The first time I experienced fear was on a late saturday afternoon.

I was around the age of three or four years old. My family had made their way to a birthday party across the street from our house. Lisa was having a birthday celebration for her three year old daughter Clarissa. I remember being excited because my best friend, Ava, who also lived on the our street, was there. As I continued into the small, dark, dusty house I noticed there being a good amount of adults there, which was understandable because Lisa was a very peculiar women. She never enrolled Clarisa into school, she was the one person I knew who cried for days after Michael Jackson passed away, she was a hamster rescuer, and she would come to our door asking for money.  As a four year old, all these characteristics were very weird to me. From those oddball interests and experiences, Lisa made some mysterious friends. Some might even call them a group of misfits because of how rare each of them were. All these friends were at her daughters birthday that day.

My three older sisters: Kelly, Devon, and Darcy, a very close friends who was like another sister Chelsea, and Ava were all running around the living room of Lisa’s house. None of us were very close with Clarisa because we all thought her family was very different than what we considered normal. We always saw the contrast in our learning as well. When Ava and I were learning how to read, Clarisa was just learning how to talk. There was a very big gap between the maturity level too, even though she was only a couple months younger than us. My family and their families were had a very close friendship. This made it easy to have a good time at this very uncomfortable birthday party.

As we made our way around the chairs and tables in the living room, playing games and running around, I noticed a man that stood out like bright light in the middle of a dark night. I had never seen anyone like him.
Fear can come in two forms: similar to a lightening bolt, fast and shocking or a very cold breeze that lingers on across your skin. To some while watching a scary movie and having something pop out and scare you, is like the lightening bolt. Shocking you, keeping you still for a second but slowly calming down. Having a fear of something and being aware of what that one thing is, is comparable to the cold breeze lingering over your head. Seeing this man was a combination of both.

As a four year old, I did not understand what was wrong with this man. The skin on his face was pink and folded with layers of skin peeling off. This was like seeing a monster. I tried to look for my parents, so they could protect me from this man. Even though this innocent person was not hurting me, talking to me, nor looking at me, I was terrified. As I looked around the house, I realized my parents had left the party. I went into a panic. I remember thinking that I could hide in the bathroom until my parents came back. Chelsea, seeing that I was panicking, helped find the bathroom with me. We waited, for what felt like forever, for the person in the bathroom to finish. As the bathroom door opened, I had a feeling like I was going to be okay. That thought quickly went away when this man I was trying to hide from walked out of the bathroom. Having him be right in front of me made me burst into tears. I had never feared someone so much before. I ran away to Ava’s mom, leaving Chelsea saying sorry to the man because of my actions. Everyone was sitting on the floor in the living room playing hot potato. Having all eyes on me, while I ran into the room, made me feel horrible for being scared of him. I jumped into Ava’s mom’s lap and asked what was wrong with the man.

That day I learned that people could be lit on fire and survive. The man I feared so much, had survived a fire, leaving him with all the skin on his body burned. Ava’s mom explained to me that Lisa had saved this man from a burning building. Being four years old I was amazed that Lisa, my weird neighbor, was a hero. I can’t remember what happened after crying in Ava’s mom’s arms but I can recall a feeling of guilt and sympathy for the burned man. 

The neighbors lost touch with Lisa and her family when we started to get older and all moved from Meridian Avenue. Only a few members from my family, the Reynolds and Lalezarzadah family remember that party and the burned man. That day and all faces of the people invited are still engraved in my memory.

If I had the chance to meet that man again, I would remind him of that day of Clarissa's birthday and then ask about how he came to get the burn scars. As a child I believed that Lisa actually saved him from a burning building but now as I think and remember the situation, I question the story.

I couldn’t stop that feeling of fear that overcome me, but I did change the way I viewed people from that point on.

“If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you, but your own judgement of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgement now.”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations