Once Upon A Time. A Story of Growing Up.
Once upon a time there was a young woman who was brave enough to get on a plane and go to another country to live and study for a while. She did not speak the language of her new country, and it was a former soviet republic where markets didn’t quite work the way she was used to. Almost nobody spoke English. She was all of 25 in years, but in reality she was much much younger.
She was offered an apartment to rent from a nice family. It belonged to their son, but he was away. However, once she was all moved in and getting used to the place, the family told her that their son would be back for a visit and he needed his apartment back for a week. So they arranged for her to go and stay in the country in a little village on her own for a few days. Someone’s country home.
It was autumn, and the farmers were bringing in their crops. The family dropped her off in the village and showed her how to get to the grocery store and how to light the coal burning furnace. Then they waved goodbye and left her there. She was terrified of the furnace, with visions of explosions haunting her sleep. She had been in the country around 2 weeks.
The girl explored the village and discovered that it was very small. There was a road out of the village in two places, but one of them had a large house with a rickety wooden fence. Behind that fence was a large dog who rushed the fence barking madly. She avoided that end of the village entirely, which was limiting given how small it was.
One day out of boredom she decided to go for a walk. (Sensibly), she headed off in the direction away from the mad dog. Along the road were some chickens. Being a city girl, she was nervous of the chickens and made sure she walked as far away from them as she could. She was pretty sure they had sharp beaks and their talons had metal caps so as to cut her pretty flesh better.
Further along there was a wide field along a gentle hill. There was a farmer in the distance, doing something with a scythe. Near the farmer there was a larger animal. As she got closer, the girl realized that it was a bull. She could see clearly enough that there was a rope from the bull’s nose to the ground so it was tied up. There was a dog sitting nearby. But she had been terrified of all bovines from an early age. Too many iterations of the story about the black cow with the crumpled horn chasing Little Boy Blue? Her knees shook as she walked along that road. Was their steam rising from the beast’s nostrils? It was looking at her with murder in its heart, certainly. There was a fork in the road. One took her closer to the bull, and the other took her further away, to the left. She took the road to the left.
After some time she thought about turning back, but was too afraid to face down the crazy murderous bull again. And even if she made it past the bull, she would have to steel herself to go around the gang of killer chickens again. Both seemed like a bad idea, and she wasn’t that tired yet.
It was a beautiful day. The country side was a bucolic as bucolic could be. There were trees, and a few farmhouses and lanes. After a while she passed a house with a long laneway and a medium sized brown dog came chasing down the lane and started barking madly at her heels. She managed to keep moving and and getting bitten but the dog was fierce. Now if she turned back she would have to go past the dog who clearly wanted to eat her kidneys. And the crazy murderous bull. And then those damn killer chickens. It was not possible, even if she was now getting tired enough to want to go back, and a bit scared because she didn’t know where she was. She could not have told anyone the name of her village, nor even say the word “where,” in the local language. She was going to have to turn back, but she couldn’t face it.
She kept walking. It had been over three hours. The beauty of the countryside was no longer a salve because she needed to go back. But the barky dog. And the murderous bull. And the killer chickens…. She kept going.
She reached a new village, just as pretty and tiny as the first. There was a fork in the road, and in that small intersection grazed a flock of about 10 clearly carnivorous sheep. Scanning the landscape, she spotted a train track along the side of the left fork in the road. A memory sparked. There was a train track through her village. Perhaps it was the same. Perhaps she could walk along the train track and hope to find her way back. The choice was to turn back and walk another three hours AND face the barky dog, and the murderous bull, and the killer chickens again. She could not face going back, so the meat-eating sheep it was.
She forced herself to walk through the sharp-teethed creatures, as far away from their mouths as possible. One turned a lazy eye towards her as it chewed on grass, and she was pretty sure it glinted with evil intent. She made it past the slasher sheep and walked as fast as she could.
Another hour went by as she walked down the new road. It was more heavily wooded than the others so there were no houses or laneways or dogs or farm animals. It was easier, and the train track stayed close by. Suddenly, a house appeared around a corner. The girl recognized that house. It was in her village. It was instantly recognizable as the house on the other road out of town. It had the same rickety wooden fence. She flinched as she walked past it expecting the ferocious dog to come racing at her, but it was nowhere to be seen.
She made her way through the village and back to the house where she was staying. She sat alone in her bedroom and took off her shoes and socks and felt her feet throbbing in pain. She rocked back and forth, and contemplated her life. She had survived killer chickens, a murderous bull, a crazy barky dog and some slasher sheep, and yet another hawkish hound (even though it stayed inside… this time). All of this to avoid the hawkish hound.
Maybe. Just maybe, being afraid of something was not a good enough reason to avoid it forever. It was something she was going to have to think about for a long, long time.
