Shadows
by motherblue212
There is a story to be told here and I am writing it as we speak
I was exhausted from this week so I nodded off mid task, mid morning. “I had this dream through a vintage filter.”
These were the notes I scribbled down when I woke, my eyes still partially closed.
_________
I had this dream through a vintage filter…
Walking a long path, in nature, taking photos. Trying to figure out my Photo of the Day. The theme is shadows. My two siblings were in front, talking. We were all both very young and of our age.
We were making our way to a house. Not home, but it felt like home.
I saw an old chair under the stairs that were underneath the back porch. Told my siblings to go on ahead. Apparently my Dad was following us as well, like he belonged there, even though he had passed many years ago. He was skipping and jumping behind us. Aware we were there but not really engaging. (It has been four years since he passed and even longer since we talked. The reasons are varied and necessary.) I wanted him to go on ahead with the rest of the family. I just wanted to get my shot. Dad ignored my requests and subtle gestures. He was climbing around like a schoolboy. Skipping steps. Leaping. Singing “Dad is great, he’s a special boy, la la la.” I don’t know if he was referencing his own dad or calling himself dad. He was doing awkward splits between a stair and the armchair.
I kept moving around the room. The under the stars was both a basement and outdoors simultaneously. He would not let me take my photo due to his goofing around. When he did finally clear the shot, the original photo angle I saw was now terrible.
He somehow took the shadows away.
I kept looking at him and he was still laughing, giddily. I smiled. Then I started crying. I caught sight of my sister’s face. She was tearing up. I said in a very heartfelt way, “I’m sorry, Dad.” He stopped his playing. He looked like someone else. Like a mixture of my Dad and Pierce Brosnan. He said “Don’t be. I’m really happy now.” I grabbed his leg. He was wearing the same brown polyester pants he wore in the 80s. Business suits. The kind he wore for meetings.
Photo of the day
Mother Blue 
“The reasons are varied and necessary.”
Wow. This is powerful, powerful writing. I often feel as if the dead come to us in dreams the way we want them to see us. I used to think it was the other way around (and maybe that’s it a little), but the dead want us to see them as human so that we can forgive them.
Thanks, lady. That is a very eloquent way of putting it. You know, I woke from that dream and it felt… Different. Gut punched and emotionally drained. It haunted me all day. I felt every second of that dream. I became fixated on the sorry. Dave said maybe it is because “you still feel guilt and you shouldn’t.” But That really wasn’t it. The sorry I uttered wasn’t for our lack of communication for that really was a necessity in my life. it was more for just… everything… I guess. Like “I am sorry things weren’t different for both of us when we existed on this earth together in the same space.”
Oh wow, you captured this perfectly- being sorry for how things could have been. Really beautiful work here, and I hope you continue with it this winter.