Today
marks the one year anniversary of a good friend's passing. And I have been thinking of him even though our friendship
ended many years ago.
We
said goodbye apparently for good in 1984 when he was making plans to
leave the area and I was making plans to marry someone else.
Naturally,
a great deal has happened in the intervening years. So it's not
surprising, or in anyway indicative of my feelings, that it had been a
long time since I'd thought of those days at all.
But
three weeks ago, I had a dream. And my friend Tim was the leading
character. He was young and handsome in the dream and taller than I
remembered. There was a remarkable brightness about him. And I know
that kind of brightness.
He looked different but I recognized his energy. Sensing it as if I was
standing next him, stepping back in time to re-experience the soul vibration of a person I once loved.
In
the dream, we met by chance. I was living alone in a big sunny
apartment and he was working at a nearby market. We bumped into each
other at his work and he asked if he could see me. Later on, standing in
my dream apartment he told me he'd wanted to contact me before but that
he was afraid that doing so would stir up old half-forgotten feelings.
And then he explained what he had felt so very long
ago and the hows and whys of what he did, and didn't, do. The
information was new but surprisingly coherent, fitting in neatly with
events I had wondered about but not fully understood at the time.
Seeing our history in this new light changed things. I no longer felt
responsible. My old remorse lifted.
After we
had finished talking, we set out together on a wide boardwalk with long
strings of golden lights on either side. There was some kind of
festival happening around us and I was happy in a way I'd almost
forgotten. I told him that he was right about the emotion. "I can feel
it," I said. "Can you?"
He didn't answer or if he did,
I don't remember. There was a knowing that our time was ending and
that he had brought me back to where I was supposed to be. When I woke
up and considered the brilliance and the clarity of the dream, I knew
that he had passed.
I
pulled my laptop into bed and found the obituary online. Tim's picture
(left) showed the same beautiful smile I'd loved so long ago. I saw
that he had died in a hospice at the age of 52. I was sad that I didn't
know but I was happy to think that he'd made it through okay.
Thank you for remembering me, as I remember you.
_________
This post is adapted from my upcoming book The Spirit Dream. ©2024 Barbara Graver Wilder. All rights reserved.
Translate
Social Icons