I have a reccuring nightmare.
In my dream, I am in a place that I know well and am attempting to turn on the lights. The lights just won’t come on. The lights sort of glow and fade in and out of a dim brown color, creating a murky, muddy half light that is disorienting and very creepy.
I don’t know why this is so terrifying for me, but “The Lights Won’t Turn On” nightmare is one of the top three in my Really Bad Dream catagory.
So, this morning, I go out to the barn like usual. I open the dutch door and step inside to the warm, rich smells of the barn. I close the door behind me, like usual, so that the wind doesn’t grab it. I navigate the pile of empty feed sacks and the stall forks and reach out my hand for the cord that turns on the “Dakari light”.
Click.
Click – click.
Brown out. It’s exactly like my dream. Dim, swimmy light. The faintly glowing bulb.
Swallowing my pre-panic, I go across the feed room to the light switches that turn on the large overhead barn lights.
Click… click.
Nothing. Well, nothing much. A low humming buzz, a dull glow. A slight darkening in the corners of the barn as the brown half-light spreads its sickly rays.
I am done swallowing my pre-panic and start in on swallowing my panic.
But wait. This is my barn. My safe haven. My refuge. This barn would not hurt me. This barn would not harbor the nebulous spirits of some murky nightmare.
Would it?
I scoot out of the barn, flipping down light switches and pulling fixture cords as I go. I’m out.
Okay, Johnson, think.
I walk to the main doors of the barn and push them as wide open as I can get them. The pale blue light of early morning begins to tip-toe into the deepest gloom of the barn.
I square my shoulders, take a deep breath and march into the barn. MY barn.
I grab the barn flashlight (always, always, always hanging in the exact same place: Thank You, Ric) and turn it on. IT WORKS! A full, strong, white beam of pure joy disguised as light leaps out in front of me.
I follow the shaft of light through the barn. I feed Dakari. I feed the goats. I throw hay. I check on the bunnies.
Then I go to liberate the chickens.
I decide to turn off the chickens’ heat lamp and heater and all other electrical things in the barn until Ric can get home tonight and look at everything.
When I reach into the coop and turn the heater knob to “off”, the bulb in the heat lamp flares to full strength! The twinge of fear that is still nestled snuggly behind my bravado retreats a bit further.
I go ahead and unplug everything and head back to the front of the barn.
I try the lights.
All burst into full glory without a moment’s hesitation.
The heater, it was the heater.
Perhaps the element went out. Maybe the thermostat kicked over. Whatever the cause, that little barn heater was sucking all the juice in the place and reducing the lights to a bare glow.
I knew it. I Knew It!
This IS my barn.
