Life at its lowest common denominator

This weekend I read a fabulous book called "The Lovely Bones" by Alice Sebold. It's about a 14-year-old girl who is raped and murdered, and it tells the story from her viewpoint in Heaven. Such a great book, but to be honest it scared the living crap out of me. This guy in the book is a serial rapist and killer of women and accosts the girl in a cornfield right across the street from her house. He tricks her into coming into an underground fort that he made, where he rapes her and stabs her to death, then cuts up her body and throws it down a sinkhole.

It goes into other murders he commits, and sure enough they all start with a friendly conversation started in broad daylight.... and it scared me. I know I can be too trusting at times, way too naive. Especially when I'm going to be out on the road, going almost out of my way to spark conversations with people. Who am I to turn down a story? Then I read something like this and... after getting to the parts where the killer imagines what the woman or girl he is talking to would look like bloody and naked.... I almost said "Screw it! I don't need to write this book! I have a stockpile of money that I can put towards grad school instead.... a nice apartment... new furniture... a vacation...."

*sigh*

But I would hate myself. If I quit now, so close to the home stretch, because of the possibility of something going wrong... then all the bad people in the world win. I could be hurt or abducted or worse on this trip, but then again I could encounter the same thing on my way to work on any given day. I have to remind myself to be smart, be cautious, be selective about who I talk to and where I sleep. And I can't let fear dictate how I live, because then it's not living. It's hiding, or worse - settling. Settling is like living life at its lowest common denominator. And I can't do that.

So Saturday night I drove into the woods, turned off the headlights, parked the car, got out and made myself walk into the dark, dark forest alone in the middle of the night. I was scared shitless. I kept thinking every little sound was a footstep, a breath, a knife coming out of a sheath. But I kept going. And I stood there, vulnerable and unarmed, in the dark for 20 minutes. And then I made myself walk slowly back to the car (I wanted to run like hell). And you know what? It was pretty exhilarating when I got back in.

So I think I'll be okay. I was okay the first time I rode cross-country alone, although I had some ridiculous self-defense hijinx along the way. Those I'll save for another time. This is kind of serious. But honestly.... if the images of dead teenagers and men who thirst for blood aren't enough to sway me from my goal.... I should be fine.