Strange

Strange

I once had a dream. A dream one dreams at night when sleep makes you as dead. When I woke up, I wrote it down and then forgot about it all.  My life went on.

One evening, months later, at a dance, I met a girl. We hit it off instantly as if there was a long time bond established between us.

We spent the whole evening sitting by the wall, talking about anything and everything and I remember it as being really interesting. I have no recollection of what she looked like, what she wore or anything of the sort. I do recollect dancing one dance with her, the last dance and also walking her out of the building into the parking lot where my brother was waiting with his girlfriend to give her a ride home. Surprise, surprise, this is where I learned that the girl I was talking with and my brother’s girlfriend were sisters. They asked if I wanted to go with them in the car as they were being driven home. Sure! I saw this as a chance to continue the conversation. It was a ten-minute ride and as we approached their driveway I leaned over and kissed her on the cheek and said: “Thanks.” She looked at me, smiled, said goodbye, got out of the car, walked to the porch, went up the few steps, opened the door and walked in.  We drove home.

When I got home, I opened my diary to record what had been a wonderful evening. After writing a few sentences something jolted my memory about a dream I had had months previously.  I stopped writing, flipped pages to search and there it was… the rest of my evening already recorded in every meticulous detail.  From the time we sat in the car, the ride, the kiss, stopping near the house, the walk up the steps and the closing of the door of the house, it was already there, written, recorded exactly as it happened.  I never saw her again but the dream and the evening haunted me and periodically I still review it and wonder.

How can I possibly dream about something that was still in the future?  How can I reach into the future and record it months ahead of its reality?  Can the future affect the present?  Can I take this seriously?  Does it mean anything? Did we meet in this dream so that we already knew each other? Is that why we seemed so comfortable together? Is the dream reality and this life a dream?  I asked this question and many others for many months after this incident.  I started reading all kinds of literature exploring these unusual concepts of the past, the present and the future and how they were connected. Eventually my interest just got pushed to the side by other pressing matters affecting teenage boys.  I went back to living the daily life of unconsciousness.

And then it happened again.