The Mind of an Overthinker – Has My Farmer Gone Dahmer?

For a while now, I have been purchasing from smaller businesses. Today was my first time supporting a local farm. I placed an online order last week to pick up on this sunny day.

THE FARM

The land was right off a lake and sat upon acres of rolling green hills. My car rolled over the gravel driveway, up to a trailer with its back doors open wide as if in greeting, and a sign tacked to one of them. I stepped out of the car, my boots crunching and scratching as I walked closer to read the sign scrawled in green crayon.

“Welcome. Online orders are in the cooler inside the trailer.”

I placed my hands on my hips and surveyed the area. After driving for 30 minutes with a podcast on the psychology of serial killers playing the entire ride over, my mind was spinning. It felt like I was about to plummet into one of those stories. Especially once I noticed the open barn door with shovels and devices unknown for dealing with cattle swaying in the breeze just 20 yards away. My heart pounded as I imagined stepping into the trailer, opening the cooler to retrieve my order only to have the trailer doors slam closed behind me.

MENTAL SPIRAL

There was nothing but silence while my mind churned out image after image of being trapped in a trailer, banging on the walls. I peered around each side and under the lone trailer then back over my shoulders. No cars. No humans. Just cattle eating grass.

I placed one foot on the floor of the trailer. It creaked under my weight. Pausing, I listened. Nothing. Then, lifting my other foot, I entered my imagined cage.

The cooler was before me, but when I went to open it, more images played through my mind of what a killer might hide in a large cooler such as this. I threw the lid open, wanting to get it over with, and, to my surprise, my order was on top, my name printed on a piece of paper and pinned to a Sendiks grocery bag. No body parts – at least none that were immediately visible or human (hopefully).

Needless to say, I think I listen to too many podcasts on the psychology of serial killers.