Kill Hill

It was naptime, finally. My two little boys were crashed out after a busy morning of eating, crying, fighting, playing, and running. 

Kyle was a precocious 4 and little Ryan was a handful going thru his terrible twos. Adorable children, but very tiring today. They didn’t stay in one place for very long. 

Now was my chance!

I had been working intermittently all morning planting a row of baby butternut trees in front of the cabin. Swing the pick, scoop out a few cupfuls of soil. Repeat. Maybe they would generate some shade in their lifetime, but not too hopeful at this point. The soil was hard, dense packed with whispy dry grass poking thru the crust. Rain would sure be nice, to soften up this concrete dirt for me. Isolated thunderstorms were predicted, but we had only gotten a few brief sprinkles during the morning. Just enough to turn to choking steam in the sunshine. 

Thunder in the distance let me know that the atmosphere was energized! I could see the thunderheads building and I hoped for one to head my way. 

Suddenly the wind came up. 

The birds that had been chirping madly in the brush stopped their chatter to listen. 

Rising up from the valley below, a massive thunderhead reared above me to the north.

 

The smell of rain was heavy. In an instant, huge raindrops began to pelt the dust making little poufs with each strike. I dashed into the house just in time to avoid a soaking. The sky erupted in a summer light show complete with thrashing trees and cracks of thunder. 

And just as quickly it was over. Blue sky above.

 

The hot sun began converting all those raindrops into waves of steam. Rivulets of mud swirled in the driveway. Too hot to do any more I went to gather my tools; pick, shovel, wheelbarrow, a bucket of saplings. 

I stopped to gaze down the hill to the little pond at the edge of the woods. Someday, those little boys would fish there if the bluegills I had released survived. But I knew they would. 

KA-BOOM! 

The flash of light and boom-hiss of expanding air knocked me to my knees! The lightening bolt that hit the well head 15 feet away from me was about a foot wide at point of impact, with a fuzzy indistinct boundary of burning atmosphere of at least that much on each side. The tangy smell is one I will never forget. 

I lay there on the dirt for a few minutes, my heart racing. I was ok. And then I tried to get up. 

I was made of rubber. Nothing worked!  My arms didn’t want to support me as I struggled to rise on wobbly legs. I lay in the dirt a few more minutes and tried again. 

It took 10 minutes to get into the house. I sat, getting my breathing under control. Lucky to be alive. 

And those little boys slept thru it all. 

It turned out that the lovely pasture high on the hill, overlooking Bryant Creek to the north and south was devoid of trees for a very specific reason. Known as Kill Hill for its attractiveness to deer for countless generations, I had witnessed just the latest tree clearing event.

  

Arrow heads occasionally rose up thru the gravel from ancient hunters who camped in that very spot to take advantage of the bounty. 
Although I bet they had enough sense to come in out of the rain.
 

I was lucky in many ways that day.