Tag: Dream

Family History: A Dream About My Mother

This morning I woke up from a very vivid dream. I had spent the day with my mother, going around Hoorn and visiting the sites. We talked about history, of the town, of our family and of ourselves. She filled in gaps, cleared up misunderstandings, put things in context and explained things that I was sometimes too young to understand. Then we had a meal together somewhere in the harbour of Hoorn. It was a good day.

There are so many things that are unclear about our family, about our origin, about the feuds and the fights and about everything which has had an incredible impact on my personality. So much understanding has been lost regarding the generational trauma which has been passed down. Gypsies, Jews, the war, Rotterdam, Katendrecht, poverty, Hoorn, a big family, a secret, second family, physical abuse, sexual abuse, death…

It’s unfortunate that I don’t have the relationship with the few remaining family members of my mother’s generation where I can go to have conversations about some of the things which have happened during my childhood and what caused them. I miss having someone who can augment, correct, corroborate and validate some of the history; like a tribal elder.

A Talking Chihuahua

I often have interesting dreams but I don’t often remember them long enough, or they’re just a jumbled mess that only made sense when I was dreaming. This morning I woke up because Joasia woke up, and I immediately told her the dream (or at least the last portion of it). Normally I am not one to try to write down dreams, but this one was fun.

I was driving on a warm evening in a little sports convertible through the streets of Lausanne (or some place like it) in order to go to the embassy of Luxembourg. I had my dog with me, a little chihuahua who I could teach how to say words. I was on my way to the embassy because I needed to vote in the elections and had been waylaid and needed to convince the ambassador to let me vote late. I ended up instructing my dog to convince the ambassador to let me vote and putting the dog into the ventilation system in order to find the ambassador, who was inside the building somewhere.

Now that I write it down it doesn’t seem as sane as I thought it did initially. But I had a really cool little dog that could talk!!

Crazy Night of Dreams

This evening I woke up at 4:00 and felt like I was done sleeping. I played around on my phone for about an hour before falling back asleep. That’s when the nutty dreams started.

I had a dream within a dream, but I didn’t realise it. I was dreaming about something really sad and I was crying. I was afraid of waking up Joasia, so I woke up. When I saw that she wasn’t stirring, I was wondering what had made me so sad. And then I really woke up. (Or did I!?) I fell back asleep for another hour, and then I woke up again because I was once again overcome with sadness.

Wtf.

How Long Will This Last?

This morning, I woke up in tears because of a disturbing dream I had. As with all dreams, it’s fading quickly, but what I do remember of it is that we had organised my mother’s birthday party. She looked like she did before she got ill, radiant and beautiful, but we did know that this was going to be her last year, so we had made it a grand affair. Everyone came, from near and far, and I was mostly dealing with all the drama that would occur if ever such an event were to happen. Especially my mother’s side of the family have a tendency to be volatile and explosive and any party that doesn’t end in police because someone drove a car through the front of a building, well, that’s a really tame party to begin with. At one point, near dawn, when a lot of people had already left for home, we noticed that my mother wasn’t there anymore. I went looking but couldn’t find her anywhere. She was simply gone. I suspected that she may have skipped out early because she thought the agony would be less. Kind of like when a doctor wants to set a bone and asks you to count to three, then sets the bone at the count of one. I don’t know, but I know that I felt very sad when I woke up.

I wonder how long this will last. It’s been years since she died and while things are getting easier, these strange dreams keep coming occasionally. I will likely never let go of the sadness, carrying it with me as proof of my love for her, but the burden of sadness has become easier to bear over time. Maybe this is a permanent addition to my life. Pleasant dreams with a sour ending to fill the void that her pleasant life (with a sour ending) left behind.