View from the North 40: My childhood still might be the death of me

I don’t mean to alarm anyone, but I almost died of a heart attack Wednesday night and, frankly, I’m too old to be having this kind of heart trouble.

Specifically, my heart issue was not of the coronary thrombosis type, but rather the emotional-slash-psychological type seen most in excitable young people who lack years of experience to make them jaded, bitter and numb to random stimuli like a proper adult.

The moment, with its unexpected rush of fear-based adrenalin, completely tapped into a visceral childhood memory.

I was innocently sitting at my computer, perusing some social media, when I decided to watch a video that some scuba diver took at Cooney Reservoir — a completely landlocked, fresh-water, man-made lake southwest of Billings — mistake. The person who put it together used music from “Jaws.”

Just a couple seconds into the video, a dark, definitely alive figure barely emerged through the cloudy water and, suddenly, a chorus of every bass instrument in the orchestra sounded off – Baahw-duhm! – with the (expletiving expletive) opening notes of the “Jaws” theme song.

I kid you not, I jumped back and actually gasped. Gasped! And, as the video kept playing, not offering any answers for a few more seconds, a few more bars of that dread-filled song. Baah-duhm! Finally, I could make out the human parts of a second scuba diver — baah-dum — but. The music. Kept. Playing. Bah-dum, bah-dum, bah-dum. Though nothing happened in the video. Yeah, but my chest finally seized up with remembered childhood terror.

Once upon a time, even I was a wee young lass. It was the summer of 1975, and Burke family – Dad, Mom, Son of 12 and Daughter of 10 – went to the late show at the local movie theater. The line on this late June evening already stretched down the city block, so by the time they made it to the ticket window they were informed that the theater, though large, was nearly entirely full so the family would not be able to sit together.

My parents, fully aware of their duty as the designated service animals for their children, said, “No, I’m sorry, we couldn’t possibly subject our children to this frightening movie without the security and comfort of their parents.”

And we all went home to watch reruns of the “Andy Giffith” show and play Go Fish.

Hah-haw, hardy-har-har. No.

What did you expect of parents who took their very pre-teen children to the late showing of a thriller-slash-horror movie to do?

They said, “Meh, that’ll be fine. We don’t want to have to wait in line again tomorrow night.” They were standing right there in front of a movie poster depicting a larger-than-life and toothsome shark swimming up from the dark depths of the ocean, mouth looming open, toward an unaware, vulnerably naked, buxom young female.

This is the stuff that keeps the mental health professionals employed. people.

I was given a tube full of Flicks chocolate candy and sent on my merry way with some unknown movie theater popcorn peddler who finally found a seat for me between two strangers — some old bachelor dude in his 20s and teenage boy who didn’t want my cooties, in the right side seating area five rows back from the big screen.

I clearly remember looking back over the packed audience, aglow with the flickering light from the previews of coming attractions, and wondering where my parents were.

I also clearly remember almost dying in the company of strangers, yeah, only that time for real.

I put one of those chocolates, shaped like a giant chocolate chip, in my mouth as Richard Dreyfuss’ character Hooper dove into the ocean to investigate an abandoned boat to the tune of an eerily subdued version of the theme song. And I nervously sucked on that candy until — screee! — a water-logged head fell through a hole in the bottom of the boat.

I gasped then, too, but I also sucked that candy pretty far into my throat and sat there paralyzed with adrenalin and lack of oxygen until Hooper broke the surface of the ocean and coughed. Then I coughed, and luckily I had enough oxygen in my lungs to dislodge that candy, so I saved my own life that night.

So I’m here to tell you today that I can name any “Jaws” tune in one note anytime it plays because, even if my conscious brain doesn’t know, my subconscious brain will do an automatic dump of fight-or-flight adrenalin into my heart.

Sure, yes, I am of the age that I shouldn’t be having this visceral reaction because of a movie I saw 45 years ago, but I’m telling you, one of these days, I might have to do CPR on myself to save me from that (expletiving expletived swearing cuss word) theme song from “Jaws.”

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I still think I’m destined to be the first victim of a fresh-water shark in recorded history at http://www.facebook.com/viewfromthenorth.com .