Moon Shadows

It started with a nightmare.

In the dream, I was taking my glasses off.  And as soon as I did, another pair would materialize on my face.  Frantic, I would take those off, and another pair would be perched on my nose.  Some times, when I pulled the pair off, two would be there, one pair in front of the other.  It was a surreal and helpless feeling not to be free of those glasses.

And then it got really weird.  It ended with me standing on my head in the middle of the living room, struggling mightily to straighten my legs while I grimaced from the pain of doing a headstand on a wood floor.  Each time I thought I had it, I would fall flat on my back.

Maybe it was the two hotdogs I had for dinner.  Or  perhaps the cold dog who had jumped up on the bed between my husband and I and found a spot behind my bent knees to spend the night.   Or maybe it was the very bright, very full moon shining above the river that caused me to jolt wide awake at 2 a.m., the scraps and swatches of the dream still fresh, still scary.  All I know for sure is that I was very awake and very unable to go back to sleep after a dream that would have given old Freud something to chew on for the rest of his career.

What did it mean, this dream of eye glasses and living room acrobatic maneuvers?   Searching for clarity and seeing things as they really are is a good thing. Pushing through pain and finding balance is, too.  Such hard work, this task of being human.  Maybe dreams like this are gentle nudges toward that end.

Before this little nudge,  my partner and I had  spent a great day enjoying the autumn splendor that is Minnesota in September.  Is there anything more glorious than a walk in the woods at this time of year?   Several times during our walk, I stopped to marvel at a particularly regal maple  longer than either my partner or our old dog wanted to.  I took photos, but as with most things, the pictures do not come close to the experience of actually living in the moment.

The trees will lose their leaves within the next month.   Too soon, we will be shutting the cabin door for another season, leaving it to the quite content critters and a winter of drunken mouse orgies.   Minutes and hours…days and weeks…months and years…centuries….will continue to come and then go away, only to be replaced with new minutes, new hours, new years, new moons.

In the meantime of my life,  I will continue to seek both clarity and balance in this life of mine.  Making room for a sleeping dog at the foot of the bed on nights when the moon casts soft lavender shadows across us all.