It is 3 am. I just had a dream. In the dream, I was a teenager out by the barn with a team of horses. It was evening and chore time, I was finishing something and then went to put the team away. I unhitched the horses and walked them ahead of me to the horse barn. As I rounded the corner of the barn the horses ran head-on into an officer. He was there for me. I do not recall the alleged offense, but in my dream, I asked Dad what is going on. I looked him in the eyes and asked him “Why are you doing this?” He could not answer the question, and things got really emotional, and then I woke up.

This was a dream, the meaning of which I do not understand. However, immediately I recalled a real-life incident. The year was 2002. I was 13 at the time. In the 8th grade. Life was a mess in those days. The extended family was in the middle of a horrible situation. One Aunt was being dragged through the court system for alleged sexual molestation of minors. As a result of that children’s aid was involved. And to avoid having the children hauled off somewhere for secular counseling, school was canceled part of every Friday and those of us in the family, and several other “troubled” kids were sent to “group meetings”. These group counseling sessions took place at Great Uncle Mark’s house. There were three groups. Great Uncle Joe and Laura met with the older boys. Great Uncle Mark with the younger boys. And his wife Dora with the girls.

These meetings were run with oversight from the children’s aid, and all notes were reported back to them.

So one evening, late. As we finished supper a vehicle pulled in. Uncle Mark knocked at the door. He said something to Dad. Dad and Mom abruptly got up and went out to the car and sat out there in the vehicle with Mark and some other person for a very long time. All of us children were left to fend for ourselves wondering what in the world was going on. It was very late. Finally, my parents return, and we go to bed.

In due time night turns to morning and I get out of bed to start the routine which at that time included milking the goats. Now at that time we actually had two herds in two different barns, and I had the task of milking in the other barn usually with someone’s help. I get started milking and after a bit, Dad joins me.

We’re sitting there beside our animals rhythmically streaming jets of white juice into our foaming buckets. After several minutes Dad clears his throat and begins talking from the other end of the goat stand. “Did you know that a girl’s breasts are private?”

“No, I never thought of it that way.”

“Well yes, they are. Did you ever touch your sister?”

“No, not that I am aware of.”

“Well, The car last night was the children’s aid lady, your sister told Dora at group that you tickled her breasts and Dora told children’s aid. They are concerned you are a child molester, so for the next several months, you will not be allowed to spend time alone with the other children. That means that you will have to walk to and from school ahead of and separate from the others. You may not at any time spend time alone with another child on the playground. You will no longer be allowed to drive to group meetings, instead one of us will need to take you children over and then pick you up again. You will not be allowed to chore without supervision, which means Mom will need to come with you to help chore. (And she literally took time out of her day to trail along with me from barn to barn doing chores, bless you dear Mom, but that was not fun for either of us.) And finally, you will not be allowed to sleep upstairs, instead, we will fix up the downstairs room for you.”

I buried my face in that goat’s flank and bawled. Except that was not really acceptable so several huge tears disappeared into the goat hair, I took several deep breaths, and we continued milking before heading off to school where I was painfully aware of the fact that everyone would notice over the next days that I was an outcast, a weirdo, the bad guy.

P.S. I have a shadowy memory that several years later while I was at Whispering Hope, my counselor mentioned one day that there was a letter from my sister in which she acknowledged that the accusation was fabricated and she is sorry for having said stuff to get me in trouble. However, due to other content in the letter, they cannot give me the letter.

What else could have been on the letter? 🤷🏼‍♂️ At this point I can’t tell for sure if that letter actually happened or was a dream, it doesn’t matter, I hold nothing against my sister.

P.S. You may wish to read the next post The Outhouse.