A Moment Longer

She had felt the draw, that longing deep in her being for days now. It had been that ever-present churning within her since the day she had heard the old farm was being sold. Before this landmark in her life traded hands, her heart demanded that she take a moment, a day and return to her country roots. She longed for a few hours at least to step back in time to remember and relive the road she’d already traveled, before embarking on the exciting adventures the new year was sure to bring. With a few days off over the 2021 Holidays from her normal, non-stop schedule, she chose New Year’s Eve to make the journey. It seemed a fitting way to close the year with a walk down memory’s lane.

She watched the city lights grow dim in her rearview mirror, as she began the couple hour drive to her little hometown called Fairview. She felt her pulse quicken as she began recalling all her favorite childhood memories. It didn’t seem long before she found her car cresting the hill on the road she had always been proud of as a kid, after all it was named after her family, “McKinley Road.” She recalled a time when she had known almost all the neighbors along this pot-hole ridden road. Most of them had been related in some way or another but that was a lifetime ago. She noted newer houses, and strange names listed on the mailboxes. While some things changed others hadn’t – this road was still a patched up mess! No need for speed bumps when you couldn’t drive over 40 mph without breaking a floorboard in some of the deeper holes dotting the road. At the foot of the hill, past the open windswept fields lay the tall white farmhouse and just past it her destination – the old white wooden barn.

It was late afternoon till she pulled in the drive. She had called ahead and her uncle who still owned the old home place for a few more days had assured her, whether or not he was around she was welcome to tour the place. She parked her Tesla in front of the milk house, and with her hand on the door knob a lifetime of memories flooded her being. She found herself shivering as she stepped through the doorway. The huge stainless steel milk tank still stood huge and central in this first room. She could almost taste the creamy white that had poured from it’s reservoir. She didn’t spend long here before she opened the door leading to the milking parlor and from there she still knew the way by heart.

The scent of dry grass, old wood and animals mingled in her nostrils and she found her eyes sliding shut for a moment as she remembered. Three decades disappeared and it was the 4 of them once again; her twin sister and her, and their two cousins. They had spent too many hours to count here. They were the best of friends and the worst of enemies. In her memory’s eye she could see them now those four rough and tumbled kids, rushing through the chores given them. Mixing and feeding the calves their bottles was one of their favorite tasks. The calves rough tongues, and the sound of those black and white babies greedily sucking hard on the bottles with their wet noses bumping up against your arms… she could almost feel it! The four of them would often team up and race to see who could finish all their chores first. She couldn’t help but smile at her still competitive self. She could still feel the frustration of losing time after time since for some reason she was always paired with the cousin who didn’t care less about winning and spent more time seeing what he could get out of doing rather than getting anything accomplished! Scraping the aisles and stalls… phew, she didn’t miss that task or smell, spreading lime or straw… shaking it hardily as dust filled your nostrils and eyes, dropping a flake of hay by each manger and occasionally even throwing a scoop or two of grain along each spot as well. She could almost feel the heat rising in the barn as the animals stood close together devouring their grain and hay or contentedly chewing their cud as they waited their turn to give up their creamy white milk.

The sound of a neighbor dog barking brought her back to her present. With slow but steady steps she walked down the aisle. The place lacked the warmth and scent of the days now past. She wondered how many months had it been since this place was bursting with the sounds and life of a farm. She found herself staring at the old wooden ladder disappearing into what she knew was the haymow. She felt it’s rungs hoping they would still hold her weight, cause if there was one place more than all others she longed to visit it was this… the haymow. She climbed carefully with the wood rough under her hands. The light was dim but when her head crested the top of the ladder the huge expanse of wooden floors covered in years of old hay caused tears to prick the back of her eyes even as a hearty laugh escaped her lips.

This place had been their gym, their stage, their playground. She glanced high into the rafters… and there it was… that famous swing! Just an old thick rope with a knot near the end but as kids they had soared to unknown heights. They had been a spaceship, an aircraft, an eagle while clinging tightly, hands clamped around its thickness. When the hay was stacked high at summer’s end they would parachute off it bailing into the tightly- bound bales… it was a wonder none of them had broken an arm or leg with all of their shenanigans. With the imagination of a child, those big square bales could be most anything. They had designed and built houses and yards and stables… they had lived Minecraft before the next generation played it on their keyboards! Over to the one side below the open, gaping hole of a window through the gathering dusk she saw a huge pile of bales still stacked high. She found her way to them and almost of their own accord her feet began to scamper up them. At last she was king of the mountain once again.

She knew she had to get heading back down and out of here. Yet even the thought of trying to find her way back out with just the beam of the flashlight in her pocket couldn’t force her feet down though. She sank into the musty, dusty brown. It scratched her hands and she knew from experience it would take hours to pick all the stubble from her woolen coat… yet this was a moment she had longed to relive- a moment that would be forever past once she climbed down that creaky ladder, and so she paused a moment longer.

For just a few more minutes she would linger – that carefree child. Without a worry in the world other than wondering how much time she still had before her mom would pick her up or better yet what snack her aunt would have waiting when they at last tired of their play and would burst through the front door only to be shooed back out to remove their muddy shoes and brush the dust and stubble from their clothes. What a childhood she had lived!!

At last she rose unsteadily to her feet. She found her face near the open window. The evening breeze felt cold against her cheeks. As she glanced out the opening, she caught a glimpse of a dark shadow hovering in the old willow tree near the edge of the drive. As she stared on, it took shape, the white flat heart-shaped face stood out amidst the gathering darkness. It’s large form was easily identified – it was none other than a barn owl. It seemed he too had come to say goodbye. He blinked slowly, turned his head surveying the territory, and then flew soundlessly off into the night. She breathlessly watched him go before lifting her gaze to the sky above. The first stars of the evening were beginning to twinkle from there lofty heights. She felt every bit that little girl again filled with wonder and amazement.

It was time… she brushed at her jacket, before pulling it closely around her. She stepped carefully, feeling her way one rung at a time down the ladder. When her feet hit the concrete below she hurried towards the doorway and then with the exit door open and the frosty winter air swirling about her she paused one last time. In just a few moments she would climb back into her Tesla feel the warmth pouring from the vents, the seat warmers and steering wheel. She’s hit the button to her favorite holiday songs and speed back to the life she lived- the life she’d chosen- back to the city’s festivities. Yet in this moment, in the stillness, in the parting, that ache deep within her- the reason she had come seemed to deepen rather than disappear.

She lifted her eyes once more to take it all in, and it was then she realized if she never saw this place again- it wouldn’t change the fact that the experiences she had lived here had shape her childhood, fashioned her values, propelled her into the destiny she now lived. The value of life couldn’t be confined to a building or even a memory. Like that barn owl she was meant to fly away, to hunt down and pursue the purpose and passion she was created for. The idealistic part of her wanted to stay here; to give her own children the same delightful, carefree, barefoot, rope-swinging, raw-milk-drinking, dirt-under-their-fingernails kind of childhood she’d lived. But at the end of the day this was the beauty of life, having lived a childhood so simple, so carefree, so full, having learned the value of responsibility, the virtue of labor, the blessing of family even now as she headed a hundred miles away – it was a part of her. It was what guided her to become the successful woman she was. It was ingrained in her being, her character. She would forever carry this place within her.