The Ghost

The Ghost
One of the things I was not allowed to enjoy as a child was Halloween. Christmas and birthdays were also taboo, as were quite a few other things that most kids take for granted. Not allowing me to celebrate these things didn’t, however, work to insulate them from the inundation of advertising and hype that surrounded these
events. I was by no means stupid. I took in most of what was presented to me and the Halloween season was filled with stories of ghosts, goblins, vampires and an array of other creatures.

I wasn’t allowed to celebrate Halloween, or to go trick or treating, but I sure did love to listen to all the scary tales. On dark fall nights I was as likely as any other kid to let my imagination run away on me. Nights are dark in the country, so trees become witches, the wind becomes a demon and any shadow that moves can become a ghost.

Most years the cattle are spending nights in the barn at the end of October. Sometimes, however, Dad would leave some of the dry cows and yearlings outside a little longer to save on space in the barn. One of my evening chores was to go up into the hay mow, throw down enough hay to feed the cows over night and distribute it among my hungry customers.

There were lights inside the stable and one light in the hay mow, but no lights at all outside the barn. That meant that on a cloudy night it was really dark out there. As there were no stairs from the stable to the mow you had to walk around the outside of the barn, up the barn hill and in a door on the back of the barn. You could then throw the hay down a chute that was more like a hole in the floor. This made a nice big pile of hay under the chute that you could just jump into so as not to have to walk around the barn again in the dark.

Now, that little point was very important to me, because I didn’t like the dark much. In fact I still don’t care much for it. I would always try to make that pile of hay high enough to jump into, but there was no avoiding the trip outside to get up to the mow each night. Dad thought that I was crazy for being scared. He told me to suck it up and do my chores.

One Halloween night I was doing my regular evening duties and the time came to go up to the mow. This night it was really dark. It had rained all day and was threatening to keep it up all night. I could barley see two steps ahead as I walked.

Suddenly, as I rounded the corner of the barn, something white swept across in front of me and disappeared into the night. I stopped dead in my tracks and stood there frozen to the spot. My heart pounded in my chest. I could hardly draw a breath. After several seconds I regained my composure and told myself that I hadn’t really seen anything. I continued around the barn and up the barn hill toward the door. Then it happened again. Just as I got to the door a white form swept in front of my face. Not just once but several times.

That was enough for me. I was off down that hill at a dead run, slipping and sliding on the wet grass. I ran right back to the stable and through a flood of tears told Dad that I had just seen a ghost and that I was too scared to goo back out there alone. Dad didn’t get angry or laugh at me. He just threw on his coat, grabbed my hand and headed for the door. I tried to hold back but when Dad had a hold of your hand you were going where he went and at his speed.

We went around the barn and up the hill but just outside the door Dad stopped dead in his tracks. There it was. A white wisp of . . . something swooping and diving in the air. I was right. There was the phantom wraith. A ghost, and Dad could see it too. I looked up at Dad to see how scared he was and saw that he was laughing under his breath. Not out loud, but he was certainly laughing. I recognized that jigglie thing his belly did. He was laughing.

“Dad,” I whispered, “What are we gonna do?”

With that he pulled a flashlight out of his pocket and shone the beam at the ghost. There, bold as brass, stood a black cow with a white tip on her tail. She was quietly munching at some hay on the ground just outside the door. Every few seconds she would give that tail a flip and it would whoosh through the air like a spirit.

Dad put my apparition back in the pasture and went to finish his chores. I went to finish mine as well. I don’t think we ever spoke of that night again and I also don’t think that Dad ever told anyone else about our bovine specter. I know he was laughing when I looked up at him but he sure did stop fast when he first saw that white thing fly across in front of us. I’ll never know for sure, but my money says that at first glance he didn’t know what he was seeing either.