An Interesting Dream

I awoke early this morning (3am) from a dream that was rather interesting. It was different from my normal dreams, or so I think, and keep me up thinking about it for quite a while. In fact, more than an hour later I'm finding myself still thinking about it, and now, writing about it.

In my dream, I'm sitting in a study/library/den type room with several other people. The feel of it is much like a family visiting, sitting around and talking. Most of the people in the room, around 4 of them, are inconsequential to the dream. They are there but aren't important. There are two important people in the dream, three if you count me.

Most importantly, there is an older gentleman. I see him as a wise man who has lived a good life, who knows what he's talking about. The kind of man you listen to. In the dream, he is part of the gathering and taking part in the conversation, yet it is only his part of the conversation that I focus on and remember as part of the dream. While his words are heard, the others just say, like Charlie Brown's teacher, "Whaaa, whaa, whaaa, wha, wha." I'm obviously meant to focus on and remember him, though I don't remember the early part of the conversation at all, just his last words to me before I wake up. I'll get to those in a minute.

What I do remember from the early part of the dream is that the old man has a little black book of sorts. It resembles a small address book, maybe three by four inches, tabbed in alphabetical order. But instead of listing addresses in this book, the man writes short notes alphabetically but person. The notes might be something like, "Paul Jensen, baby girl born July 07" under J. I was definitely interested in this book, wondering, I think, if I could make use of a similar method of note-taking. I have such a hard time remember things. What was nice about his book was that it wasn't written in all nice and neat and perfect like I'd try to do. It was just notes, hand written haphazardly, in pencil, under the correct letter of the alphabet.

The other important person in the dream was a woman. For the entire dream, she did nothing and said nothing. She simply laid on a couch/bench over in the corner of the room with her back turned toward us, sleeping. Near the end of the dream, one of the other people in the conversation asked the old man if he thought she would return next year. He said he believed she would. And that brings me to the final part of the dream.

At this point, the man and I go for a short walk outside. I ask him about his little black book. He shows it to me, but his agenda is to talk to me about the woman in the corner. He tells me not to be put off by her standoffishness. He goes on to explain to me that she is dying, and that she had come there to die. He explains that her actions stem from her beliefs, that in her culture (gosh, "culture" doesn't feel quite right here but I can't think of another word for what I'm thinking) one envelops themselves in a physical and emotional shroud while awaiting death. And that she was sleeping due to the affect of medicines she was taking for her condition. He explains that it isn't yet her time to die, that she indeed will return next year, and that I should "sit with her. [I] would be good at it."

Then I woke up.

I immediately had two thoughts: that was the second time I've had that dream recently and that was an odd dream. I initially felt sure I had recently had the same dream. Perhaps the conversation in the room was different but the room, the man, the lady in the corner, and the conversation were the same. After thinking for a while, I cannot remember having had the dream, ever, let alone recently. I wonder why I was so sure this was my second time having the dream.

I spent some time thinking about it. It wasn't odd in the usual sense. Normally, my dreams ARE really odd. Normally, they involve bits and pieces of books or movies I've recently seen, twisted into the strangest of dreams. But this one wasn't like that. I tried to think of what I had seen or read recently that would apply. I came up with only two things involving death that I could remember, and only one of them was recent. One of them was Patch Adams, the movie about the doctor who connected with his patients on a personal level. A couple of his patients, whom he couldn't heal, he helped make their dying wishes come true in a sense. But that's not what this dream was about; it was simply sitting with a person, providing a kind of silent companionship. The other was the book Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card. In that book, Ender travels between planets to tell the dead person's life story from the view point of the dead person's intention, the truth that usually gets muddled by each involved person's own experiences and perception (it's really an interesting novel). But again, he's visiting years after a person is dead, not sitting with them at the moment of death. Neither seem related to the dream. Not that I can see anyway.

"You should sit with her. You would be good at it." Those words rattle around in my brain. Why were they in my dream? Why did my dream end there? Is this just another odd firing of brain synapses trying to make sense of random bits of memory? Or is there a message there?

I've had a strong feeling that the dream was a message since the moment I woke up. That might be why the dream is so odd to me. I never feel that way about dreams. I rarely feel that way about anything really. I don't generally feel like I get "messages" in any form except for the telephone kind.

You should sit with her.

You'd be good at it.

The Big Birthday Boy

Josh turned three on Sunday. Having watched his big brother and sister get birthday parties recently, he knew very well what day it was, and he was adamant about what he wanted: a birthday party with birthday cake and Nikki. He got two out of three...sort of. He's young enough that he didn't notice that his demands weren't met. He was still a happy boy.

We started the day with going to church for the first time in weeks. (We've all been battling a cold that's been impossible to get rid of.) He was thrilled to go. He usually loves going to his Sunday school class.

After church, we took him out for a birthday lunch at Red Robin. He got his favorite food, mac & cheese. It was a special treat because of our current dairy free diet. We don't have dairy in the house, but I let the kids order whatever they wish when we are out since they don't have any overt allergy to it. He also got sung to and his birthday ice cream there.

Upon arriving home, he took his nap. While he was sleeping, we brought out his presents and put them on the table so he'd see them first thing after waking up. He was all for opening them.



Here he is opening his first present. It takes him a while to get them open still. It was a Play Doh set containing all kinds of accessories for making food. It has quite a lot in it, and the kids have all enjoyed playing with it. That was my plan: buy him something to encourage the kids to all play together, getting Josh more attention from the older kids.

His second present was another Play Doh set. Toys R Us was having a sale, and I couldn't pass up getting a second set for half price. This one was a "silly faces" set. Think generic Mr. Potato Head. We had fun testing it out when he was done opening his gifts.


Here's a couple of our creations. Aren't they cute?


This gift was Josh's favorite. It's a Lil Kinz lion. The webkinz craze is strong here. All three kids love them.


The truck was kind of a dud. It was the only idea I had for a long time because a neighborhood boy has a truck that Josh always plays with when the kids are all outside together.


He also got another game. Again, I was thinking multi-player items to encourage togetherness in the kids. We haven't gotten Josh to play the game by the rules yet. He just likes putting his monkeys on the bed and pushing the button until they fall off the bed.


Josh wanted to help make his own birthday cake. He enjoyed the batter, too, but not the photo.


You can tell he loved his baseball cake, complete with three candles. We sang Happy Birthday to him just like a real party.

He even knew to blow out the candles.

I think the only thing missing was Nikki, one of Mika's friends.

Allergic Shiners

Can you see it? It's more obvious in person than in the photo.

Scott and I decided it is time to get Sam allergy tested. I'll be taking him back to the doctor soon for a follow up to his latest round of antibiotics. (We've been fighting sinus congestion, cough, and ear infections for two months now...and he's still having symptoms.)

Anyway, Sam's always had red-rimmed eyes. Always. We were hoping to see them go away now that I've eliminated nearly all of the dairy in our diet. I'm completely dairy free all the time. Scott and the kids are dairy free at home, but I allow them to order whatever they wish away from home. If the allergic shiners were caused by dairy, I'm confident we would have seen the correlation.

A couple times in the last week or so, I've noticed the redness around his eyes being more pronounced than usual. One of those times, the redness was the most noticeable ever; the day after the entire area was peeling. We haven't been eating out, and I can't pinpoint anything obvious in our diet. It's time to do allergy testing and try to determine the cause. We're hoping that if we can find the cause, we can do something about it, and in doing so, help him with some other areas he struggles with.