Childhood Thoughts Part Two

Gravel roads and days that stretched endlessly before me, filled with boredom and empty hours.  Oh there was always plenty of work to do but the young don't seek work....they seek adventure.  They crave to grow up and as one growing old it makes me smile to think that growing up is an adventure in itself.

The empty days of summer were both a blessing and a curse. For in the dead of night in the summer, when the body is not exhausted from a day of school, the goblins come out to play. Many might be tempted to dismiss my memories as nothing more than childhood foolishness but the truth is you didn't have to be a child to experience it.

The short lane that twisted into our front yard jutted off a longer lonely gravel road but over time the lane came to be just a little creepier. During the longer summer evenings it was easy to wander off for a walk but suddenly with heart pounding realize that the sky was darkening much quicker than expected. Hurrying down the lane on trembling legs I caught my breath as behind the bushes to the right of the lane I could sense and almost feel something. Some unknown entity lurking just a few feet away but invisible behind the shield of briar bushes.

I paused just briefly, turning eyes into the dimness of the bushes.  I took a step and felt the creature on the other side take a step also. It matched me step for step down the lane that only a few hours ago felt short. Now the rough gravel and puddles presented a challenge to my stumbling feet. I tried to pretend nothing was there but I walked faster. I looked ahead with dread because about a hundred yards before the end of the lane spilled into my yard the bushes ended.

Head down I rushed head first into the coming dusk. Quite unexpectedly my brother started up the lane on his bike. I wanted to shout a warning but my mouth was dry and the words never escaped me. We meet, my brother and I, just at the end of the bushes and as I turned to look into the field behind those bushes, the wind picked up and blew the tall weeds and grass, gusting as if a storm approached. Yet nothing lurked there that human eye could see. The sense of a presence evaporated as dew in the morning sun.

Imagination? I fear not for those bushes came to represent a gauntlet of sorts.  As in "running the gauntlet". Not a form of military punishment but a challenge, an endurance test, a symbol of our ability to brave the odd and often present entities that lurked about the fields and woods surrounding the haunted farm.

This post tells the story of CARD 17: The Lane