It’s Scary How Suspicious Minds Can Rob Us of Our Joy

We are about to enter the Haunted Mansion on a Saturday night at Disneyland, my 6-year-old and I. My sister and her son, also 6, are waiting near the exit to meet us when we come out.

It’s not that he’s scared , my nephew has declared. It’s just that he would rather not enter this particular place. My daughter smirks.

“They’re just pretend ghosts, right Mommy?” she says.

“Absolutely,” I assure her. Disney ghosts are old hat. We charge on, cocky, giggly, ready to be artificially spooked.

So why are the teen-aged boys in the cars in front of ours carrying on like the demons are for real?

They shriek and yell and grab at the displays as they pass. They’re dressed in jeans and black leather; they look tough. The smell from their marijuana weights the air.

“Why are they so scared, Mommy?” my daughter asks.

“They’re just pretending to be scared,” I come back.

Except that doesn’t quite register with my daughter. She gives me a look, knitted brows, innocent unformed words. Huh? No, she doesn’t get it.

Why would these big kids want people to think that they are scared? At 6, my daughter works on being brave.

And I do too, for my daughters mostly. But more and more, true bravery escapes me. It is far too noble a feeling for what I experience nearly every day. It’s suspicion that makes up my shell. I’m becoming an emotional casualty of our times.

No, nothing “happened” in the Haunted Mansion; Disneyland is still an escape. Even the routine rudeness of the outside world comes as a surprise here.

When a cashier snaps at me that there are no lids for my take-out coffee, throws me some cream and turns her back, I feel gypped. Had the same happened outside the Magic Kingdom, I would have expected as much.

Yet had something untoward gone on in the Haunted Mansion, I would have just chalked it up. I was waiting for some drama to unfold, expecting it almost.

As my daughter stares wide-eyed at the dancing apparitions, the self-knocking doors and talking heads in crystal balls, I keep my eyes on the teen-agers out for a different sort of fun.

I’ve become an edgy mother hen. Keep away from my children, or else.

The night after Disneyland, my husband and I get an urge for ribs. Take-out seems the most reasonable choice, seeing as how the 2-year-old is in a mood. But when we walk inside the place, dark and smokey, dominated by a bar, the waitress seems exceptionally nice.

Something doesn’t click.

“Forget take-out!” the waitress says. Stay here with us, business is slow. Settle down, have a drink and don’t worry about the girls. Why, this waitress has two kids herself--boys--so she can certainly handle our own.

My husband and I look around, and at each other, without saying a word. We’d be the only people eating. What looks like a few regulars, men with deep drinking to do, are at the bar. Every once in a while they say something, but mostly they stare at the TV.

“Sure, why not?” I say on impulse. The idea of a child-friendly restaurant intrigues, but it seems almost a dare. My husband retrieves an extra diaper from the car.

And then the waitress delivers too.

She takes our daughters to check out the fireplace, gushes about their pretty dresses and introduces them around. One of the old guys at the bar produces a balloon from somewhere, blows it up as best he can, and presents it to the 2-year-old.

It isn’t long before our daughters are playing on the bar stools, chatting, acting at home. The little one starts to dance.

Then two guys, youngish, unsmiling, seem to slink into the booth next to our own. No, they won’t be eating, they tell the waitress. Just some liquor will be fine. The waitress tries her smiles, some small talk, but these guys aren’t in the mood. They don’t talk, they just stare.

Suspicion straightens my spine. I lean over the table and whisper to my husband, “What do you think? They going to rob this place or what?” My husband says he was thinking the same.

We eat as fast as we can after that, calling the girls when they stray too far, making sure they aren’t bothering our neighbors now. One of the guys disappears.

Then the one left behind starts talking, not to us, but to the 2-year-old not yet infected with mistrust. She likes him, it seems.

This man raises his head toward me next. He’s never around kids himself, he says. They don’t seem so bad, lot of energy and smiles. His own older sister used to beat him up. He is hardly touching his drink.

By this time, my husband and I are ready to leave. We corral the kids, get in the car. Not a bad time, we say. Sort of reminds my husband of a place in Rapid City, S.D., he’d been to years before. Everyone there, too, was naturally friendly, relaxed.

We take deep breathes and don’t say anything for a while. Then my husband starts talking about suspicion, about how we’ve grown accustomed to expecting the worst.

Yes, we are relieved when that doesn’t happen. But it still takes away the joy.