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What did you believe?

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21:04 / 12.10.02

In the spirit of this site, what were some of the strange things you believed as a kid? I used to believe that if you moved fast enough, you could catch your shadow. Or that there was a litlte man in the refridgerator that would turn off the light when you closed it (It wasn't until I was 9 that i actually figured out there was a toggle switch that the door tapped).

21:21 / 12.10.02

I believed that there were poisonous snakes at the foot of my bed, cobras, I think, and that wearing socks to sleep prevented them from biting me. Not because of the thickness of the socks, but because logically the snakes would not want to get fuzz in their mouths.

The Apple-Picker

21:24 / 12.10.02

I used to believe that my dolls and other toys came to life in the night, when I was asleep.

I used to believe that there was a boy who lived in my closet, which opened to a different world, and he collected children in the night.

I believed that a man would come to my second-story window and aim a revolver at me in my bed.

I believed that vampires came into my room at night and that the only protection was to sleep with a sheet fully covering my body, top of head to tip of toe, as I slept through the night, even on the hottest nights.

I used to believe that I could create my own little personal aircraft from spare plywood and bicycle wheels.

I used to believe that when they got married, that was the end of the story.

I convinced my younger brother to believe that...

...all the continents were connected by a complex system of bridges and that we could drive to Antarctica if we wanted.

...the world was in the stomach of a giant man.

...he was a human child that we (his parents, sister, and I) were raising as part of an experiment, we being immigrants from the planet ZrGREEEEEEEEEE-BOT!

Okay, my sister and I never convinced him of that last one, but lord how we tried!

21:38 / 12.10.02

Mazarine, thats the cutest thing ever.

When I was 10 my cousin and I used an old barbeque pit and my uncles intercom system to convince my little sister that "The Ghost of New York" was going to barbeque her head and eat it. Then I convinced her it was going to get on the plane with us and eat our mom.

Bastard.

22:11 / 12.10.02

I used to believe that they only showed old programmes on my grandmother's television. She still had a black and white tv and hadn't yet bought a colour one.

I also used to believe that that it was a ghost operating the automatic stylus on the record player and I would hide behind the armchair (or so I'm told).

00:43 / 13.10.02

I remember when I was about 9 that I thought Comic Relief raised more money the longer you kept your TV on and watched, I understood it as effort and suffering for the cause, looking back I can see why.

03:08 / 13.10.02

I remember finding out that commercials repeated on Tv, they weren't constantly new ones...

I always assigned personalities and characters to inanimate objects like furniture, belongings, etc. Oddly enough I still do this...

The Return Of Rothkoid

03:20 / 13.10.02

I used to believe that cybermen lived in our bathroom, just waiting for tiny me to go to the loo.

Evil tin bastards.

Solitaire Rose as Tom Servo

04:32 / 13.10.02

When I was a kid I honestly believed everything my friends told me, so I believed that Kevin had a Wonka-Mobile that would make candy as it drove, and that there was a hidden chamber in the back of his closet that led to other houses.

I believed when I was about 5 or so that there were ghosts that would move my toys when I couldn't find them, and that they weren't happy about me coming up to my room to take a nap because it meant they couldn't play with them anymore.

My parents are notoriously late for everything, and I thought that when you saw a movie you'd go in at anytime and watch until you got to the part where you came in and then left.

I spent a summer digging a hole in the back yard, utterly convinced that if I did it right, I could dig an underground roller coaster I would be able to ride on with my wagon.

09:39 / 13.10.02

I believed that there were lions in the pipes and that the noise of a bath draining or the loo flushing was the lions roaring, preparatory to leaping out of the plug-hole and devouring everything in sight.

Not sure that I actually believed this to be the truth, but I still got myself out of the bathroom as quickly as possible and shut the door very hard.

10:10 / 13.10.02

I lived in this naive, optimistic belief that as one got older the job, family, house, spiffy car, and all just sort of showed up.
I believed that people were inherently good, except that strange older couple one rarely saw outside their home.
Mazarine, what about cottonmouths?

12:44 / 13.10.02

As a child I was petrified of spontaneous combustion. The worst thing was that there was no measures to be taken it against it. Not even sitting in a bath 24/7.
Of course, the most horrifying aspect of this what that I got this obsession after watching an episode of Toksvig on ITV...

13:42 / 13.10.02

I used to think that when you were born you didn't have fingernails, and someone took you to the Doctor and ze stuck them on you.

It's no very otherworldly, I know...

Our Lady of The Two Towers

15:05 / 13.10.02

I remember that when I was still young enough that I had a booster chair in the back of the car believing that when my parents got in the car they actually chopped off the leg that was still outside the car, then grew a new one immediately. It was really disappointing when I found out my parents weren't salamanders, or indeed any part of the lizzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzard family.

One of my earliest memories is being in the back garden of my parents house (which would mean I was at least 2 because we moved there when I was about 18 months old) and seeing what looked like a milkfloat for dwarves come through a gap in the hedge at the bottom of the garden (which is why I've always had a bit of a soft spot for that bit in Volume 2 of the Invisibles about how babies see the things (are they antibodies?) that adults don't).

I also, from around the same time, remember thinking there were only two or three days to a week. Were the big strikes of the 70s still on around 78/79? Was it that some of the first words I could understand were related to the three day working weeks?

17:58 / 13.10.02

i used to believe that the moon followed me around wherever i'd go. just didn't understand that you could see that distant fucking rock from everywhere...

Cloned Christ on a HoverDonkey

19:17 / 13.10.02

I had an old black and white portable TV in my bedroom and used to believe that I could derive "hyper-powers" by placing my palms on the static filled screen for a few minutes.

I would then run around our estate, in and out of neighbours' gardens, really believing that I was going too fast for them to see me.

I convinced a friend of mine that this was true and, after both of us recharging our hyper-powers, we both followed an old man, at a distance of about 6 feet, for about half an hour, convinced that we were invisible.

We weren't. We were grounded. hehe.

The Apple-Picker

20:33 / 13.10.02

My dad is bald on the top of his head. When I was a small child, I used to believe that he went to the barber to get his hair especially cut like that.

20:59 / 13.10.02

If you put your hand in a swimming pool immediately after it has had chlorine poured in it, when you draw your hand out it will be nothing but a skeleton hand.

The characters on a He-Man: Masters of the Universe poster will become real and defend you if monsters or burglars enter your room--even the bad guy characters.

Harrison Ford is able to portray Han Solo in "The Empire Strikes Back," and then grow beard stubble veryvery fast so he can run to the next theatre and portray Indiana Jones in "Temple of Doom."

07:29 / 14.10.02

I believed my mate Mark when he told me he had a space ship that he kept in the garage. When I walked past the block of flats where he lived and noticed he didn't have a garage, I imagined the flats opening up at the front like a kinda gigantic Batcave and the ship flying out. I'm still reeling from his betrayal.

I also remember being very, very freaked out by shadows, and trying to detach mine and run away from it - damn thing follows you everywhere!

I remember trying really hard to make psychokinesis work - it didn't, though it should have.

13:26 / 14.10.02

I love this thread.

I used to believe that:

- as you ate, the food would gradually fill your body from the toes up. So if you ate enough, or lived long enough, you'd literally fill yourself up and have food coming out of your mouth.

- the past was black & white (the past being everything before WW2, and some bits of Britain up to and the including the mid 60s).

- all films were shot in one continuous take, like a stage play, so a 90 minute film would take 90 mins to make. I might even have thought it was all live as you watched it, and it had to be re-enacted every time you saw it on telly, but that's prolly a fake memory.

Up to a certain age I believed everything that my older brother told me, including:

- the fact that heads are made out of wood

- that a monster had emerged from the woods which were just visible from his bedroom window and that it was doing terrible monstery things outside the newsagents in the small parade of shops round the corner, where mum used to buy me sweets. I was terrified - an actual monster! I vividly remember chasing my laughing brother round the garden, tears streaming down my face, begging him not to leave after he told me he was going to pop round to have a look at it. Eventually he twigged that he'd be in trouble for making me cry, so he yelled back (as he ran out the gate): "It's alright, it's not true!" to which I replied: "But I don't know what true means!" Which was true, at the time.

02:57 / 15.10.02

...the things I believed that my older brother told me i.e. everything...so embarrasing...

The best one being that when he was at a friend's birthday party they went to this restaturant where you could go inside the video games and have people control you as you ran around inside Super Mario. I believed that for awhile.

I saw a map of the world showing locations of major dinosaur finds in a dinosaur book as a kid. I asked my parents where we lived on the map and they pointed to the tiny bit that was eastern canada, which had a dinosaur over it. After that I was convinced that there were dinosaur bones under my house and that we should move the house and dig them up.

04:48 / 15.10.02

Heh, that's a really adorable story, Saveloy. And you're not alone. I break a smile everytime I read these.

I also used to think that all the states were colored like they were on the map in my first grade teacher's room. Needless to say I was pretty fucking amazed to find out that Texas wasn't orange or that Kansas wasn't blue when we went to visit family members there.

I'm still a bit disappointed about it.

The Natural Way

09:37 / 15.10.02

Up until the tender age of 11, I believed that women couldn't get pregnant unless they were married. So, one day I'm sitting there getting real confused watching a doc about teenmums and I'm scratching my head and eventually I pipe up w/ "How can they be pregnant?! They're not even Married!" ....Well, that was a very embarrasing day for me: "mongy" faces and sound effects all round.

pointless and uncalled for

09:48 / 15.10.02

I used to believe that I would grow up to be a nice, respectable member of society.

I used to believe that Sam Fox would marry me if I asked nicely.

I used to believe that my dad could do anything and my mum could do even more.

I used to believe that one day Santa would see how cruel my brother was to me and switch our presents so I would get the really good ones for once.

I never believed in the Easter Bunny, I mean seriously, how lame is that.

09:49 / 15.10.02

Yeah this is a fucking ace thread. I remember believing that whenever you died you'd end up in a crucifix shape - all games involving death and disaster played with my cousins ended up with the dead party arms spread out on the floor, legs together.

The Natural Way

09:59 / 15.10.02

I also believed:

- My Grandad was going to build my mates and I battlesuits (designed to our specifications) that'd turn us all into superheroes. I grew out of that, eventually coming to the conclusion that, at the factory where Grandad worked, it would be impossible for him to get hold of the correct fabrics for superhero costumes - it would be much easier for him to turn us all into Transformers. I would be Ironhide. Or Trucks.

- I had superpowers, anyway (as did everyone if only they'd PAY CLOSE ENOUGH ATTENTION). This belief was encouraged by the hugely hippy adults I hung out with who'd lift spells directly from the magickal tomes littering their shelves and explain to me "if you want to make yrself invisible, try this........"
Superpowers could normally be regenerated by heaters.

- God was always watching me. He saw into my head. This led to much pain and confusion after a late night prepubescent fumble with a 9 yr old ladyfriend. Afterwards, she fell asleep. I sat up all night worried that an angry God was going to send me to Hell. Oh yeah. I must have believed in Hell too. Bloody fuck, I remember the sense of relief when my Father explained to me that Jesus probably wasn't the Son of God.....

- That my Grandad was going to build my mates and I an arsenal of weapons (incl. explosive bolas, laser swords and vibro whips) that would lead to the formation of a new band of Musketeers for the 20th C. This was inspired by Dogtanian and my Grandad's highly skilled, ingenious work on the production line. Poor old bugger.

11:04 / 15.10.02

Let's see.

At night, if the closet doors were closed, the monsters living inside wouldn't be able to get me.

When getting out of bed in the middle of the night, I had to keep my feet away from the bed, so the monsters living under it couldn't grab my ankles and pull me under. This involved flying leaps to and from the bed. Luckily, I never miscalcuated how far I had to jump.

When I was about 8, I came to the conclusion that my entire life was a dream and eventually I'd wake up and I'd be four again. (If only this were true).

If you dug far enough, you would end up on the other end of the world. I never got to test this theory, as every time my hole was around 6 feet deep, I got in trouble and had to fill it in.

If I had a knife like MacGyver, I could do all the neat things he can.

When I was 16, my parents would buy me the car of my dreams.

Kentucky was called the "bluegrass state" because the grass was blue. I was a bit disappointed when the grass was green like every other place.

11:41 / 15.10.02

Nan:

"God was always watching me. He saw into my head."

*shudder* me too. I can't remember where I got it from, but I believed for quite a long time that masturbation was a perversion, and that you could catch VD from it! But worst of all, it made God cross. Thank Christ for sex education and atheism!

Speaking of God, I used to believe that all anyone did in Heaven was sit around on lovely green hills all day just 'being'. One day, my tiny nipper brain got to thinking about eternity, and tried to imagine what an eternity of sitting around on a lovely green hill would be like, knowing that it would never end - and it facking terrified me. It wasn't just the boredom, the stasis that bothered me; I tried to think of ways that eternal life might be made interesting - travelling round space, perhaps - but however I imagined it, the simple fact of knowing that I would be forced to keep going for ever, that that was it and there would be no finish; well, it put the willies up me something chronic. Of course, being tiny and religious I had absolutely no doubt whatsoever that this was going to happen. My first moment of self-inflicted horror, eesh. It still bothers me now.

13:01 / 15.10.02

Thank Christ for sex education and atheism!

uh-huh, i think we can all have a drink to that!

13:32 / 15.10.02

I slept with my sheets covering me from head to toe, too, as protection against vampires. And with my curved hand placed protectively on the side of my neck. Once I sculpted a wooden stake and hid it under my pillow, because I knew the bastards were coming to get me one of those days. Yeah I was pretty much psyched about vampires back then.

I believed I could run at Flash-like speeds, and was always trying to run faster. I was always running.

I believed people on the tv set could actually see me.

I believed that my father had a huge treasure hidden behind a secret wall in our old home.

I believed in God and I constantly talked to him. The bastard never bored to answer back even once.

I believed in everything I read, in everything I saw on tv. It took me a while to learn no to.

I believed Death sometimes would call you by name, and if you answered It would take you with It. So whenever I sort of thought someone was calling me but wasn't really sure, I'd never answer.

And the most embarrassing thing is, when I was a kid I really thought I was from another planet, and that there I was important and respected. One day they would remember me, show up in a beautiful spaceship and take me home...

13:42 / 15.10.02

I believed that in order to swear well you had to practise.
I believed that itches on your back were bright purple.

13:53 / 15.10.02

I believed my Dad was the best driver in the world, and recognised as such by all other drivers. I think he'd still insist that was true.

I believed there were secret passageways in the walls of our house, despite all the evidence to the contrary, and would go around knocking on them hoping to hear the shift in tone that would indicate a hidden door.

I believed that magic had to be true, because reality was far too mundane to be all there was. And so I spent lots of time looking for fairies and trying to do spells.

And I used to do the monsters-under-the-bed leap too, Trihaos.

15:41 / 15.10.02

I believed my cousin when he told me that hamsters were "all around us", and that they carried machine guns, which they hid within the folds of their fur.

My friend Bill believed his dad when he told him that they'd found a Dalek's nest on the building site he was working on, and that he'd throw Bill in it if he didn't behave himself.

16:23 / 15.10.02

I believed...

...that God had told me I didn't have to brush my teeth because we had made a deal that he would protect them for me. And that worked well for about five years, when all of a sudden I got like ten cavities in one dentist visit. I guess I did something to break the deal...

...that the skeleton my friends and I dug up in this circle of stone in the woods behind his house was the skeleton of a demon. As an adult, I decided that it must have been a horse.

...I could learn telekensis if I stared at a pencil for an hour afterschool every day. I think one of my brother's friends told me it was true after an episode of Ark II. Tomorrow People didn't help either.

...only men drink beer and only women drink wine.

18:35 / 15.10.02

I believed that Sean Quinn really *had* build a huge underground fort at the beach, with a trapdoor and Oriental rugs to keep the sand from filling in and a TV and bookcase and stuff.

I believed that other people really existed. Sometimes.

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