The Old Laurel and Hardy Routine
DREAM: I board a train bound for Fort Worth. At least that is where I thought it was going. Instead, the train climbs a great mountain and as we travel along the vast summit I am struck by the sunlit vista: more mountains, and interspersed among them mansions with gardens more beautiful than Babylon, all spreading away to impossible distances.
As I travel through this land, I discover I am no longer on a train, but flying now, and I become aware that if I wish it so and am willing to let go, I can see my father again. But I am afraid to let go, thus awake in the 3:30 darkness, unable to go back to sleep, get up, pick up the paper from the doorstep, turn on the computer, read an email, go back to bed, sleep. Then two nights later dream I am touring a high-tech facility, Google Land, an indoor theme park where you take a tour on a carnival ride that swings you around at frightful heights and exhilarating speed, and am aware once again that if I wish it so, I can see my father.
This time I let go and embrace Eternity, arms outstretched with palms upward to receive the winds and so descend through the floor into fire, and beneath the fire discover water, clear and calm, disturbed only by two pebbles that send out concentric rings of ripples, one ring overlapping the other, and beneath the surface, a large eye which I recognize. The eye is attached to a dark and shapeless form whose limits cannot be seen …
Later, I am standing in a strange-yet-familiar house, watching a great storm whip the trees around in a fury, much like the view from the hospital window on the night I said goodbye to my father. The wind carries a wolf through the sky. I go upstairs for a better view of the storm, and as I do, notice that the lower carpeted steps are dirty with dead leaves and cat vomit, but become cleaner as I ascend. Also, higher up, the railing is fine and polished. Someone has finally done something with this decrepit old house. I always thought it had possibilities, and now they have been realized.
And yet, I see that, at the top of the stairs, you cannot step up easily to the next level, but must grasp the landing and with difficulty pull yourself up and swing your legs over. I wonder if I can do it, and while I am wondering notice a group of people coming up the stairs towards me. In this group is my father, as real as life, young and smiling. I am happy to be with him once again.
My father leads me to the second level, but we enter the door at the same time and get stuck. We laugh. “It’s the old Laurel and Hardy routine,” he says, and goes through the door ahead of me while I watch. Then I awake in the dawn light, at peace …
As I travel through this land, I discover I am no longer on a train, but flying now, and I become aware that if I wish it so and am willing to let go, I can see my father again. But I am afraid to let go, thus awake in the 3:30 darkness, unable to go back to sleep, get up, pick up the paper from the doorstep, turn on the computer, read an email, go back to bed, sleep. Then two nights later dream I am touring a high-tech facility, Google Land, an indoor theme park where you take a tour on a carnival ride that swings you around at frightful heights and exhilarating speed, and am aware once again that if I wish it so, I can see my father.
This time I let go and embrace Eternity, arms outstretched with palms upward to receive the winds and so descend through the floor into fire, and beneath the fire discover water, clear and calm, disturbed only by two pebbles that send out concentric rings of ripples, one ring overlapping the other, and beneath the surface, a large eye which I recognize. The eye is attached to a dark and shapeless form whose limits cannot be seen …
Later, I am standing in a strange-yet-familiar house, watching a great storm whip the trees around in a fury, much like the view from the hospital window on the night I said goodbye to my father. The wind carries a wolf through the sky. I go upstairs for a better view of the storm, and as I do, notice that the lower carpeted steps are dirty with dead leaves and cat vomit, but become cleaner as I ascend. Also, higher up, the railing is fine and polished. Someone has finally done something with this decrepit old house. I always thought it had possibilities, and now they have been realized.
And yet, I see that, at the top of the stairs, you cannot step up easily to the next level, but must grasp the landing and with difficulty pull yourself up and swing your legs over. I wonder if I can do it, and while I am wondering notice a group of people coming up the stairs towards me. In this group is my father, as real as life, young and smiling. I am happy to be with him once again.
My father leads me to the second level, but we enter the door at the same time and get stuck. We laugh. “It’s the old Laurel and Hardy routine,” he says, and goes through the door ahead of me while I watch. Then I awake in the dawn light, at peace …
posted by Mack White at 9:14 AM
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