Dreams

I woke up early. Sometime around 4 a.m. I had a weird dream, about a flood, here in Jacksonville. The cause was vague. Maybe a tsunami. The dream was about survival. We, Frankye and I, watched as the water rose around our house. As only would happen in dreams, a stray row boat washed up as the water rose from the creek up the back yard. I was able to snag it and tie it to the back deck.

The rest of the dream was about preparing what to take with us if we had to board the boat for our survival. We wanted our animals, all 7 of them, several days food for the animals and several gallons of water, which we had prepared in empty plastic gallon milk jugs in anticipation of Hurrican season. For ourselves we packed every cracker, protein bar and packet of protein breakfast we had. Our meds, a shaker bottle to mix the protein with water, some nuts we had, a small first aid box, and 2 flashlights completed our survival kit.

We put a few animal cages out on the deck, a blue tarp, and rope. We packed a small canvas bag with sun glasses, sunscreen, our tilly hats, and several t-shirts and shorts each. We then packed a large zip-lock freezer bag with important insurance papers, deeds, bank and account info, atm cards, credit cards, and photos of Frankye's children, H.H. Holiness Karmapa, our teacher - the Venerable Bardor Tulku Rinpoche. We carefully wrapped a small statue of Manjushri that was blessed and filled with prayers and relics by Rinpoche in a kata and then put it in another freezer bag. We also packed our mala beads and my small handwritten prayer book. That was it. Those were the things that mattered most.

The dream progressed to having to board the boat, and having a harrowing experience for more days than we liked. At one point our boat drifted out to sea and toward the east. All the animals except Ben and Yeshe, our young daschunds, died, most from shock and exposure. We set them in the water as each of them died. At one point we were able to pick up tree branches that were floating on the surface of the water. We used these to make adaptations to the boat, creating a tarped awning to keep us out of the sun.

The dream woke me. It was terrifying and as I woke up I still felt the need to play out survival scenarios in my head. At that point it became a tape loop, trying over and over again to problem solve dangers to our survival. I finally got out of bed at 5:20 and ended the teleplay in my mind.

I guess I've been watching too much Katrina news. I want to stop watching it. I want to shut it out. The suffering is so immense. But I can't. I keep thinking about the fact that the vicitms, human and animal, can't get away from it. Their misery is 14 days old. They can't switch it off. They can't say they've had enough and distract themselves with something inane. This is their life now. For now. As Buddha said, things change. This, too, shall pass and what does not kill us makes us stronger.

Photo of Manjushri from Namse Bangdzo Bookstore.