C H I L D H O O D ::: The Beginning, Balls of Light, Missing Time

The nightmares started young, and bad enough that I still remember some of them almost thirty years later.
The first ones were ghosts. They'd stalk me through the house, chase me through doorways into rooms without light. Then came the Mad Hatters, stick figures with black top hats so big only their bony legs could be seen. They would hold tight and we'd fly. And then started the toys. They'd chase me around the room, growing larger and full of evil. Dolls weren't so cute when their eyes grew bigger than their heads. I didn't keep many dolls, and favorite toys quickly fell out of favor as they made their appearence in nightmares.

The Beginning

My folks were in the military, and we moved a lot.
Every house we lived in was haunted.
No, of course that's not true, but as children, my younger brother and I believed it. There were always shadows, and the floating balls of light.
The creepiest place in any home was the hallway. The spookiest moment, right before you flipped on the light.

My memory of strange events began somewhere around age six. I woke and found I couldn't move, and I couldn't breathe. Something I can only compare to a balloon filled my mouth and nose, and when I tried to scream it expanded like bubblegum. Something touched my chest, then my temple, and there was a piercing crack like gunshot accompanied by a flash of brilliant white and sharp pain.
I heard a scream (probably my own), shot out of bed and fled to my parents room. I have a vague memory of telling them what happened, that someone stood outside shooting a gun. And even though they waved it off as a nightmare, dad went outside and checked.

From that point, my nightmares changed slightly, still including the poltergiest kind, but now I dreamed too, of war. Nightmares powerful enough to make me a doomsayer by age seven. The world would end, everyone would die, it was all hopeless.
Images of horrible bloody things, people screaming and dying, soldiers being killed on the battlefield. One was so vivid, I insisted to my dad that I was there watching a young soldier run across an airstrip when a hail of bullets hit. He grabbed his face then quickly pulled away, and stood there for seconds just staring at his hands. There was so much blood, he collapsed to his knees and turned toward me, a splattered eye socket washed blood down his face.
There was a feeling of horror, but more than that, one of great sadness. I cried whenever I thought of him being dead. I begged my dad to find out who he was. He was so real, I still sometimes believe there's a name for him out there that I need to know.
What triggered the new set of dreams could have been from that night, or something else I'll never know. But they continue, and made me part of who I am today.

Balls of Light

Many early memories that I can corroborate with my brother involve the floating lights.
My room was first off the living room and I'd see them float or zip past my door and toward the end of the hall where my brother and parent's rooms were. I'd tuck the blankets tight around my head and peek from under the edge.
Sometimes they came back to my room. Then I don't remember.
They were about the size of soccer balls, soft whitish, phospherant glow, fuzzy around the edges. Sometimes they floated slowly, other times, a zipping flash from the corner of the eye. They would hover at the edge of the doorway just a few feet off the floor, like peekaboo. A dip and look around the corner, then disappear. A few moments would pass then they'd do it again.
Despite fear, we always seemed to fall asleep anyway.

We'd tell our mother in the mornings, and she'd suggest possibilities such as guardian angels, the Sandman, and fairies. Good intentions, trying to make us feel not so afraid. But then, she never saw them.
We called them ghosts, and they appeared in all the houses we lived in.

Missing Time

The earliest memories and beginning were in California. And carried over to Texas and the next memorable event at about age eight.
We'd gone to see 'Star Wars', come home at eight, and I went to get ready for bed. In my room was a 'monster', blurry, grey, and what I considered a very tall and emaciated dog. I blinked, it disappeared and I ran out to tell my parents. I got chewed out for still being up at nine o'clock.

That was my first and only definite bout with missing time. I argued with them about having just gone in there, and they insisted I'd been so quiet, they thought I'd gone to sleep. But there I was, still dressed, wide awake, and an hour had passed with them only a room away.