Falling Forever

If it hadn’t been for the coming night, hay-baling day would have been heaven. Not for the haymakers, of course, the work being hot, itchy, exhausting, and sometimes hurried, with an eye to the sky. Rain meant trouble. Even I knew that. I could never understand, though, how something wet like rained-on hay could start a barn fire.

Already the hay had been cut, crimped, and raked into windrows. And on my favorite day of haymaking, the baler moved up and down the field binding the mown, dried grasses into blocks the perfect size for building, what we kids called, hay houses.

We made them big enough to hold two or three of us at a time and with windows to let in light. We’d take dolls inside and kittens and, if we were lucky, a nest of baby rabbits that survived the tractor in the field.

This play was all the more alluring for its brevity. As the sun inched down the sky, the tractor would chug toward us across the now-emptied field. For some reason, likely the goodness of my grandpa’s heart, the bales of our houses were the last to be loaded onto the hay wagon.

Following the wagon, I’d trudge toward the barn to watch the hay elevator, the source of my nighttime disquietude.

My grandpa hefted one bale at a time onto a long ramp that hauled hay up to the loft window high above. There the bales dropped off the elevator and landed with a satisfying thunk on the haymow floor below. This dropping-off triggered the nightmare that haunted my childhood.

In that recurring dream, I’d get caught at the bottom of the elevator ramp. It would take me up toward the yawning hayloft window. But inside the barn, there’d be no hayloft. Instead, a bottomless pit, where, if I’d start falling, I’d fall forever. Just before this drop,  I’d jerk awake in terror.

But it got worse. One day, a cousin told me with great authority in his voice that if you had a bad dream and you didn’t wake up before its terrible ending, your heart would give out and you would actually die. In real life.

Why was this dream so strong? And why did I dream it over and over? I’ve never figured it out.

I’m quite certain, though, that if my husband had played in the same hayfield and watched the same elevator at work, this nightmare would not have visited him. He’s prone to finding good, even in the bad.

I, on the other hand, can detect danger, even when it isn’t there.