So I Had This Dream...

I'd been a single Mom for about thirteen years before I met Steve. He stuck because he refused to let me run away (you know the old PMS adage - Pack My Stuff). I really admire him for that because, like Jessie Wheeler in my Drifters books, I'm a runner. I'm also Aries. Need I say more?

Anyways, like any ordinary Island gal I did all the things you're supposed to do while you're on the hunt (is that descriptive a bit too strong?) for THE ONE. I made my lists, I had sessions cross-legged on my bed with candles, soft music, and the occasional rabbit's foot…there may have even been incense, I can't recall exactly. I think these sessions became even more regular after one day at a post-church Sunday brunch when my Mom said "It's time." I'm sure she was just wondering who was going to take care of me, or perhaps of my house - I'd bought a 120 year old century home, crazy me - but, at any rate, no one knew more than I did just how much I wanted to meet a NICE GUY and SETTLE DOWN. (pardon the caps. But it's hard to write the finger-parenthesis. Or…should I just use real parenthesis??? ses??? (Where's an editor when you need one!)

And let me add that I didn't need taking care of. But there are other reasons why a woman seeks a man / partner. And I've come to discover, over time, that I actually like being taken care of. Once in a while.

So. This is where my story gets interesting. 

Maybe because I was praying so hard for some assistance from the universe (let's just keep it simple, shall we? I know not all of my readers are Catholic!), but one night I had this incredibly vivid dream. I was in a downtown mall. Someone greeted me - he was a tall, lean young man in his late twenties or so. I seem to recall he had dark hair. He stood across the hall from a store which was one of those mall-style art galleries with prints for sale, and he waved his arm as if to  say TAH-DAH, although in fact he didn't say a word. I followed his gesture and glanced across the hall to the store. Inside were numerous paintings / prints for sale, and they all featured sailing ships.

They were in all different sizes, and featured different ships, but they were all AGE OF SAIL ships, meaning they dated from the Eighteenth and Nineteeth centuries, and they were rigged as schooners, barques and barquentines. The paintings / prints covered all three walls, and were displayed so that barely any wall space was perceptible, Victorian Gallery style.  I remember thinking that somehow my new man would be tied into these paintings. As the dream went on, my Guide disappeared but I remember feeling like I was in love.  At the end, I went up two or three ancient flagstone steps that were essentially a path through a low stone wall, and the dream ended. I remember feeling sad at the end and knowing that the reason I felt sad was because my man and I were disagreeing over money - he thought money was important to me but he didn't understand that it was love that I was truly seeking.

The dream was so vivid that, upon waking, I immediately wrote it down in my journal. Before coffee, even. I don't know how much time passed before I met Steve, but I'm certain it was a matter of months. We do disagree about money, but what couple doesn't? Oh, and by the way, we met at Adult Sailing Lessons. He pushed me out of a boat - a 420 dinghy - because we were going over on the crest of a wave and were potentially going to swamp the boat if I didn't get my butt out of it. There was a spectacular sunset, which I saw from my low vantage point where I was furiously treading water in Bedeque Bay. Steve still thinks that's funny, that he pushed me out of the boat. I'm usually a good sport. The water was warm. The shower afterwards was even better.

I think I've only had one other super vivid dream about Steve. He was walking towards me. I can't recall any surroundings except maybe a mist, or clouds. What I do remember is his wardrobe - a long, calf length duster; maybe a cravat, hat? Musket or rifle at his side? Glasses. Round. I woke up thinking that he and I had met once before, in another lifetime. I felt certain he was the owner of a Plantation near Charleston, SC, a city I have always felt a connection to.  I mentioned that to Steve the other day as I was ruminating on that dream, and he didn't like it. The man I know today would not be someone who would consider another man, woman or child his 'property.' But that was another time, and often plantations were passed down through generations. I do remember that he looked tired in that dream, his head was hanging kind of low. But his essence was the same as the man I know today - kind, strong, determined, a quiet fortitude. Occasionally funny, dry, a jokester. Good solid company. Someone I deeply respect.

I find myself sharing these dreams not because I want to 'go on' about Steve, or about how amazing it was to finally find love at age 38. Instead, my purpose is to send the question out to all of you - Is there more to this life and world than we usually allow ourselves to believe? If you've read past blogs of mine you will recall the interesting 'messages' I received from the universe while writing the Drifters books which, as you know, singularly has been the most amazing, satisfying career move of my life. (Not just career, in fact - heart, soul and much love went into the writing of those books).

I've had so many vibrant dreams and weird intuitive experiences that I cannot imagine that this life is all we know. I've visited psychics on occasion when I felt I was drifting along with some unseen tide, and for the most part things have come out the way they said they would. Same goes for my son, Christopher. He's had many people tell him that 'he is going to invent something that will make millions of people happy.' He was going to go back to school and study The Classics last year. A random woman came into his coffee shop, got her coffee, took it to her table, and then marched back and out of the blue told him "No, no school. You are going to invent something that is going to make millions of people happy." He called me right away and we both hummed the theme to The Twilight Zone. Do do do do, do do do do...

do do do do, do do do do….

This week I woke with a start one night at 4 a.m. We'd always thought his invention would be a song, or maybe something to do with the Third Wave Coffee Biz, which he is totally into. But that night I had this feeling that it was his BAND, Rebel On A Mountain. I dunno. I'm Irish, which perhaps lends to my intuitiveness, or superstition, if you want to call it that. But I think we all have this gift, or the ability to see / hear things we don't understand. My brother once explained what we call ghosts as this, "Picture someone back in 1700 trying to understand cars. We just don't have the  right reference point to understand any kind of afterlife or visitations from spirits in this life. But that doesn't mean these things don't exist."

I don't know that I've seen spirits, but I feel like I've felt them, and heard them. It freaks me out at three a.m. sometimes. But the last guy I know who passed away was an amazing fella. So if it's him or my grandmother or maybe my beloved old tabby DC that's hanging around, then bring 'em on. I just wish we could converse. Imagine what I'd learn.

I have a gazillion stories I could tell you. I bet you all do, too.

I'd love to hear yours! This blog is safe, I'll never share your secrets. And I doubt I have that many readers! So share away. Tell me about your strange dreams or visitations or just, simply, your intuitive moments.

Have your dreams come true? And I'm talking about the slumbering zzzzzzzzz type, not the 'When am I ever gonna win that Oscar?' dream.

I believe that mine has. 

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Sailing on Tara, summer in P.E.I. He didn't throw me out of this boat. Ever. (Phew)

Or maybe, as Steve often tells me, "Sometimes a dream…is just a dream."