Letter from the editor

Letter from the Editor

When I was a child, I’d often have a specific, recurring dream. For years, it would plague my sleep, playing out the same way, every time. Although I was five years old, I’d be behind the steering wheel of a Jeep, driving it up a steep, sandy mountain. The path was small, and I couldn’t stop the car as it hurtled up the incline, several miles over the speed limit. It was only a matter of time until my hands slipped, and the Jeep crumbled down the side of the cliff. I haven’t had the dream since high school, but I still remember the feeling in my stomach as I plunged into the unavoidable depths. 

It turns out that I wasn’t alone with this dream either. Almost 65% of Americans have frequent dreams about falling, making it the most common nightmare in the country, followed by being chased and losing teeth. But what about the other fears we hold? Surely falling and dental accidents aren’t the only things that keep us up at night. There’s so much more that curls toes and disrupts REM. Little, mundane things can worry us too, making them as frightening as the folklore we’ve heard for generations.

In this issue of SCAN, we wanted to explore the concept of a nightmare, and what’s behind everyone’s deepest fears. Whether it’s something small and intimate, or something out of a child-like imagination, no one is safe from what goes bump in the night.

Welcome to your greatest nightmare…

-Eva Erhardt