I bolted myself awake this morning at 5am. I was shaking and could not catch my breath.
I was dreaming that I was dying.
Something like this: Floating around on a raft with some people in a big ocean (as opposed to a small ocean? anyway, you get the point. There's no land anywhere...). Somehow it becomes clear that everyone will die if I don't send the cannon barrel (think large civil war era cannon) to the bottom of the sea. In order to do this, I must ride it down. So of course I will die, but everyone else will be safe.
So, I watch myself climb onto the cannon and drop over the side of the raft. (No comments from the Freudian peanut gallery) Except right here in this part I look like a young Harrison Ford. Go figure.
At this point, I watch myself from far away underwater, sink to the bottom of the ocean. A Discovery-channel-type voice narrates my descent, asking "Will she land on the shelf? Oh, it looks like she'll tip off the shelf and fall to the very bottom, the dark deep where light does not reach..."
At this point I wake myself up. I sit up. I hate dreaming that I'm dying. I walk around the house, get some water, try to calm myself down. Eventually I crawl back into bed, huddle up with cats and scoot as close as I can get to my cielo. "Are you ok?" she says. "I dreamed I was dying," I say. "Pray, then." she says.
I am not sure what to pray so instead I sing myself back to sleep by singing hymns in my head.
Oh God our Help in Ages Past
Our Hope for Years to Come
Our Shelter from the Stormy Blast
And Our Eternal Home.
When I woke up again, I felt better, and began thinking about what this dream might mean. As I was showering (I don't know about you, but I think great thoughts in the shower), it came to me that perhaps it is not so much me that had to die, but my old self. The old me who was too scared in college to enjoy school and such very much. The old me who was depressed and anxious. The old me who would not (or could not?) speak up in class. The old me who doubted my worth and my gifts and my voice.
Besides being one step closer to discerning my calling by starting seminary, I think this opportunity gives me a chance to start anew, to redeem some of my mistakes and fear from my past.
So I am determined to live into my new-found self, the one I have struggled so hard to find. The old, scared me can sink to the bottom of the ocean, and become food for the fishies. I shall live into my wonderfulness, my gifted-ness, my voice.
I shall live into my Towanda-ness!
Towanda, The Amazing Amazon Woman, Righter of Wrongs, Queen Beyond Compare!
