Robert Frost is my favorite poet. His poems have that simple yet beautiful sense to them, and whenever I finish reading one – whether filled with images of forked roads, or changing seasons, or fire and ice – I always acknowledge his work with a quiet, “Wow.”

I’ve been thinking about Robert Frost a lot lately. Every so often, more and more frequently now, a line or phrase from one of his poems will pop into my head. I think my Robert Frost syndrome stems from the current time of year, especially as a senior.

For Robert Frost, winter means age. Winter signifies death…or, sometimes, change.

Last weekend, one of my friends brought a legit set of tarot cards to a party. I watched her flip over three cards and read the fortunes of several of my other friends. But after everyone was given a glimpse of their future, then, of course the inevitable question for me was, “Do you want your fortune read?”

Caitlyn characteristic #57: I’m incredibly superstitious. If a black cat crosses my path (which has, for whatever reason, happened to me way too often), I’ll have a mini panic attack for the rest of the day and will immediately throw a handful of salt over my left shoulder as soon as I track down some salt.

Needless to say, I was apprehensive of the whole fortune-reading thing because I actually tend to treat stuff like that seriously.

One of the cards that came up in my hand was Death. My heart started beating a million beats a minute. Death? Perfect. But after a little internet research (and after my friend consulted her handy-dandy “Tarot Card Guide Book”), I learned that in tarot readings, “Death” rarely means, you know, death. Death often comes before a great change or a wild transformation.

My Connecticut backyard, the first snow of last winter.

Death is a new beginning. Winter before spring.

I still remember my senior year of high school so vividly. That year was filled with excitement; I was constantly looking forward – waiting for the flurry of acceptances and deferrals and denials, waiting for a fresh start and a new chapter and all those other “new” clichés.

Now it’s my senior year – of college. I can recall driving up to Delaware, my whole family in tow, ready to move into Russell. Then we arrived…a day early. My mom had read the date of freshman move-in incorrectly. (Side note: My mom is – usually – never wrong. My whole family trusted her unflinchingly. Hence the surprise at this particular mix-up.) We finally got off the exit, drove past the then-intimidatingly-huge football stadium, found the (empty?) Russell dorms…and realized what had happened. Major face-palm moment. But I was actually relieved; as soon as I got into my mom’s red CRV, my previous excitement morphed into terrified anxiety faster than I could say, “Blue hens.” In the car, I asked my mom and dad what would happen – did they remember their freshman years?

My backyard again…with a little more snow

“Yeah it’s scary,” my dad admitted. “Definitely at first. But before you know it, it’ll be your senior year of college and you’ll be graduating again.”

Why did he have to be so right?

“…To go with the drift of things,

To yield with a grace to reason,

And bow and accept the end

Of a love or a season?”

~Caitlyn Goodhue

Dear anonymous blog reader, I’m curious: Do you like scary movies?

Last week was Halloween, but the holiday still lingers…at least for me.

I practically pulled an all-nighter Wednesday night. Well, I had a nice three hour nap from 6:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m., but for the bulk of the actual, blanketed-by-darkness nighttime, I was wide awake. To paint a more vivid picture, I alternated between YouTube videos, Facebook, a project for a class and a book of adorable dog photos that my sister gave me last Christmas. Surprisingly, the project wasn’t what kept me awake – although the rare productivity during the wee hours of the night/morning was an added bonus. No…I was scared.

In all honesty, in the glorious light of daytime, I feel like a pansy even writing this. The idea of fear has always fascinated me in a keep-a-far-distance sort of way, though. I’m amazed by the fact that some people love scary movies, T.V. shows and haunted-house-type horrors. My cousin is one of them. She just enjoys the thrill of screaming at a horror movie in theaters or having bloody, masked strangers jump out at her at a “haunted hayride.”

I’ve never really understood the enjoyment factor, but that’s just a personal thing. I simply don’t enjoy the rising sensation of panic in my chest or the creeping knowledge that these images will forever have some sort of life behind my closed eyelids.

I’ve always wondered how other people process scary images and stories, because the concept is foreign to me. I mean, I was the little kid who was terrified after seeing an episode of the T.V. show “Arthur” (yes, the loveable aardvark) that featured a banshee.

Going back to the very beginning, my first memories of Halloween were sheltered.

Yup. This is yours truly. That pink thing is my younger sis.

I do remember wanting to be a blue Minnie Mouse the first time that I dressed in costume. “But Minnie Mouse wears red,” everyone would remind me gently. I didn’t care; I was two and a half years old. I wanted to have a blue Minnie Mouse dress with polka dots and a blue Minnie Mouse bow. Convention be darned.

That was also the year that I enjoyed dressing up so much that I wore a cat costume to celebrate Thanksgiving. But that’s another story.

Digging deeper though, I remember a distinct absence of anything horror-related throughout my earlier Halloweens. If a commercial for a scary movie came on the T.V., the channel was instantly changed. When I got older, Halloween parties became a whole different ballgame. My parents would encourage me not to go…but who listens to the wisdom of their parents in high school? My parents evidently knew me better than I knew myself, however, because the first time that I went to a high school Halloween party – complete with a token horror film – I didn’t sleep for weeks. Amityville Horror, I’m finally calling you out for this: way to deprive me of my normal sleeping patterns for a long time! Also, way to kill off my favorite character: the dog. And those demonic hands at the end? Seriously?! Nightmares! So many nightmares!

Sorry, there’s clearly more pent-up hostility toward this movie than I realized. It didn’t help that I was living in my grandparents’ old New England house at the time. Stupid creaky floorboards.

I’ve gotten somewhat better since high school at gauging what I can handle and what I can’t. Sometimes, though, I slip up – and the result is the occasional sleepless night…like last night. My issue isn’t always the content itself but the fear of what will happen when I finally close my eyes and drift off into my subconscious. My other problems: I have (a.) incredibly realistic dreams, and (b.) a ridiculously overactive imagination.

Overactive imaginations: good for writing, occasionally bad for sleeping.

~Caitlyn Goodhue