Show Transcript

Fight or Flight

Narrator Back for another story, are we? I guess you really do like things that go bump in the night. I'm glad that I haven't scared you off. I know we don't really live in the same world, you and I, and it can be just terrifying when worlds collide, can't it? Finding yourself standing right there on the edge, your heart racing, hands trembling, staring into that inky unknown. No way of knowing what lies beyond... when all of a sudden a creature burst through, penetrating the most fragile place, that delicate veil that you call reality.

Narrator Goodness. Well, thank you for letting me come inside. Of course, in a strictly physical sense, my world and your world share the same space; this tiny slice of dirt between deep sea and deep space.

Narrator Yes, I know I look out of this world, but I'm a local girl. And since I'm bound to this physical plane, I'm always interested in stories about other dimensions.

Narrator For example, this is a real recording from a flesh and blood friend of mine. He is listening to his radio late one night when the signal is interrupted by a strange broadcast.

Narrator Where does the sound come from? It's not from this realm.

Narrator It takes a lot to raise the hairs on the back of my neck. But this sounds sends a shiver up my spine. Is it from deep space? An alien spaceship announcing our doom? Or could it be a recording from the deep sea? Some ancient monster, enormous and undiscovered, lurking beneath the waves.

Narrator Then, just as mysteriously as it began, the signal fades.

Narrator Whatever it was, it barged right into our reality and made itself known. Tonight, our universe gets invaded by uninvited visitors. Stories about very close encounters with powerful creatures from another world, another universe. Strange and frightening creatures that don't look like us at all.

Benjamin They're just a really, really large creatures and they, you know, they have sharp teeth. They could rip in half. They're scary. And a lot of people would make the argument that they're majestic creatures, but they could easily kill you. And they would, given the chance.

Alexa I was, like, trembling. I just like I stood there and did not know what to do. And I just started screaming.

Lindsey I think just they're so much bigger than I... even just seeing them, you know, they're huge, but being so close to one and seeing a lot of its body, it's pretty overwhelming to see how big they are. I think I probably cried, honestly.

Benjamin Yeah. Hi, my name is Benjamin and I have a fear of whales.

Lindsey Ok. Hi, my name's Lindsey.

Alexa My name is Alexa and I am terrified of whales.

Valerie Whales.

Lindsey It was definitely dark gray. I didn't get that much of a look of its actual face, but was like just this huge dark gray figure, you know, jumping out of the water.

Benjamin I think it started the first time I was ever in Alaska.

Lindsey It's just something you never really see, especially on accident when you're not prepared. It was yeah, it was huge.

Alexa And then I realized I turned around and the whale Shamu was just like right there in my face. And I'm little. Like, right there, just going like, "waaaagh." That's the sound that whales make to me, waaaagh.

Benjamin And all of a sudden there was a pod of about forty five orca whales that came up right behind our boat and they came all around and surrounded us. And I thought it was the most terrifying thing ever. Everyone was saying how beautiful it was, and I knew that at any second they were gonna slap on top of our boat and they were gonna wreck the boat, we were all going to drown and they were going to eat us.

Lindsey And we were sitting on the benches and there was just like a bar rail behind us. And the whale just kind of swam by and like came out of the water. So you could see the entirety of the whale. But that first initial jump was just so crazy to see that. And it being so close then. And I think me being in the water with it was even more kind of terrifying.

Alexa My dad used to take me to SeeWorld all the time, and it was my favorite place to go. I loved, like, you know, sea life. I had a free willy cardboard cut out in my room, and I couldn't even go into my room, I made him go in there first and take it out and then I didn't want to sleep in there. I had to sleep on the couch and it was super upsetting.

Benjamin They're just really, really large creatures. And they eat seals. I kind of look like a seal. So if I was in the water, I would be easily confused with one. And yeah, children, they've pulled children into the water and drowned them, not let them come back up.

Alexa So fast forward to maybe like twelve, and we're walking along the boardwalk pier, and all of a sudden the exact same thing happens again. There's a freaking humpback whale just like right there, right next to the pier. And I was I was just like, oh my God, this does not happen. It happens to me.

Lindsey It just made me feel like so small and it was so... freaky.

Alexa I saw Castaway with Tom Hanks and the scene where he is on that raft and the whale comes up? Like, it's supposed to be a beautiful moment, I was trembling. I could not watch the movie anymore. I was so terrified.

Alexa And so now that I have these reoccurring dreams of me, on a raft, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the ocean, with just whales swimming underneath me. And that should sound peaceful and like oh that sounds nice. No, to me like I... cannot. It scares me.

Valerie That's so sad!

Alexa And that is what I'm terrified of!

Lindsey You know, my whole class on the boat, I was looking around like, "why are these people excited? This is crazy that we're doing this." And everyone was so excited. I think that kind of made me more scared where I'm like "wait, why am I the only one freaking out? This is really weird." You know, I think that a lot of people have pretty irrational fears. And so in my mind, I was just like, yeah, it's really weird. I don't really know how to explain it, but it's just what it is.

Benjamin I won't go to an aquarium at all, if there's gonna be whales there. Specifically orca whales, but I don't really care for any of them. I don't even like stuffed animal whales.

Lindsey People would tease me so much, too. They would buy me all my birthday cards with whales on them. Any time someone saw something about it, they'd send me videos or whatever they could to tease me because it's so irrational. I just kind of thought it was like a random thing that I felt that way. Out of all the people I know I'm the only one that felt like that, so I was always like, "oh, this is just such a strange thing that I think of."

Valerie You are actually the third person who's had a whale phobia and wanted to talk about it.

Lindsey Oh my gosh, how interesting. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. That is so funny. Yeah. I've never met anyone. So that's so interesting that you know three. I would love to hear why. Because mine, I mean, It was more the size, I think for me that really got me scared in the first place. I want to see if that would be something similar. Out of curiosity, just hearing their stories would be really cool. And to see if they still are.

Alexa The thing is too, my son loves... I had just recently got a fish, which unfortunately, rest in peace, he passed away and we had to flush him down the toilet. It was just like, you know, a little, what are they called, Beta fish? But my son loved it so much. And so I was like, oh, he's going to love to go to SeaWorld, he would probably love to go to the aquarium, like he would love to see that, because he likes stuff like that. So I just... I'm just going to have to kind of get over it, or not go.

Benjamin You know, I feel sick to my stomach, I can't watch them on TV. And I don't ever want to be in a situation where I will be around them, so I avoid the ocean. I don't go on boats that will go into the open water.

Lindsey Learning a little bit about them was really helpful to me. Instead of thinking of them as just this super large creature in the ocean that you don't really see, and kind of made me feel like kinder towards them in my mind, it made them softer, I guess. So that helped a lot. And, you know, I think fear comes from more the unknown, so it kind of took that part away from being scared.

Valerie So do you think that you could go to an aquarium or a SeaWorld now?

Lindsey Uhhhhh.....

Narrator Well, maybe we never really get over those first encounters of a close kind. Speaking of which, remember our mysterious space alien whale song? Does it make it less scary to find out this is actually a song by an experimental French composer? Or would hearing this come on your radio late at night still give you the willies? It's easy to be brave when your fears feel far away, but when you're face to face with the fish, it's always fight or flight!

Narrator Stay a Spell is made by Valerie Ramos Mills and Steve Nelson with story editing by Alexis Ettner. Additional credits can be found in our show notes. Special thanks to Larissa Mills and avant garde French composer Pierre Henry.

Alexa That's the sound that whales make to me, "waaaagh."