I have the irrational, or not, fear that my cats are unhappy and that it's my fault for not being a good enough mom.

I know I have some others, but they're buried deep in my unconscious and I can't remember them right now.

I have too many to list, but the one that I constantly have to face is talking on the phone. I don't know why it scares me. It just does. I really hate talking on the phone to someone I don't know. Actually, even with close friends I feel the need to hang up after about ten minutes. If a pizza needs to be ordered I'm hoping beyond all hope someone else orders it. It sounds silly, but I've already passed on some film opportunities because I have to call someone I don't know. I also have a fear of sales people. I love those new automatic checkout lanes. I wish every store had them. And, of course, women. It's not a coincidence I'm still single. I'm so shy around women that when they talk to me my childhood stutter comes back so I just don't talk. Most women think I'm some kind of boring jerk because of it. The stutter thing is something else that constantly preys on me. It's what gave me such stage fright when I was an actor and when I do stand-up. Ok, I've said too much.

If you want me to call about the film opportunities, let me know. I'll call and you can show up.

Funny thing about talking on the phone with you: if I abruptly decide that it's time to stop (because I don't really like talking on the phone either), you sound surprised, and I worry that I've hurt your feelings.

It's sharing time, dear readers.

Oh, yeah! Talking on the phone. I've got that one too. Very inconvenient.

I don't particularly like talking on the phone, but I am not afraid of it. Some people are easier to talk to on the phone than others.

I am not so sure what my "irrational" fears are. I have a great fear of failure, but so far being that I have successfully failed so many times, I don't think that is all too irrational. :-P

I have a fear of my marriage failing, too. I could argue that it is irrational because things are going so well. I have no reason to think it won't work out until I'm dead. But when you look at the success-rate of marriages in general, all of a sudden it doesn't seem so irrational!

I am pretty positive that it is irrational anyway. Three and a half years and no problems so far! :-)

I hate the phone, too. God bless email.

This has never happened to me, so I suppose it's irrational, but I live in fear that I'm going to forget my keys one morning. It's not so bad now, but during tax season, when John didn't get home until 9 or 10 at night, I was always afraid that I'd be locked out, and the dog would be inside starving and peeing on the floor, and I wouldn't have our cellphone to even call John to come home, etc., etc.

After I put my keys in my bag in the morning, I always double-check that they're there, sometimes only a minute later. Perhaps I have OCD.

Oh, and last month I had an irrational fear that someone was going to steal Moose (the dog) while I was walking him. A creepy guy that we ran into on the sidewalk took a strange interest in him--kept saying what a "gorgeous dog" he was and looking at him funny. I wanted to scream "He's fixed! And he's missing a toe! And his breath smells like old rotten tuna!" For a week after that, I lived in fear of dognapping. I got over it, though.

my fears are all perfectly rational.

I have a really skin-crawly fear about being tortured. I can't read about it, hear about it, or even listen to Amnesty International people talk. I'm also scared of fascism, but that may not be so irrational. And I'm beginning to fear Christians (see previous)--not people who love God, just people whose view of HOW to love God would fit through the orbit of an electron. Is all this a complex, do you think?