I had such a wonderful dream tonight
Posted on | December 31, 2008 |
…that it sounds like fiction. I mean, dreams are fiction anyway, so I present this as a work of self-dreamed fiction. And you’re very lucky - I rarely remember my dreams!
SHIFTING GEARS
It’s New Year’s Eve and I have a cold, so I stay home to cozy up on the couch, cough and eventually fall asleep. Even nature wants me to stay in - it’s been snowing large, fluffy flakes of snow all day. It’s gorgeous - probably the friendliest snow we’ve had this year. I’m serious - this snow is has cheer on its side.
So as I proceeded with my plan for complete comfort, my eyes became heavy and I dozed on the couch. After half and hour of this, I went into the bedroom and dropped into a merciless pit of sleep. it had all the markings of anti New Year’s Eve behavior, but I didn’t care at all. I was just trying to feel better.
Dark. Restless a bit. Heavy head, tight back. Ugh.
I am out wandering the winter highway. It is covered in snow and people in good cheer. Gaily-colored hats doffed, they walk hand in hand swinging their arms. Christmas lights line the sides of the street, leading to a brighter village down the road.
Unlike today, there is no light pollution; the stars are piercingly clear and the Milky Way dances around them, calling out to each star, giving it a place in the revolution around me and the other revelers. I crunch onward to the village and suddenly it’s Spring.
I’m at a concert. But this outdoor concert has lawn seating and people are relaxing on blankets and folding chairs. The band is playing some wonderful mix of everything I’ve ever wanted and the good cheer from the Winter Highway is redoubled again here. In fact, everyone has just arrived from their journey and they are resting on their jackets, hats and gloves.
A rope chair passes by me and I grab it and fly upward for one of the sky box seats, slowly passing over the crowd, getting a new view and swaying in time with the music. The tempo tightens up and inward, like a jam from the Allmans, everyone disappears into their thoughts and becomes one with the perfect syncopation of the rhythm section with the passing of the lead. It’s one of those joyous moments in live music where that inward journey unites all, and the good feelings redouble once again.
I scan the crowd and see a gal looking up at me that steals my breath. Her features are indistinct, but I am attracted to her immediately and guide my rope chair to land next to her. She makes room for me on her jacket and we sit listening to the music. It’s not quite right. She’s too right, too much surface, not enough inside - you know these things when they happen.
As I turn back to the stage another gal looks me in the eyes, smiling. Snap. My eyes snap onto hers. Crackle. Something sizzles in the air between us. Hug. What? Air hug? It felt like a hug, but we’re 10 feet apart. She beckons. I turn to the gal next to me and she vaguely nods and goes back to looking pretty.
Without a moment gone by, I am sitting next to this new gal. She puts her arm around me for a little squeeze. It feels like she is in my head, saying “There, there. Your found me now.” I try to turn my head but I find that she is actually whispering my ear.
We sit foot to foot, knee-to-knee. The band plays on, some rollicking indie-pop/rock that strums something inside all us thirty-somethings on in the third gear of life.
“I saw you.” she says.
“I know - I felt it.” I am not under- or overwhelmed. It’s simply as if a piece of a puzzle fell into place.
She reaches out and taps me gently on the nose. “I don’t know how I know, but I do. You and I are supposed to meet. It could have been last year or five years from now, but it is today. What will you do with today?”
My eyes widen, then soften. A great sense of relief comes over me. “I’ve been looking so hard that it feels like I want every piece to fit my puzzle. But you should come over and see my puzzle… mangled pieces of opposing colors jammed into place… It’s ridiculous.”
She throws back her head and laughs loud and long. “You, sir, have just described the puzzle I threw away last week.”
“Why throw away your puzzle?”
“Well, sometimes you just have to start over when the edges are frayed from repeatedly trying to fit something wrong into the right place.”
“And how’s the new puzzle working out?”
“There is no puzzle, “she smiles.
I frown for a moment.
“Everything fits if you allow room for it, Matt.”
The band kicks into a cover of my favorite Department of Eagles track, No One Does It Like You. Snigger. For some reason I know that it’s twenty years later and this song is now a standard memory of my generation. But it’s not. It’s 2008-come-2009 and I am time-confused, time-independent. It’s that moment. The meeting. The beginning of everything. The new chapter. The shifting of gears.
“You know what I just did?” I ask her.
She smiles and nods.
“I just tossed this old puzzle. Gone!” I motion over my shoulder - the other gal I first sat next to frowns for a moment and then grabs an air chair and swings away.
I shift around to sit next to this gal and ask her name. We talk about those things you do when you’re getting to know one another. She looks at my hand and asks, “Are you divorced?”
I smile and look at my hand, then her. “I was divorced, now I’m single.” I continue, ” I live in Dobbs Ferry. You?”
“I do, too. Down by the water. I have a house and a dog and I bet you’re coming to visit tomorrow.”
Dogs and I usually don’t get along, but something light and bright eradicates all the shadows within me. It’s not her, it’s not the music, it’s not the journey, nor the common and shared good cheer. It’s my own interior illumination - burning with insight. It kindled low while I worried about what lay in the shadows, at the edges. Now, the corners are empty and clean, and the shadows disappear as I crank it up.
“I am looking forward to getting to know you better,” I whisper in her ear.
She grins and replies, “I know. I feel the same way.”
The ground falls away and I am flying out over the Hudson River Valley. Down river I see Dobbs Ferry glowing its private and simple glow. I don’t go flying often. It’s tricky. Landing is awkward, but I’m sure it’ll be okay.
I awake. Happy. It’s 10:30pm, 2008. Normally, this could be a reason to be unhappy. But somehow I know that despite that the dream was vivid, so splendidly vivid that I awoke expecting to remember her name, something profound happened. And it happened at just the right time. I’m ready for where the Winter Highway takes me…
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January 3rd, 2009 @ 11:43 pm
very cool!