What A Nightmare!

I was in the fifth grade when I watched my first horror movie--Nightmare on Elm Street--at my friend Robin's birthday party. 


Her parents were not as strict as mine; they allowed things like horror movies and ouija board games. If my parents would have known those things were part of the birthday activities, they probably wouldn't have allowed me to go. 

Other wholesome games included "stiff as a board, light as a

feather," which, all these years later, I cannot remember how you play or what's the point of the game. 

There was another game, too, where you stare into a mirror and repeat "mother Mary, mother Mary, mother Mary." Or maybe you're supposed to say "Bloody Mary" over and over again. I can't remember which phrase. Anyway, you're supposed to repeat it five times and then something happens, though I can't recall what. I'm pretty sure it was supposed to be terrible. 

I kept to the fringes of the occult games, caught between wanting to be cool and participate but feeling scared that I might be going straight to hell. What would my mother say? What would my minister say if either of them knew? 

In my fifth grade mind, I pictured the red devil with his half man, half goat body, greeting me at the gates of hell after God crushed me with a lightning bolt, the devil saying, "Oh, yes, here we are. We have a seat reserved just for you."  

Mutually horrified and terrified when I got home hours later, I couldn't tell my parents what occurred at Robin's birthday party, fearing that they would be angry with me and at Robin's parents. 

Furthermore, I felt supremely guilty, too, honestly fearing that I had unwittingly participated in some kind of devil worship. I was scared to go to bed, staying up to stare at my open closet door, fearing that Freddy would pop out of there, ready to rip me to shreds with his long metal claws. Not to mention that God would smite me dead as punishment for my wicked ways. 

It was a long, anxious night. I finally fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. I remember waking up the next morning and thinking: Yes! I survived the night! I didn't die after all. 

Fast forward to my present day life. I don't really think the ouija board or playing those silly games "stiff as a board, light as a feather" or bloody Mary are acts of devil worship. Come to think of it, I don't know what would qualify as devil worship. They are parlor trick games meant to freak you out--nothing more, nothing less. In that regard, they certainly succeeded. 

What are your ghoulish childhood memories? 

Happy Halloween, everyone.