Two nights ago, I dreamt that bombs fell on my home. I was with my family when orange light split the sky and rockets came down. In that moment, I made peace that I would die. Maybe I did so because I thought I couldn't cease to be.
I woke from that dream to the incessant vibration of my phone. A friend was calling me, who I ignored last time he did. I let it ring. When I didn't answer, he texted me. Our old friend had died less than an hour before. Isn't it odd how dreams border reality?
I often see little difference between life’s two dimensions of the body and the spirit. For a time, I understood them as the same. For my fore-bearers, there was only the body. One moment you’re here, the next you’re gone to the grave. I think that’s why we bury bodies instead of spreading ash. It may be a sign of resurrective hope, but I think a part of us doesn’t want to let them go.
When I visited my uncle’s grave a couple times ago, I felt a sense of loss. I was home and thought it time that someone in my life met him. We pulled up, and upon stepping out, I was confused, then I was lost. I couldn’t find his oak tree. When my family lost him in ‘81, my grandfather planted a tree beside his bed. It became a large oak over the 40 years it grew, turning into a beacon of shade and a roost for the birds that homed in its branches.
I searched, but the tree wasn’t there. I walked in and out of so many gravestones, searching for his name everywhere. I finally reached him, and I nearly broke down. The oak tree was gone, chopped to a stump. I tried to make the most of it, to talk to him anyway and acquaint him with my guest. But the sun burnt upon my back, and my companion couldn’t care less about the emotion under her feet. I didn’t come back ‘til my grandpa died.
When I look back, this brings me to tears—not because of who I was with, but because the oak tree wasn’t there. The tree was so comforting to me, and it had given a hug to many others too. The small bench under its leaves was a seat of many conversations, and the grass beside its roots had long held a refreshing shade of green. But since the tree disappeared, the grass was hard-pressed to live without shade, and when I finally saw it, it had died. The bench was also dried and brittle. It almost broke when I sat down alone.
But when I dream, I don’t have to remember the reality of sun or drought. I get to see the grass’s green with my own eyes. I sit on the bench, looking up to see leafed branches alighted by sunlight. A cardinal flies to its home among the living branches. My uncle sits next to me. His smile warms me, and his smile says that it’s all going to be okay. This is a nice place to sit.
“What a joy it is for a son to fall asleep in his father’s arms.” This is my recall of holy words I once heard, though bent by memory. I’ve wrestled with this truth, but I’ve finally submitted. It is a joy for a child to fall asleep into the arms of a parent who loves them. My father loves. My mother loves. The loss of consciousness doesn’t change that. I trust this so, and I’ve even before fallen asleep as they’ve driven me home.
I wonder if my uncle felt that last turn into his parent’s driveway. I wonder if my old friend smiled as his father opened the back-seat door. I wonder if I’ll feel it when I am picked up and placed softly in my bed.
I cannot know what comes when we fall asleep. Yet, I’ve found that dreams often border reality. I dream of death and life. I dream of many things that make me cry. I see bombs that fall, I see friends that have slipped away, and I trust in an uncle’s smile that gives me peace.