report: Quiet Student. Works Hard. Never Makes Eye Contact.
And so, thinking it was a vision problem, I was fitted with enormous glasses which led me to believe I was too ugly to be looked upon, so I started hiding behind furniture. Anyway, the point of this self-indulgent reminiscence is that it leads me to reveal that I used to stay home and hide behind furniture rather than go out to somebody else’s house and find something appropriate there to hide behind. So, one day, when my parents tried and failed to persuade me to accompany them to my Uncle Nigel’s house, I waited for them to go and retreated to my favourite spot behind the sofa instead.
It was to be an eventful afternoon.
I think I was reading James Herbert’s The Moon when I heard the noise. It was a rhythmic tap, sturdy yet stealthy, coming from upstairs. It sounded like someone was walking about in my parents’ bedroom.
You could say that I was bound to overreact. I had reached the bit in The Moon where all the people are having the wild orgy of death type thing (is it me or have I used the word Orgy twice in this column so far?) and at that moment Postman Pat would have seemed sinister. Nevertheless, my hormones jumped to the conclusion that a burglar was upstairs.
Not just a burglar: a drug-addled burglar with mental problems and a taste for young female flesh. A rapist-murderer-burglar with syphilis, hideous yellowing teeth and a liking for Chianti. Basically, I compiled a composite photo-fit of every nasty man I’d ever read about and decided he was coming to get me.
I cowered behind the sofa. I cried a little bit, very quietly. Time passed, and my hormones told me drawers were banging, jewellery was being pocketed, knives were being sharpened. More time passed. The burglar seemed to have found lots to do in my parents’ bedroom. He was still up there, tapping away.
In an act of tremendous courage, I crawled out from behind the sofa, headed to the nearest window, and threw myself out. Then, with only minor cuts and bruises, I ran to the neighbour’s house and knocked politely on their door.
After I had traumatised them for a while with my relentless hysterics and my Richter Scale 6 hiccups, they finally understood that an intruder was in the house. So my neighbour (the male one) armed himself with a hammer from his tool box and headed into the house of horror, his expression reminiscent of someone standing in front of a wind tunnel.
He emerged five minutes’ later with more relaxed features. Nobody there, he told me. Not a sausage. Just the catch of the open window in the bedroom, tapping against the sill.
Yes, I felt appropriately silly. But the damage was done. I refused to be left alone in the house for three years after that incident, and am still jumpy when left on my own. Sneaking up behind me is never a good idea. And what does all this mean? It means that I am well attuned to frightening things. I can sense a horror novel from thirty bookshelves away. I can recognise an ASBO candidate at a distance of five miles. I know danger when I come across it.
But the conspiracy theories that abound on every subject, the whispers of secret organisations, high-powered murderers, alien intelligence on Earth, do these cause my hormones to jangle out their familiar warning?
Never.
Let me debunk some myths for you:
Because ancient civilisations drew a few weird-looking things on a few cave walls? Well, if representing aliens is a sign that they must have visited Earth, how come modern life is full of Doctor Who and Predator, yet we know these entities don’t really exist? Humans make stuff up. That’s what we do, whether we’re ancient or modern. We love a good story. Even my granny fibs occasionally.
That’s funny. Last time I heard, everyone hates a rich git. Since when have you done exactly what your boss tells you to do without taking your time about it, giving him the V sign behind his back, and bad-mouthing him in the canteen later? People don’t like rich people. If you had the opportunity to piss off a millionaire by blabbing his secrets, no matter how much he paid you, you’d do it. Or at least drop some hints.
It seems to me that conspiracy theories fail to take into account that most basic fact. We’re all human. We all hide behind the sofa from imagined ills sometimes. But it doesn’t mean there really is anything to hide from. It’s just that being frightened can make as good a story as having a really nice day out at the park.
So try hiding behind the sofa occasionally. Just remember, the only real danger is from dust mites. Now, if those things decided to mutate and take over the world, we’d really be in trouble.
Word of the Day: Macarism. Taking pleasure in other people’s joy.
Go here to provide the Pootle with feedback, ask her for more information about that orgy in the James Herbert book, talk about her new novel, Three Things About Me, or simply to say hi.
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