A Dream

 

Those moments when sleep is giving way to wakefulness can be strange. As the dream world starts to mix with the conscious world, bizarre and vivid scenes occupy the mind in a way that deep sleep prohibits or at least prevents the brain from remembering later in an awake state. That in-between sleep time gives a tiny window into the inner workings of the mind and it gives images that stick, for better or worse.

I do not often remember dreaming of Chris. I wonder if that means I do not often dream of him, or if I simply am not in the right stage of sleep to form memories of the dreams. It doesn’t matter. He is not here to know one way or another, and I can’t control it, anyway. Still, I feel a bit uncomfortable that Chris is not there even in my dreams.

One recent morning, though, I had the rare experience of a dream of him that I remembered with clarity. Just as I was becoming aware of my bedroom lightening around me and the birds beginning their early chattering, my awareness stayed engaged with the last dream of the night. Only a snippet of the dream remained in my conscious mind, but the fragment stayed with me for days. Though it was crystal clear, it will be impossible to adequately describe because there were no words and no real events - it was just the strong sense of being with Chris, simply together as we always used to be, punctuated by his unique human sound of clearing his throat. He jokingly used to call this sound “the animal” since he was plagued by allergies and often needed to clear congestion.

That’s it. A nebulous sense of being together and the infamous sound of the animal.

Funny how what amounts to a minute at most of a dream could take up hours of time in the next several days. My conscious mind turned that experience over and over, examining and questioning it from different angles. As usual, those thoughts elicited many different feelings.

First, relief. I did not make up how it felt to be with Chris! He loved me and I loved him, and we did indeed have that rich life together.

Second, sadness. I would like to go back to sleep and return to that moment of his presence. I desperately want to feel his love again, but there is no going back.

Third, anger. This is all I get? How is this enough? I guess I am supposed to be satisfied with the crumbs of a dream including the sound of my husband’s throat-clearing when most people I know get to live with their spouse who is living, breathing, talking, comforting and on and on.

Fourth, the relentless questions without satisfying answers.

Why didn’t he say anything? What am I doing something wrong that I don’t dream of him more often? Is this what you’d call a sign from him? What does it all mean?

It’s all rather exhausting, this constant ruminating, analyzing, over-thinking…

Perhaps the most important, constructive thing to do is to look to the initial reaction of my less complicated sleeping self. Yes, my semi-conscious mind experienced that moment in the best possible way, for when I felt the dream presence of Chris and heard his animal, I simply smiled.