The Dark

When I was a young child (and a child not so young) I was terribly afraid of the dark.  My mother would tell me there was nothing in the dark that was not out there during the day but my imagination populated the night with all kinds of terrors and my brother did not help by telling me scary stories.

My brother would always tease me about it and tell me the same thing but I was not interested in logic. When it got dark I wanted to be inside a house with the lights on.

I'm not sure when that all changed but it was sometime in the late 60s.  In 1967 we moved back to Nat's Creek so my mother could take care of her father and I had to walk from where we lived to where the school bus picked me up.  This spot was right beside an old cemetary.  Well, actually, just down the hill from it.  And, with a 21 mile bus ride to school I had to be before dawn most of the school year I guess I just got used to it.

It is funny how things have changed over the years.  Now, and for years, I have loved the darkness.  Darkness brings me peace and tranquility.  I never have the lights on in my cube at work.  I rarely have the lights on in my "office" at home.  I like sitting outside in the night, watching the stars, hearing the night sounds, feeling the coolness of the evening and just being at peace.

Night time in Kentucky had many more (or at least different) sounds than I have now that I live in a "neighborhood" and I miss them.  Most of all I miss the whip-poor-will's calls.  The call of an owl on the 'hunt' and even the croaking of frogs.  I guess it is all in what one grew up with.  It is what makes us most comfortable, what we knew as kids.

Even such things as a 'mudhole' in the road filled with the scum of frog eggs is nostalgic now.  Any of that is gone for all time now for me.  Circumstances of life have changed things so I doubt I will every experience those things again as they require some separation from other people and a quiet place in the wilds.  Even if I had such a place I could not go as my wife could not survive living in the country.  Lord, you ought to see her react to a very small bug!  I can't imagine what it would be like should she confront a snake lying on the doorsill (that actually happened to me) or even the total darkness of a rural night.  Here in Columbia, SC we have to have large dusk-to-dawn ligts in both the front and back of the house.  It is alway high noon at my house.

I kind of miss having a real night.  I guess it won't be too awfully long before I have as much night as one could ever wish for.  Shame I won't be able to enjoy it.