Aaron Mahnke

And a can of mummy-proof spray.

In the glove box.

Sometimes folklore works like an opposite version of the telephone game.

Rather than a true message being broken down and warped into fiction by repeating it over and over again, sometimes fiction can be passed along for so long that it feels exactly like the truth.

It's a process that has happened countless times in the past, and in this digital age, I doubt it's going to stop.

Urban legends, though, are almost always a reflection of the fears of the time.

Of course, that doesn't mean people were once quite literally worried about a mummy coming into their suburb.

It is, as it always has been, a bit more nuanced than that.

Bandaged lumberjacks shuffled onto the scene of a small logging town when the newest generation wanted to look further afield for employment.

Phantom buses showed up at a time when technology was developing too quickly to keep up.

And Bunnymen?

Well, there's no real explanation for that one.

It's just a story about a guy in a bunny suit.

At the end of the day, though, most urban legends can act as little time capsules, each one preserving the fears of a prior generation.

Fears that they then pass on to their children and grandchildren.

Yes, they might tell a story about where we once were.

But maybe, just maybe, they also tell a tale about where we're going.

From bandaged men to bunny men, there sure are some weird characters out there.

In fact, most urban legends involve some sort of mythological figurehead.

Maybe in your town it's the old man who killed those teenagers out in the woods.