Nothing is scarier than children. That is a scientific fact. Horror movies use wispy laughter of children, ghosts of children, and even children being possessed by television sets (I see this every time My Little Pony is on). That being said, sometimes my children venture into truly creepy territory.

One of the earliest memories I have of this involves child One. She had just gotten into a ‘big-girl’ bed and was newly potty trained. I would wake at odd times of the night with this feeling of someone watching. A small face, bathed in green light from a digital clock would stare and in a high and raspy voice say, “daddy…..juice” The first few times were the worst. My dream worlds would blend with the little Golem beside my bed and paralyze me with momentary fear. Eventually my subconscious figured out what was going on and these incidents became more of an annoyance.

No worries though because she kicked it up a notch. As she got older she would tell me stories about her ghost friends. I don’t know where she learned about ghosts, maybe from Scooby-Doo. I thought, perhaps, this was an imaginary friend scenario where the word ghost was inserted for imaginary. Then we had this conversation:

Me: So these friends. They are imaginary huh?
One: No daddy they are my ghost friends.
Me: Soooo, where did they come from.
One: They died.
Me: I see. What are their names?
One: I don’t know, they have a baby though.
Me: Oh like a ghost mommy and a ghost daddy had a ghost baby?
One: No the baby died and is a ghost too. They are so funny.
Me: Do you want to go watch Spongebob? I need to pick up some salt at the store and soak the carpet in holy water.

Creeped out yet? Yeah me too. So what awesome parenting thing did I do?
Nothing at all. Ignore it and hope it goes away.

It hung around for a while and I think she told me once that one of the ghost friends was an old relative of some sort, Great Granddad maybe? Some ghost dogs joined the story later and I think she has moved from child Medium to teller of interesting imaginary friends stories.
So if your kid doesnt see dead people and dogs, and doesn’t play with them in their spare time, you might be a better parent than me. You’re welcome.

Underdaddy to the rescue.