Under-the-bed Monsters

Faith is a funny thing. It really comes with being a grown-up. We have to have faith all the time. So much so that it could make a person go insane.

They always say, 'Have childlike faith,' but children don't have to have faith in anything. Mommy drives them to all the places they need to be, she feeds them, she clothes them, she makes all their decisions for them and she buys them the Christmas presents they ask for. They don't have to think about any of that stuff or worry about it at all. There's no faith necessary in the life of a child.

But as adults, we constantly have to believe in things we cannot see and be certain of what we hope for. All that fancy talk just means that we have to appease ourselves constantly. We have worries and fears that would be scarier to any kid than even the monster under her bed. And all the while, we have to tell ourselves whatever works to assauge our nerves and anxieties so we can get through another day doing all the things that we have to do.

I want to go back to kindergarten. When even though I worried about how late my mom might be in picking me up from daycare, it didn't take any ounce of miracle to have faith that she would show. Why can't Mommy get rid of all of my fears and doubts now? It's hard out here for a girl on her own. But that's the tricky part, isn't it? I'm not really a girl anymore. (shut up, Britney Spears...) I'm an adult.

Yikes. Maybe that's scarier than all my fears and doubts and under-the-bed monsters.