When my family moved to a more rural location in 1988, when I was about ten, Melany was the first friend I made at school. She lived on a dirt road just off the road we lived on, too, and I spent a lot of time over there, at her trailer, or she came over to our place, and her and I and a few other friends in the area hung out even more often during the summer.
It remained that way until high school, when things in my life became remarkably weird and I changed as a result, and in many respects. The distance between Melany and I grew, mostly because I felt she expected me to be someone that I no longer was, and honestly believed I had never truly been in the first place.
We’re Facebook friends now, both of us are in our forties, but we’re not close anymore at all, nor do I ever suspect we will ever be again. That’s one reason why the dream I had of her this morning is so curious to me.
The other is this new, recurring theme of dead people in my dream-life.
We were on a front lawn somewhere, and though I can’t be certain, it feels like the front lawn of the suburban home I lived in for the first decade of my life. From out of frame we both hear the voice of who I know to be her daughter calling, though I never saw her. She was explaining to Melany that someone was in her trailer, and when Melany asked her who, her daughter informed her it was Melany’s father.
Instantly, Melany stops doing the yardwork, or whatever it was that she was doing. Her face falls, her eyes tear up and quickly grow red. I know her immediate sadness is due to the fact that her father has been dead now for years and the mere mention of him overwhelms her with unbearable emotion.
It was as if the whole possibility that the ghost of her father hanging out in her trailer was immedeately forgotten, that the possibility that it might be true wasn’t entertained by her for as long as a milisecond, so intense were the emotions she was experiencing. She was absorbed in her grief entirely. Rather than consider that he might have actually returned, the mention of him only reminded her that he was gone, reminded her of how agonizingly much she missed him.
My heart went out to her. Impulsively, I came up to her, wrapped my arms around her, she wrapped her arms around me, and I hugged her — one of those incredibly long, deep hugs where you open up completely, where you don’t hold back, where your energy and that of the other person melds, resonates, temporarily merges into one. The hug lasts a long time, but its not awkward or uncomfortable — even when, during this period, our faces come close to each other at least twice and I fight this odd impulse to kiss her. I find this not just inappropriate but bizarre, as she is merely a friend. Even so, its quickly forgotten by me — as swiftly and mysteriously as the prospect of the ghost of her dead father waiting for her at home was evidently forgotten by the both of us.
When the hug is over, she seems disappointed with me, frustrated, even angry. She tells me that I was supposed to do more. I honestly feel confused. I ask her, “What is it you wanted me to do?”
I don’t know what happens to her after that or how our interaction ended. All I recall is that shortly thereafter I feel frustrated and depressed and I walk away, behind the house, and out into a large field behind it. With me I have my cigarettes, a lighter, and a bowl with some very loosely-packed weed in it (its just shake; essentially bottom-of-the-baggie weed dust).
Though the field looks nothing like the field that used to exist just beyond the chain-link fence of my family’s first house, in the dream, that’s exactly what it was. It looks like autumn. I remember thinking how I want to go out into the field one more time before I left, which was exactly how I felt, and what I in fact did, just before we moved from the first house in 1988.
Nearby some tall weeds, I crouch down to take a smoke — be it the weed or a cigarette, I can’t be certain, but as I crouch down and look in the direction of the house, I see my mother inthe far distance and seem to lock eyes with her, and so immediately abandon the plan anyway.
I stand up and walk further, through the field, passed the field, until I come across an open doorway to a strange, creepy building. I step inside before I really take the time to consider the idea and, with a sudden surge of anxiety, immedeately realize my mistake. I get the sense that its a huge warehouse or something, though before me is only this vacant, sort of lit hallway that leads to somewhere I can’t see.
I immedeately try and step back out of the doorway, but as I step into the frame some guy abruptly walks up to the door, gets uncomfortably close to me, seems to take something from my pocket, and walks away. Though I have no idea what he’s taken, I feel violated, afraid, and angry.
Chronicles of a Madman. 