Cows At Night

Most people have at least one thing that creeps them out. Something that, when thought about or confronted with, raises the hair on the neck and makes the heart skip a beat. Or several beats.

For me, it’s rather weird and obscure- it’s a scene in a movie that I couldn’t finish, and the few seconds I watched it has stuck with me the years that have gone by since I saw it.

It really freaked me out. In the movie “Ghost Ship” there is a scene where the crew and passengers are on the deck of a cruise ship enjoying a starry night and dancing while the ship’s orchestra plays on. A steel cable on the ship snaps and whips across the deck at an amazing speed, slicing each passenger in half at about waist level in an instant. The orchestra slowly stops playing as each passenger’s upper half slides off their lower half and drops to the ground with a thud. Their legs stand a moment longer and then crumple to the ground.

Ugh.

Guillotines freak me out too. It’s the whole “hey, my head or upper torso just got separated from the rest of my body..crap…what am I going to do now?” thing. Its freaking me out even now….I have to stop for a bit…I will be back shortly to finish this.

I’m back. So, anyway, my wife Michelle has her own thing that freaks her out. While spiders and other creepy crawlies (including field mice that find their way into our house) scare her, the thing that FREAKS HER OUT are cows. In fields. In the dark.

We live in an area with large properties, horse farms and pastures filled with bovine characters of every stripe and color. At night, as we drive the rolling winding roads our headlights occasionally light up a portion of a pitch black field…and there…starting ominously at us like they’ve been waiting for us all night…are…..cows.

I like to flash the high-beams and point out various patches of cows to Michelle as we drive. She doesn’t appreciate it.

She can’t really explain why it freaks her out… she quite loves cows during the day. She has always been partial to them, and even slows down to a near stop while driving the roads (IN THE DAYLIGHT ONLY) to "ooh" and "aaah" at the newly born calves that hobble along next to their mothers. But at night, they transform into the creatures of her darkest nightmares.

What freaks you out?