For a couple of years Maia had an intense fear of going into our home garage. We have a door that opens from the office into the garage, where the laundry, extra refrigerator and extra cleaning and toilet paper supplies are. As an eleven year old, Maia was already doing her own laundry and replacing her own toilet paper for many years, but while I was away at university, Maia started to adamantly refuse to enter the garage.
Now, we have dealt with rats coming into our garage ever since the neighbourhood cat died. We live close to the foothills and many neighbours also deal with similar issues, so setting rat traps and seeing the occasional sneaky guy in our fruit trees is familiar and sort of fun, to me at least. But I guess getting your soccer balls chewed up is not so fun.
Maia, on the other hand, has become absolutely traumatised by the sight and sound of something scurrying in our garage. Every time we smell a strange odour in the garage, we let the dog loose and she quickly finds another suspect caught and killed, but that doesn’t seem to bother Maia as much as the idea of one darting across her path. Perhaps she saw one once and that was enough for her. But now as a “grown up” tween, she makes puppy eyes at whichever person she thinks will most likely go fetch her something out of the garage fridge or replace the toilet rolls for her. Maia will do just about anything to not have to enter the garage, even to the point of offering me some of her birthday money to go in for her.
When she is forced to go in herself, she props open the door and sings and shouts so loudly that any conversation inside must come to a halt. It first starts with loud complaints of having to go in, but that quickly gives way to an ABBA or Disney soundtrack number. You’ll know if Maia has to go in the garage, and so will the neighbours two or three houses down.
This is a bit different than how I approached what I feared when I was young. When I feared something, I would quietly observe how others dealt with it and even let out a small scream if it abruptly came near me. But I quickly learned that I didn’t need to fear things if I was in control. So, I often did things that scared me on purpose. I learned to be able to control things, but especially to control my own fear. If it scared me, I would walk with my eyes locked straight ahead and keep going. I decided that it wouldn’t scare me. That way, I was in control.
When I was on Masaka Road, this meant that when I feared for my life I still kept my head on straight and did what needed to be done. I couldn’t let the surrounding horrors scare me because then I wouldn’t be able to act. Yes, adrenaline played a huge part in that, but there were multiple times when a pause in activity left me wondering if I could dart behind the farthest tree and avoid the whole scene.
It’s no secret that I like control. After years and years, it would seem that every trial and temptation stems from my desire for control. But as much as I love control, it seems equally true that I let fear control me more often than not. Things that threatened my perceived control scared me more than anything. But what I still fear most is that God might have a different plan for me than the life I envision. Instead of keeping my head straight and doing what is put in front of me, I loudly protest, and even try to barter with God. I make sure the whole neighbourhood and everyone around me knows my objections to what I am having to do. What kind of counterintuitive behaviour is it that takes over me?
Life has thrown me some lemons, but God isn’t keen on my obnoxious protests. When Jesus was tempted in the desert, He didn’t clang symbols and tell everyone how much He hated what God was allowing to happen. He kept His eyes locked ahead and told the devil what was what.
When I am tempted to let fear probe apprehensive behaviour out of me, I hope that I can keep my eyes fixed on the prize. I want to do what is in front of me and do it without fear.
Maia is slowly learning to overcome her garage fears. Sometimes she even absent mindedly enters into the garage and she’s halfway to the refrigerator before she realises there is a reason she doesn’t normally go in there. She is daily confronted to exchange her fear for faith–faith that even if a rat pops out at her, she’ll be okay. With the reality of how scary that rat must be to her, I hope I can have her faith and courage one day. She inspires me to do what I need to do, and maybe if I have even half her courage, I’ll be able to get a popsicle, too.
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