Scary Made-up Stories

So some have been bugging me to update my blog, cuz it has been a while. Unfortunately, I am so burned out from a long week at work (its only Thursday!) that my brain is a bit fried to think of stuff to write about. My sister tells me to just make it up. The last time I can remember making something up, it turned out rather scary.

I worked at a summer camp for inner-city children for 2 summers between my first couple years in college. What a great experience! Of course, with any camp, there are all the scary stories to tell around the campfire. This camp, being as it has been around since 1940 or so, had a lot of stories that had carried over from year to year. I was no good at telling them. At least that's what I thought...until one night...

I was in charge of the horse program at camp. During the summer we had six 12-day sessions of kids. Every session, we took a select group of kids out for one overnight campout with the horses. We would ride about 45 minutes outside of the main campgrounds to a small clearing that was called Lost Village. It was a pretty neat spot. The main area was this big flat space with a spot for a campfire and more than enough space for the kids to spread out their sleeping bags and sleep out under the stars. There was a separate clearing where we would tie up all the horses and a nearby spring where we could water them. The camp staff would drive all the food and the kids' sleeping bags up earlier in the day and everything would be waiting for us to set up for a fun night under the stars.

We would start the evening out with an easy hike up to a spot where you could look straight out to the ocean and we would watch the sun set over Ft. Bragg, located on the north coast of California. What a view. Then we would head back down for hot dogs, and later, s'mores. One particular night, over some especially good s'mores, all the kids begged for a scary story. I didn't really like the common stories that are told frequently around the place: Bat Boy, The Ridge Runner, and numerous others, so I decided to make-up my own. I decided to make up a story about how this particular area came to be known as Lost Village.

Mind you, I cannot remember much of anything of that story as it has been about 6 years since I made it up. But what I do remember is that I don't think those kids, nor myself, were ever as scared as that night. It wasn't long before I noticed that they were no longer sitting on the opposite side of the campfire, but rather they were crowding in close around me and my other staff member friend, Liz. But by then it was too late, I was too far into the story to quit. So I kept it going and the kids eyes got wider and wider....then all of a sudden...SNAP! Something behind me made a loud sound and I jumped off the ice chest that served as my bench, and kids jumped to my side, clinging to me fiercely. I turned around and looked and didn't see anything. Much relieved, I sat down again and the kids relaxed. Then an eery quiet settled over the place. I believe my story was done at this point and the kids were about to get ready for bed and clean up the campsite. I sensed something behind me and as I slowly turned, a figure appeared out of the shadows walking towards me. I screamed louder than I ever have before and kids scattered everywhere...I couldn't stop screaming, even AFTER I recognized the figure as being one of the staff members from camp who had snuck up to our campout to scare us all. Well he did a darn good job of it...I was screaming like a mad woman and wouldn't shut up. He had to grab me and shake me out of it.

Looking back, it was pretty darn funny. I guess I succeeded at my mission to tell a scary story. But I don't think the storyteller is supposed to scare themselves. No more making stuff up for me!

Until next time...