Dreams are interesting. I’ve always found dream
interpretation to be interesting, but I’ve only ever taken these interpretation
books and websites with a grain of salt. We all dream, but we don’t always
remember them when we wake. I frequently have vivid dreams and remember them
with great detail. There are many that I don’t. Most are pleasant, some are
funny, and others are terrifying nightmares.
Some time ago, I wrote about my Dusty Dog coming to see me in a dream post mortem.
He wasn’t the first to pass on to later visit me in a dream. My grandmother, Yai Yai, as us grandkids all addressed her, died more than ten years ago. Some time after her passing, I dreamed of an old telephone – one that had a cord and was plugged into the wall. In the dream, I was in a living room of a small house. The old phone was ringing. I picked it up to my ear and heard static. I said through the static, “Hello?” I could hear a woman’s voice faintly over the crackling, but could not make out words. The static stopped, the call was disconnected. I hung it up.
It rang again. Static… but then I heard, clearly, my grandmother’s voice, “I love you, Joshua…”
Her voice was gone as I tried to speak. Even in the dream I knew she was dead. I wanted so bad to talk to her. But the call was gone, and the phone didn’t ring again.
Although I wrote it off as a nice, yet heartbreaking, dream, this was the first time someone would communicate from ‘the other side.’
My grandfather passed about five years ago. I’ve seen him in many dreams, heard his voice, but he and I haven’t talked in a dream – until recently, but more about that in a bit.
A week ago tonight, I lost a dear friend. He was way too young. Friday night, John, or Mudd, as we all affectionately knew him, came to my table in the tavern to say goodnight. I stood, shook his hand, and with a brotherly hug, said the parting words that I’ve always said, “Love you, brother. Ride safe. See you next time!” No one would ever know that just a few miles away would be his last goodnight.
Two nights ago, I was inundated with vivid dreams. I shall discuss them now, only in the way that dreams are never quite like reality:
In a suburb neighborhood, not unlike that of Homosassa Hills, full of unique cookie-cutter houses, I was approaching the front door of a pleasant looking place not unlike that of the Stark family residence a block away from my childhood home. However, it was not the Starks’ home, it had been converted into a bar-b-cue smokehouse restaurant of sorts.
As the crowd entered the front door, the line passed through the living room and were served drinks – of all kinds – then passed through the kitchen for a plate of bar-b-cue with all the sides and trimmings, then exited the back door into a large back yard with picnic tables, a small pavilion shading an acoustic band, and a strange bin full of roasted peanuts.
This bin of peanuts was no small bin. At least four feet square, built of two-by-fours and plywood, taller than my waist… filled to the bottom with roasted peanuts.
I had my clear plastic cup of beer in one hand, and was balancing a plate of food in the other as I pushed the wood framed screen door open with my toe. Outside, in the sunshine-filled, summery back yard, I saw the typical Florida lawn. Mostly green and lush, but only white sand and patches of crab grass in the highly trafficked areas. I surveyed the tables and found a corner to rest my plate and beer while I went for a fistful of peanuts.
At the opposite side of the peanut bin stood a man, leaning on the bin at his hip and cracking peanuts. I approached the bin and reached in as the man turned my direction. I looked up from the peanuts, and Mudd was there smiling at me.
“Hey, brother!” I said cheerfully, “I didn’t expect to see you here!”
With the big smile that only John can make and happiness in his voice, he said, “Yeah, I died two days ago!” Followed by a boisterous laugh.
The timing within this dream is not accurate. In waking life, John had passed five days before.
I moved around the bin to stand closer to Mudd. At this time, many others did as well… all wanting to talk to him. Among all the chattering and trying to get my own words in, I heard myself ask him, “How long can you stay?”
I was aware in my dream that he was visiting, but I was not aware that I was dreaming. He was happy and cheerful, as Mudd always is! Although I never heard a response from him regarding his duration of stay, we were all happy. Laughing together, eating bland bar-b-cue, salty peanuts, and drinking cold beer.
As dreams have a way of doing, I was abruptly transported to the street in front of the house-turned-biker-bbq-joint. I was walking north. The beautiful afternoon had suddenly turned to early night. Just after dusk. As I continued north, I was no longer on a Florida suburb street. I was on the old two lane Highway 17 on the south side of Hampstead, North Carolina.
I saw a Piggly Wiggly on the left that I know really isn’t there by the big oak. Anyone from Hampstead knows the big oak, as well as I do. I thought about the few groceries I needed as I crossed the street into the Piggly Wiggly.
Coming through the sliding front door, I saw a single cash register and a few aisles leading back to the meat department of the small grocery mart. I went right, towards the produce.
Walking parallel to the face of the building, I was approaching a refrigerated case of orange juice on my left.
There was a tall, pleasant man with silky grey hair looking over the selection of orange juice. I passed behind him, making my way to the produce. Once he was behind me, I heard him clear his throat.
“I know that man,” I thought to myself and turned to see it was my grandfather standing there. Being clever and funny, like he always was, instead of saying anything, I decided that I would approach him from behind and stand uncomfortably close next to him until he looked at me.
As I had planned, he turned his head to look at me and his expression of uncertainty instantly turned to a face of joy! We chuckled together as I put my arm around his shoulders and looked into the orange juice case with him.
At this point, the dream became cloudy, but I recall walking throughout the store with him, talking lightly. I wish I could remember all that we talked about. At one point he asked me, “Why are you shopping here? Isn’t there a Hoggly Woggly closer to your house?”
“Well, yeah.” I said, “But I came up here to make an insurance payment at State Farm.” Even in my dream, I knew this was a lie. I don’t have State Farm insurance. I’ve never lied to him before, why would I in a dream?
As dreams have a way of doing, I was abruptly transported again.
Exiting the front door of Piggly Wiggly did not exit to where I entered. Rather, I was coming down the front steps of my old house in Wilmington, North Carolina. The bright, summery, sun-shiny day had returned. Making a right, I headed towards the big part of my yard where the oak trees are.
I saw mom near the neighbor’s fence. She’s living, of course.
“Hey!” I hollered. She turned to me as I was making my way across the lawn.
“I’ve got someone here who misses you!” she yelled back.
From around the corner of the fence, my great big Dusty Dog was running full tilt straight at me!
I dropped to my knees as he barreled into me. I wrapped my arms around his big chest and held his head to my neck. He was so happy and excited he couldn’t hold still!
As I was loving on Dusty and playing with him, mom went to sit in the swinging bench hung between the two big oak trees. Dusty and I made our way closer the swing as mom was saying, “He’s been looking for you.”
Thinking of my grandfather, I glanced back to the front door of my old house. I wanted to tell mom who I was just walking with. I was aware that going through the door of my house would not lead back into Piggly Wiggly, but into my disarranged, bare-floored, unkempt house.
Dusty and I played and mom watched with happiness in her eyes and a beautiful smile on her face. Strangely though, behind the swing in the oaks, was a dog house. It wasn’t Dusty’s. He was an inside dog. This dog house wasn’t any old wooden dog house. It was a small teardrop camper that had sunk into the North Carolina soil down to its floor. It was aluminum, the paint was faded and peeling. I could make out some of the lettering of the Spartan logo from the forties.
“Mom! This is a Spartan camper! Do you know how rare these are?”
Spartan did build campers and tag-along trailer homes through the forties, but never a teardrop camper.
This camper-turned-doghouse was in my neighbor’s yard. I was scratching Dusty’s ear with my left hand while looking towards the neighbor’s home thinking about how to ask them if I could take it to restore it.
In an instant I was awake. It was just after five AM.
Three of my favorite people dropped in to say hello. In a dream that felt like an hour, it had passed in mere seconds.
