Dream Notes No. 1
I had a weird +good + sad dream last night. I wanted to take notes, capture the details, and remember the dream. So, here’s the first installment of A Writer’s Diary Dream Notes.
I was driving down Middle Beach Road in Panama City Beach, but it was different. It was more desolate. You could go 70. So I was driving fast on a gray cloudy beach day.
Cloudy days at the beach are different from cloudy days not at the beach.
I arrived at a condo owned by the TV station my dad used to work for. Everything was various shades of berry. The exterior walls. The interior walls. Ceramic tile. Shag rug. Sofa. Club chairs.
Berry.
No one was there.
Silence.
A half dozen candles were burning, and I wondered why Mom would leave all of these candles burning. It's dangerous to leave burning candles unattended.
Some of Mom's things were scattered about like she had been working or having some time alone with God or maybe even a Solo Writing Retreat.
I pulled a slip of paper off the top of a tall tight stack on an end table painted a shade of bright berry beside the dusty berry overstuffed sofa and saw that it was a prayer vigil reminder. When I read it, I noticed the reminders were arranged in chronological order according to date (or time?), and several of them fell and got out of order; and I felt terrible, guilty, like I was going to get caught snooping.
Then I reminded myself it's not snooping if the thing I'm looking at is in the open. But then I questioned if I was supposed to be there. Maybe I was snooping.
While I was wondering if I was somewhere I shouldn't be, I tried to tidy up the prayer vigil reminders and put them back in order, back in a nice tight stack, but I only made things worse.
After many failed attempts at something that shouldn't be difficult (dreams sure can complicate simple things), I stopped. I accepted I had made a mistake. Mom wouldn't mind, and it would be fine.
After the prayer vigil reminder situation settled, the condo door opened, and a few people entered—some of my dad's co-workers from the TV station. I said hi and hoped no one could see my mess. All those fallen reminders all out of order.
Then my dad came in.
I ran over to him and hugged him, and after several seconds I told everyone, "I'm hugging my dad. I know he's dead. I'm sorry if I'm hugging someone else, but y'all need to let me think I'm hugging my dad."
Then I woke from the dream I knew was a dream because even sleeping me knows that shit's pretty weird.
But I got to hug my dad, which was nice, even though it means I'm crying now.
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