10-30-08

A family that scares together, stays together

My grandfather, on my Dad’s side, is the type of person who loves to play a joke or scare the life out of an unsuspecting person.
This might be where I get it from. I love to scare people. It doesn’t matter how old or how small they are. Scaring someone is such a classic way of making someone scream and someone else, usually the person doing the scaring, laugh and cry at the same time.
I just love it!
On the other hand, I will get so mad at someone who scares me. I hate it with a passion. I mean hate it.
I’m not sure what it is about scaring people that I love so much. I am sure a psychologist would have a chapter to show you about people like me. They could probably go on to tell you about all of the things that were missing in my life and how I try to get some form of fulfillment through making people feel weak and vulnerable.
Blah, blah, blah, blah. I’ll scare them too, if I get the chance!
With my brother and sister being younger than me, I had lots of opportunities to plot good heart-stopping scares. Anytime I could I would jump from behind a door, sneak up behind someone, or just flat-out “BOO” someone in the dark... whatever it took.
You might be saying, “Bryan is just plain ol’ mean!”
YUP, I sure am.
In a past article, I told a quick story of how I used a central vacuum hose placed under my brother’s bed as a way to throw my voice and talk through it very deeply while he was sleeping. I said, “I am under your bed, if you get out, I will pull you under and eat you.”
Yes, my mom got all over my butt, however, I am sure she and my dad were laughing to tears when I left the room.
There were times that I would put a lot of thought into a good scare. Sometimes a good Halloween mask on my head was all it would take, especially when waking my brother or sister for school.
Once, and this is a good one that my mom still talks about today, I got my dad really good. We had just gotten home from a family get together. Dad was pulling up our driveway and letting everyone know to get their trash and personal belongings from the inside the van and to not leave empty-handed. It was late at night and everyone was really tired. When the van came to a stop, everyone was gathering their stuff. I had already gathered my things and asked to be let out. Mom opened the sliding door and I slid out.
I ran around the back of the van and climbed up the steel bumper, scaled the spare tire, and pulled myself up onto the roof. I quietly slid myself from the back of the van to just over the driver side door. I waited, and waited... and waited. Finally, my dad opened the door and began to step out. As he did, I grabbed his shoulder and neck and moaned real loud. I have never seen my father scream like a little girl, but that night he screamed like 100 little girls. I also realized how fast a grown man could run and cuss at a 12-year-old boy. My mom had to hide me for the rest of the night!
One Halloween I made a haunted house out of cardboard boxes from some furniture that my parents had just ordered. This haunted house had black lights, streamers and strobe lights and went down our sidewalk and up to our front door.
Each trick-or-treater had to walk through the cardboard contraption to get their candy. (Did I mention that I was hiding inside?)
A mother and her little monster started walking through my haunted house. The child was getting upset and the mom was saying, “Don’t worry, don’t worry.”
As they got about halfway in, I jumped out and roared. The mother screamed bloody murder, dropped her kid and ran. The child got up and ran quickly behind. Needless to say, they didn’t come back.
About a month ago, my four-year-old son got me good. He wasn’t even trying and that is what has me worried.
I was putting clothes away in my closet and backed up to grab another shirt to be hung from off the bed when out of the corner of my eye, I saw a three-foot figure looking up at me.
Ethan was supposed to be in bed. I jumped out of my socks and almost woke his little sister with my scream.
Ethan didn’t know what to do, mostly because he wasn’t trying to scare me. I saw a sheepish look on his face and a wry smile started to form below his little nose. He knew he had just done something great. He had just “GOT” Daddy!
Before I knew it, he was running off to tell Mommy that “ I scared Daddy real bad!” In the distance, I could hear sets of laughter and realized a crown was getting passed down to the next generation.
Bryan Pinkey can be reached lurking in a closet or at bpinkey@nccox.com.