1.) Chasing lights actually moved. It blew my mind when I realized that it was an illusion. Fact: I was like 15 when I finally realized this.
2.) There was somebody somewhere who could read my mind and control me with a remote control. This belief came about because four-year-old-me could not figure out how, say, my arm moved when I wanted it to, or how I could walk. It all seemed really magical, but because I figured magic wasn’t real I decided that the next best answer was that there was somebody somewhere who figured out what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it and controlled me like a remote control car.
3.) The clock would only move its hour hand when I wasn’t looking, just to spite me. I 100% BELIEVED THIS. I used to go sit in front of the clock for five minutes and not take my eyes off of that hour hand. I KNEW I COULD CATCH IT MOVING. But then I would get bored and leave and when I came back an hour later IT HAD MOVED AND I KNEW IT DID THIS ON PURPOSE.
4.) There was a toilet monster who was going to shut the toilet seat on me while I was sitting on it and make me fall in and get flushed.
5.) The vacuum wanted to eat me and all of my toys.
6.) Wishing upon a star worked and that was how I was going to turn into a gerbil. I thought about this really hard one night when I was about… six, weighed the pros and cons (Cons: loss of intelligence, really short life span. Pro: Get to run around in wheels and balls and tubes all day) and then warned my mom that night not to be surprised if I was a gerbil in the morning.
Yeah, things were special in Baby Pike World.
I thought it was someone’s job to sit in an office underneath every stop light and change the lights for the cars.
I also thought there was a toilet monster, only mine was a vampire. He had a little sitting room underneath the u-bend, and if you didn’t shut the lid on him, then he would come out and kill you. Thus, public restrooms were super traumatizing for me (NO LIDS AUGH).
I didn’t think someone was controlling me via remote control, but I did often wonder if everyone around me was a robot, or if I was one. Mostly because I couldn’t tell what they were thinking (like, I couldn’t read their thoughts) so I wasn’t sure if they had any.
I also believed you could only have a baby if you were married and you asked God to send you one.
@ Bell – Okay, the light-changing job? I want that.
Babies I never really thought about which is kind of weird because I’m the oldest so “my mom having babies” was a normal thing for me. I was probably about ten when I finally asked my mom about the mechanics on “how it all got there in the first place,” she told me it was “Like how the guinea pigs do it” because we had pet guinea pigs at the time.
Yup. Like guinea pigs.
Ooh! I was really scared about the toilet flushing for a long time there. I would shut the lid and open the toilet door, ready to rush out as soon as I had pressed the button 😀
I was also scared of water noisily going down the drain after you have a bath.
I believed dogs were boys and cats were girls when I was younger! A part of me still weirdly believes that it could be the case…
Oh I forgot this one in my post, Bell’s comment reminded me!
I thought that somebody would come in at the cinema and put the video in to start the movie.
And I didn’t think anybody else had thoughts either, like, I was the main character of this book I was clearly in. They were just there for show.
AND oh! I thought there was a little man who lived underneath the lamp posts and turned them on when it got dark. I can’t remember if I thought there was one for every lamp post and they lived in a little box, or if it was one big space under all of them for one man to do, but, yup.
Kay, 3, not 1, shush.