basements

When I still had to go to bed in the early evening, my parents would occasionally do the household chores after they were free of me and my brother for the night. The washing machine was in the basement, directly under my room, so that I could hear it, especially when it was overloaded with towels and started clanking during the spin cycle. Whenever I would hear this rhythmic metallic sound in the basement, I would huddle under my covers, envisioning a parade of skeletons marching around the basement.

Ginevra

When I was younger my dad told me that there was a alligator in the basement and that if I didn't go to sleep he would come out and eat me. That really scared me since I slept in the basement. Now he says that to my children to keep them out of his basement.

Anon

I used to believe that Mr. Rodgers lived in the coal celler in my basement, and that all of his shows were filmed from there.

Anon

When I was little my dad would tell me that Dino from the Flinstone's was evil and he ate little kids. He also said that he lived in my basement. I truly believed that it was true and never went in my basement

Erin

I use to believe that my basement was filled with water halfway up the stairs with elephants waiting to catch me if I dared open the basement door(which my mother told us not to).

Joy in Spfd., MO

my grandparents had a dark, unfinished part of their basement. their washer/dryer was there and a cupboard where they kept cleaning products. my brother thought mr. clean was a real man and that he lived in my grandparents' basement. it terrified him. he was three.

Anon

when I was little, I used to believe... if you had to go to a dark and spooky place, like the basement at night, you should sing really loud, THAT would scare the ghosts away.

Joan

My dad was pretty sick of the ‘why’ question by the time I was 5 or 6 so he started making things up just for a laugh. In Kindergarten or 1st grade we were discussing how a thermostat works and I corrected the teacher because she had it all wrong. My father told me that there was a little man down in the cellar in the furnace and when he got cold he turned it on and when it got warm he turned it off. The thermostat just told him we were a little cold so he could warm us up. I refused to shut up about the little man in the furnace until my teacher called home and my dad had to tell me the truth as far as I could understand it. You have to realize that my father was the smartest man I the world and he would never lie to me.

Ya…I did the same to my daughter for years :)

John Johnson

When my brother and I were kids we would get sent to the old basement to retrieve drinks and pop for everyone while visiting our Grandparents. We were convinced horrible monsters lay in wait in the long dark storage room next to recreation room. The drill was to turn on all the lights and slowly walk to the far end of the room, showing no fear because they would come for. Get what you came for and walk back past the two black gaping doorways. You knew they were going to get you if you showed fear and ran for the stairs so you walked up the first couple steps, then spun around a hit the lights and ran for the top...slamming the door and hitting the lock. (Why turn off the lights? Well, who wanted to be told to go back down there to turn them off!)

Funny tho, we never refused to go down. I do remember an expedition with all my cousins one summer to root out those monsters. Seven little kids with golf clubs, bats and flashlights trying to root them out together. Them or us we figured :)

Todd

To keep us out of the unfinished basement my grandfather told us kids that there were crocodiles living down there.

At my grandma’s basement there was a hold in the middle of the floor to sweep dirt and water into after a storm. It was shallow and covered with a piece of wood. For years I thought it was a portal to Hell or a grave.

Anon

When I was like 3 years my grandfather died and a few years later I discovered a hole covered with a metal plate underneath the stairs in our basement.
Until I was 10 or so I kept thinking that my dead grandfather was buried in there.
Until my parents built a wall there so there is no space underneath the stairs I was scared to hell whenever I passed that hole!

Tobi

In the home I lived in as a kid we had a second storage area in the basement. There was no door in the door frame and our furnace was down there. All I ever saw was the red light from the furnace and my parents told me it was santa's eye and that it watched me. So every time I went in the basement I'd run and jump passed the open doorframe so santa couldn't see me

Kali

I used to think Skeletor lived in my basement and plotted evil against me. The Bee from Romper Room was his leader.

Kat

Between the ages of 7 and 9 I truly believed that Freddy Krueger lived in the hot water tank in my basement. When I'd have to go to the basement to get anything I would creep down the stairs slowly until the bottom step then I would run as fast as I could to get whatever it was I needed (usually some toy I'd left down there) and then I would bolt back up the stairs as to not disturb him.

Danielley

i always thought that if you went into the basement or the garage without any lights on that someone would kill me, but if the lights were on i'd be fine. Even to this day when i'm done in the basement i run up the steps slam the door and turn off the lights...like they couldn't just shoot me in the back

Jack

i used to believe that there were mini aliens with machine guns that lived in the basement (i know, wieerd!!) but were invisible until you turned your back. i used to run like hell up the basement stairs!

Anon

When I was little, my mom used to sit me in front of the TV and put on the 'neverending story'. The wolf scared me to death but, as I later found out, she thought I loved the movie because I always looked so intense. Well, this movie led to frantic dashes up the basement stairs (and still continues to this day if I get paranoid enough) because the wolf in the movie OF COURSE lived in my basement

Anon

When I was 3, my grandma let me watch ET (the movie) in her basement. It scared me to death and from 3 to 10 I believed ET lived behind the pipes in the back of my grandma's basement. I never went to the back of the basement by myself and had to turn on all the lights to even go to the basement.

confuzzled

When I was younger, I was always afraid of being in the basement by myself if it was dark, so if I was turning off the lights at night, I would run up the stairs. After I turned off the lights, I was convinced that monsters came out and had a party in my basement.

Anon

when I was a small child, my brother and I would say "I want ... , I want ... , I want ..." sometimes my dad would say, "yeah, and the people downstairs want ice water"

I was always afraid to go into the basement because I was afraid of all the thristy people that were hiding down there.

lulu