I remember wandering through the woods out back my house for hours on end ... purposefully trying to get lost. I never thought about serial killers or kidnappers or falling down and breaking my leg. I just wanted to follow the creek to wherever it would lead me.

It's kinda cool how even an ordinary creek can be magical to a child.

I would take off my shoes - not considering broken glass or sharp rocks that may lay at the water's bottom - and squish my toes in the wet sand.

Sometimes, when things got really rough or my parents were fighting, I would rush outside and take cover in those woods. Me and my next door neighbor, Bobby Jean (yes, that's her real name) would steal blankets from her sister's bedroom and build forts in the trees.

Her parents used to fight too.

We spent hours climbing those trees. Never once did we think about falling.

I remember one day, I got lost. It was summer and I had all day to play in the woods. I kept following the creek the entire afternoon - so enraptured by my little adventure - that I hadn't realized how far I had gone. It was getting dark so I started to head back.

When I got home, the whole neighborhood was at my house. The police were there. Everyone was calling my name.

I couldn't understand what the noise was all about.

Then I saw my mom. She looked furious with me. Or at least, at the time, I thought it was fury. Now, as an adult, I think it could have been sheer terror.

Anyway, she told me to go to my room immediately. More than told me ... she bellowed at me. She had panick in her voice. It was the voice of a mother who thought her child was gone.

I was grounded for a week.

I was so angry with my mom then. I cried all night. I didn't think I had done anything wrong. And, in a twelve year old's mind, I really hadn't.

Now I'm older. And I know that she was so upset because she was afraid. I'm sure a thousand horrible things ran through her mind. So many worst case scenarios.

I think she was so worried - so overcome by grief of what might have happened - that, when she saw me, she didn't know what to do with that emotion.

She sent me to my room because she wanted to know where I was. She tasted what it felt like to lose me. And she never wanted me to be lost again.

Now I'm older. And I'm afraid of everything. I don't like to walk after dark because I'm afraid of getting raped. I don't like to light the kerosene heater because I'm afraid it'll explode.

I'm afraid I won't succeed.

I'm afraid I won't be a good mother.

I'm afraid there's no such thing as fate. Or souls. And that we've made it up to make ourselves feel better.

I'm afraid, when it's most needed, I won't be able to scream.

I'm afraid of growing old, growing weak, and growing up.

I'm afraid of my basement. But this one's understandable. My basement is pretty scary.

I'm afraid of taking a shower when I'm alone in the house. I think this is a consequence of seeing "Psycho" way too many times.

I'm afraid of dying.

I'm afraid I'll outlive my husband.

I'm afraid I'll step on my cat in the middle of the night and crush her.(she's black.)

Mental note: Next time, get a white dog.

I'm afraid I'll be forgotten. And that I won't matter. I'm afraid that my existence will be inconsequential.

I'm not exactly sure when I became so fearful of the world. I suspect it was when I realized that people die. When I understood the permenance of death. And the pain of loneliness.

Maybe it was too much of a shock too early in life. I don't know.

In any case, I don't walk in the woods alone anymore. And never at night. I haven't been in a creek for well over a decade. And, as for climbing trees, I shovel my driveway and I get a back spasm. A tree would put me in permanent traction.

Maybe it's a good thing that I don't do these things. When I was a child, I played as a child. When I became a woman, I put away childish things.

However ...

As a child, I was fearless. The world wasn't some scary, dangerous place but a magical land ripe for exploration.

I think I miss that.

Yeah, I think I do.

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