Lessons in the Mansion of my Heart-Conclusion?

I woke into the dream and the warmth of her on my lap. She was listening but looking at me often and smiling. I didn't understand the whole thing at all, everything was in broken stutters and rapid clicking and syllables, all running together in bits I could discern then not.

For some reason, I decided to speak, "I don't think I understand," I said. "Could you repeat that more slowly?" I asked, looking at the last person to speak, a man who had a vaguely familiar face.

"The point is that we don't break down all the barriers we build up until we come here, because they don't come with us," he said. "So, we were discussing how barriers are built, and how much easier things are when they never are put in place."

I nodded, and he continued.

"Barriers are protection, and they keep us from feeling vulnerable, even when they are figurative," he said. "But barriers limit us, not just the world around us, so it's more of a weakness to have them than a strength."

Gary cut in at this point and I looked up at him. Marcie squeezed my hand... "Listen..."

"The main discussion is about the stuff outside your house, there, Frank," he said. You build the barrier, you don't just lose the contact with the people you want to lose it with, or the exposure to them, but a lot of other things never some to knock on your door."

I looked out through the weird window and the mountains beyond and saw piles of stone and wood, barbed wire and building materials. a small assemblage of vehicles, tractors and trucks, seemed to be parked close by.

"That would be one big wall, and a lot of barrier to get through or over," Gary said, continuing as I inspected the faraway scene. "We were just talking about how few fences you have, but how much of a maze your world is to navigate as is."

I nodded. I looked into Marcie's eyes, their blue brilliant and glowing a bit, as I was used to now in these dreams.

Marcie whispered, "Honey, if you build it up, you'll never tear it down, and someday it will just be you in a crumbling mansion, with no way to get out from behind it and grow." Somehow, silently, the class disappeared, and she was all that was left, and stroked my nape as she talked to me quietly, melodically.

I looked in her eyes and smiled, bit my lip, "Well, a lot of things keep landing on my doorstep that I don't want because the house is so open."

"You don't have to answer every time, and you don't have to ask people in past the foyer, and you don't have to let the ones you keep into the innermost part of your heart, you just have to keep making room when you need to, and let people wander around and out, if they want." she said.

I nodded and gulped, and she cupped my face, something only she ever really did in all my life. It had been so long since I felt it, I had almost forgotten that special touch. But it was so vibrant, real. I felt hot tears.

"Don't make a fortress out of your mansion, because I love that place the way it is, and so do you," she said. "Just keep it in mind, and keep your heart open. I know you'll get more joy out of being the wild and untamed man you should be than some crazy hermit in a castle."

I looked up and realized she meant more than just my thoughts to be less open, and that some of the other ideas I had in my life may be just as strong for barriers as a hard heart.

"Okay, I will wander but I won't isolate myself," I said. "But sometimes I am going to need to retreat. It's all way too much sometimes, and I am not my best when it is."

She nodded and smiled, "You know where our friends are, and you know who really loves you, so don't retreat, just go love them back a little."

The dream ended with a kiss, and my pillow and face were wet. It was 5:25 AM, so I stayed up and watched the sun rise over Mt. Helix. It was cold in the morning again, but I did not really feel it overmuch. When the ground was lit, I went home.

Lessons in The Mansion of my Heart-3

Preface: I have been trying to revisit this for the last week, but it did not return until last night. I stopped thinking about the dream and just slept, doing a little breathing exercise to relax and fall deeply asleep.

However, Marcie did pop into a dream I was having about a hike in Humboldt County.

I was wandering around the forest above Humboldt State with some long-lost Zendik pals and my old dog Spot, which was weird but comforting, and I essentially knew I was dreaming.

Nom said, "Fen, redhead alert!" and I followed his finger, seeing a flash of red hair and some blue disappearing over a hill in a clearing.

We hiked out of the redwoods and over the little rise and Marcie was there, picking a little white gardenia from what looked like a hedge of them.

"Hi, hon," she said. "Try to come home. I am going to put some of these gardenias in bowls of water and put them around the house, then I want to work on the fence."

I nodded and she hugged me, a cool, almost cold kiss on my neck no less nice for the fell of her against me, and she was gone."

"Dude, that was your wife?" Dawna asked.

"Yep, that was her," I said, beaming with pride.

"Well, we're heading up the mountain, maybe you should head home?" she said, and she winked and wiggled a bit.

I blushed in the ears. "Yes, maybe I should."

Spot barked and ran down the hill ahead of me. I chased him then jumped, and soon was floating down towards Arcata.

And I awoke.

Lessons in The Mansion of my Heart-2

I watched her sway around and put on her jewelry. She was always so simple in her tastes for it. Here, in the opulence of this place, she still wore simple earrings, with little blue stones hanging from hair-thin but brilliant golden threads.

She smiled at me in the mirror as I watched, then said, "You should get up and get ready, we are meeting some friends on the other side of campus."

I got up and seemed to know where I was going. I stepped into a walk-in closet, modest but well filled with clothes. Everything was white and touched by colors, from vivid blues to intricate patterns in small accents.

I reached into the clothes and a light, silky shirt with a small red looping embroidery seemed to just slide into my hand. I slipped it on, and noted the hanger held a pair of pants and even some boxers.

I slipped it all on. It was light but felt somehow strong. It was all loose enough for comfort but did not make me look big. I smiled at her and caught myself in the mirror. As young as she looked, I felt old.

"There's my handsome man," she said, kissing me on the lips and holding my cheeks with that stroking, gentle touch she always had. She tugged my goatee.

I slipped on some sandals as we headed to the door. Garfield accepted my pat on the head but then curled back up in his little velvet bed.

We walked through the mansion and I realized I was asleep in that strange space with her again. That dream space without dominion, where I could not control everything, but also was not forced to play a part I did not control.

It made me happy. I was with her. She squeezed my hand.

We passed doors with names on them and I smiled at them, felt an ache at others. She stopped and said, "Let's go see someone for a minute,"

"Oh, Francis, look at you," the young woman said as we walked in. "I sure have meissed you, son."

We hugged and I did not know her name, but I felt familiar and safe, and she talked for a while about me and my love for the pool as a child. We had never had a pool, but I had loved swimming.

I was about to ask a question but was interrupted as she took out a book. "Well, you two have someplace to be, and I will be right here whenever you want to visit. We don't take turns around here, you know."

I was almost confused but as we walked out I went to close the door and stopped, looking back in. "Bye, Grandmommy," I said.

"Goodbye, Francis," she said, seeming pleased I had figured it out.

We walked past a few rooms and one made me stop. It was someone special, someone I had cared for. I wondered if her room being there meant she had died. I sighed and Marcie touched my hand as I went to open it.

"She is in there, but you can't see her right now, because she can't see you, okay?"

I nodded. I opened the door and looked around. It was like a teenage girl's typical room, stuffed animals and posters, superimposed over the wood and finery of the house itself. The bed was made, and I felt a chill as I looked at the pictures on the wall.

"Let's go, sweetie," Marcie said, stroking my back.

We left the house through a side door. A clean, cement road with stone or tile lines in it stretched off into impossibly steep and beautiful mountains. I gasped at the deep blue and white clouds. I could see for thousands of miles,

"How far?" I asked.

"We should fly. We don't need to, but I know you like that," she said, kissing my cheek.

We were off. I followed her and she wove graceful, arcing swoops and turns through the strange mountains, which soon gave way to green valleys of trees and grass.

I recognized the campus. The University sprawled below in a some strange mix of antebellum and Greek architecture. Advanced modern touches like glass domes and green roofs with pools if shallow water were throughout.

We landed on a small balcony, and she gripped me in a hug as I floated tentatively down.

"I have one little surprise for you," she said. "Someone you always could learn from."

"Hey, Frank! What's hoppin?" a man said.

I looked into the room beyond. It was an impossibly well-appointed auditorium-style classroom. People I did niot recognize filled the seats. But I knew the man in front of the class.

"Professor Melton?" I asked, guessing his name despite his youthfulness,

"You betcha, man!" he said. "Take a seat! I think you'll enjoy our discussion."

I tried but woke before I made it to the chair.

Lessons in The Mansion of my Heart

So there we were, riding in a bus. We had done this often in our early years, but this was no ordinary commute. We were sitting in luxury, and everyone was chatting about their classes and plans for the week.

"Isn't this awesome?" Marcie asked, smiling and sipping her blue-tinted glass, recently filled with a Cosmo a man with a cart shook for her as her passed.

"It certainly is big, and it certainly seems expensive," I said.

"We already paid for it and it doesn't cost a thing!" she laughed, her victorious chuckle the same as always, the rise at the end making her sound as if she were getting away with something.

I nodded and sipped, and felt the bus slow a bit. It was almost silent, I noted, save for voices and music.

The bus intercom said in a gentle voice, "We have arrived and you may proceed to the exits for disembarkation. Personal belongings left on board will be returned to your domiciles. Greetings from the faculty and staff of the University."

We stepped off the bus onto a perfect blacktop, shaded by trees. People walked everywhere, pretty much dressed in white and with dashes of color. Marcie took my hand and tugged.

A group of people rode by on horseback. "Do you recognize that horse?" she asked excitedly, her mouth open a bit as she cocked her head.

I nodded and smiled. The horse my uncle Charley had at the ranch in La Posta, then raced in Tijuana to some success. People tied off and a light bell rang out.

"Let's go eat!" she said and pulled me along, running. Her hair was almost down to her butt, and was lustrous.

She had never looked healthier, if thinner and more toned, I thought. She was just radiating youth and health, and I basked in it.

She turned and kissed me on the lips. "Oh! That's very sweet of you to think," she said. "But save it for later. We're having the best roast ever."

I sat and soon two tunic-clad servers arrived. One served Marcie yet another Cosmo, putting a glass of water in front of me. The other placed plates of roast and rose potatos, asparagus and tomatoes before us.



I woke as I tried to take a bite. I stared at the plain white walls of my room, gulped and covered my head with a pillow. I was lucky, and soon fell asleep again, straight into the dream.


We were hurrying, "I am so glad you woke up," she said. "You were just out like a light. Get dressed, we have a class in like 10 minutes."

I felt the sense of urgency and dressed quickly, enjoying the slide of some light and smooth material over my shoulders as she put on makeup. A cat jumped in her lap, and I recognized him instantly.

"Garfield, please get down," she said.

He did, and he rubbed against my leg then sat leaning against it. I felt a tear in my eye. I had missed him these last 20 years, save for a fleeting dream of him in my 20s.

I stroked his long, grey tabby-pointed head and listened to his Siamese vocalizations. Marcie touched my shoulder and I looked up.

"Let's take him to class with us," she smiled. "He will be fine."

"Come on, Garfield!" she said and he trotted, then galloped past her as she opened the door.

We held hands again and walked along a richly appointed hallway to a staircase. He yowled from the floor below and chatted us up happily as we approached. The door opened and I began to step out with her but stopped at the message above the door.

"Some people have little cottages for hearts, and they never really have more than one person in them at any time," it read. "Mine is a mansion, and every wing grows with each person I come to love."

"Some people stay in the mansion and share in my celebrations, some wander out and back, and still others drift away forever," I said, remembering this conversation with a friend. "All of them have their own rooms, and some may leave them a mess, but inevitably they all have a place here."

I gulped and Marcie looked up at me, "I put it up a little while ago. I thought it was the best description of this place I would ever hear."

I looked around and realized where I was, looked at the pictures on the wall and a never-ending directory of faces and people, a reservation book of sorts. I looked to her and her gentle smile warmed me more.

"So you live in my heart?" I asked her. "And this is it?"

"This is just a part of it," she said. "And you live in your heart, too. That's why I stay here, and that's why I want to stay here. I want to see what you do with what I helped you build."

I kissed her on the forehead and held her tightly against me, and she stroked my back.

"Are we late?" I asked. "For class, I mean?"

"No," she said. "You're learning right now, and I think class is over for the night."

And before I could protest that it was still daylight, I woke again to the memory of her smell, Angel and cool, cosmopolitan-laced breath.

Into the dreams

She calls me again and I slip into sleep,
run to her and then I fall and I weep.
She lifts me anew and I rise to my feet,
to take in her view, of a life now complete.

She sings in my soul and I dance to her heart,
We embrace, are made whole, though waking apart.
Urging me, no matter how hard it seems,
to be strong and proud, in her light, in my dreams.

Marcie in Hong Kong - Visit

Marcie visited last night, but I was too conscious and couldn't go with the flow. Still, there was a moment at the end... far too brief.

She continues to console me, but I still wake and fall apart after her appearances. For a little while, until the comfort of her presence and the specialness of that connection wraps itself around me like a hug.

More later.

A Moment with Marcie-Epilogue

It was the most clear and concrete long dream I have had of her, this last one, and there was of course a lot that I left out. But I think what was most striking, both in the garden and tea house-cum-shrine-cum pagoda, was how direct Marcie was.

One of the things that most bothered Marcie was that I took my time to decide on a course of action or a matter at hand. It frustrated her.

In most of my dreams, there is a modicum of control. I can manipulate the world at will around me and change the scene however I like. But in dreams with Marcie, things do not always work my way.

However, our conversations have always been very soft. This last dream was much more eye-to-eye, There was something she needed.

I always ask myself if what we dream is simply the firing of random neurons and nothing more. This always has put a sad little doubt in my dreams of her. But I think what Marcie's message was went well beyond, "I am real."

Marcie, in the place she visited me, wanted me to see these visits as just that and take them at face value. We discussed them long before she passed and she promised me them. She also said she might not know how she would feel about it.

Marcie was concerned I would never move on. She was right in her own way. I will take my time, likely infuriating her with my "Hemming and hawing" as much as this post, "agonizing" and analyzing the dream, probably makes her toss her hands up, roll her eyes and sigh.

Inasmuch as she can, that is.

What strikes me is not that she simply says, "I am who I am." That came across very strongly in my dream. Her honeymoon with the hereafter and her confusion were not even on the table. Her eyes were open and she was playful but sharp and incisive.

Of course, the question remains as to whether or not the dream is just a random firing of neurons that line up in a very favorable or enjoyable way. I think her answer is that it doesn't matter.

Mine is that as well. I agree with her reasoning, that she will be with me whether I decide she is not there (and suffer), or decide she is and embrace it. But I also agree for my own reason.

Even if everything is the pseudo random or random firing of neurons as far as how we perceive and experience the world and our minds in a dream state, the fact that Marcie did not "guess" what I was thinking and was off a bit was very important.

We can convince ourselves of anything, but the fact that something in me wants to be convinced to have an open mind on this situation and its implications.

So my reasoning is this: in life we were two people who grew to become a part of each other in addition to being our own separate selves. That which I took in from Marcie continues within me. I did not always agree with or understand her, and she did not always agree with or understand me.

That being said, it does not matter if she is made of memories and patterns and thoughts, or she is simply a soul coming to visit me when I am open to her or most able to sense her. That is not important or valuable.

The fact that I can experience her and her motives and personality in such a detailed way that we still do not have the same mind on things, that she left in me an understanding and a bit of her will so strong it makes its point and mistakes mine means I can continue to learn from her.

I don't care what the nature of it all is, as far as her presence's source.

Some ask me about all of this and faith. f it is a question of faith, then I will simply say that what faith I have is vested in the idea that we all continue to affect the universe as the ripples of our presence , relationships and actions multiply and go on.

That the phenomena that we collect around our existence, which can be said to describe us, now may lack one companion, "physically alive," in their company does not mean that they do not grow in number, or that we no longer direct them to.

I enjoy that she is still there at all, and I would rather agonize a little than decide, then get too hard-headed and -hearted to accept that beautiful maybe it all implies. And if I am just enjoying a little ripple of her presences, then it's a good wave to ride.

A Moment with Marcie

I have missed her, though she has been in my dreams, alive and well, her body no longer infirm and her countenance unmarred by the fear and pain the gnawing of cancer inflicted on her. Sometimes, her appearance has been fantastical and her demeanor absolutely supportive.

But those have not been the most important visits. Of late, there have been few because of how little I sleep. I stay awake into the wee hours and plan and work, then wake and work at the school district. Sometimes, I seek out a little company and stay out late instead of in.

Last night, I dreamed of her for the first time in a long time. Perhaps it was because my work is beginning, or perhaps because my life is on the verge of changing wildly yet again. But what stuck out was how very present she seemed and how engaged. We had a strong, real conversation.

It's still haunting me.

I walked into a garden and saw a Buddhist treasure tower. Red and white, with intricate inlays and detailed carving, I stood near it and felt my awareness slowly open. I was dreaming.

"I'm in the Japanese Friendship Garden," I said, smiling. "I can stay as long as I want. It's my dream, and the garden can be as big as I want it to be."

The hair on the back of my neck stood on end a moment as I touched a beautiful pink Camellia. I listened to the wind in the trees. I felt a lump in my throat as I realized that I would usually be stealing bloom for her at this point.

"Of course you would," her familiar and smiling, mischievous voice rang out.

I knew I was dreaming. I bit my lip and my eyes burned. I wfelt tears in my sleep, I thought.

"Oh, my god, would you buck up?" she said, much closer now.

I turned and nearly ran into her. I was startled and stepped back, but she stepped in and grabbed my hands, squeezing them. I was hugging her and felt a wave of relief as her smell and the feel of her skin sank into me with a familiarity I do not believe a simple memory could summon.

"Ooookay," she said, impatience in her tone. "Okay, honey. I know you love me. I'm here now. Are you okay?"

I looked into her eyes and saw so many little details in them. The greenish and white flecks, some large and distinct, others so familiar they were distinctive to me alone, likely. I nodded.

"Well, I need you to listen to me, honey," she said. nodding. Her hands lifted mine and lowered them.

I nodded. "Okay, honey," I said, wondering what my unconscious had to say to me now.

"Frank!" she said, her eyes hardening and widening a bit. "Don't you do that. You need to listen to me and hear me out. Don't dismiss me like that."

I looked at her and she turned her head askance a bit.

"I didn't say anything," I offered.

Her eyes narrowed a little. "You don't have to say anything. I don't have to hear anything. I know what you are thinking, and I can't tell you what to think, but you would probably do well to just hear me out."

I nodded and bit my lip, turning my head a bit and squinting. I felt tears again and blinked. "I'm sorry," I said. "I miss you."

Usually, the Marcie in my dreams would pulle me into her arms and hug me, whispering and soothing me. But this time, she broke down with me and her tears flowed.

"Oh, honey," she said, her voice almost disappearing in the high range. "I know. I miss you too, sweetie. I worry about you so much."

I took her in my arms, and I held her, and she buried her head in my neck again, for the first time since she had died, really. She kissed me and we sat until quiet returned.

I felt her warmth and smelled her hair again. My heart slowed. "I don't know what to think," I said.

She looked up and she shook her head. "You agonize so much," she said. "Sometimes you think I am your thoughts, sometimes I am my spirit, sometimes it is your memories. Do you want to know?"

I bit my lip and remembered the tears and the dreams and the visits and the strength she gave me, and then I looked down, unsure.

She turned her head and looked stern. I suddenly understood that I would not know unless I told her I wanted to.

"Yes," I said. "I want to know."

She smiled and her eyes watered then teared as she replied breathlessly, "Okay."

And when I had held her a little while, afraid of what i would learn, she began.

I cannot continue tonight. Tomorrow, I promise. It was a long visit.

Chrissy's Dream

I loved hearing about Chrissy's dream because it shows the side of Marcie that was more concerned with her loved ones and friends than herself. This held up through her illness, to the very end.

Marcie's strength and empathy were always in play, and even if her patience wore thin and she grew tired of some problem she saw a fix to, her heart could only be sweet.

She might grouse later or point out the silliness of the people she comforted, but her consoling touch, which I miss most acutely, always shined. At times, i think she only complained to keep her tough image up.

We who loved her saw right through it, I know...
Chrissy shared:

"Shortly after Marcie passed away, I had a dream that she was picking me up at the San Diego Airport. When I saw her, she was dressed in a beautiful long, white, flowing dress. She came up to me I walked toward her. We were so happy to see each other. She had come to pick me up, and I knew we were going to her memorial. She put her arm around me and she said, 'You're going to be ok.' It was so special, because in my time of sadness she was comforting me, only she was already gone."

Thank you for relaying your beautiful and very telling dream of her, Chrissy. What a wonderful moment to share.

Much Love,

F.

A Dream with a Message

All my thoughts and signs of Marcie, as well as a peek at a friend's personal blog, triggered a dream last night. But it seemed like some little bit of Marcie was coming through with a purpose, and not the random synthesis of imagery drawn from our lives.

In the dream, Marcie and I were making out in an airport lounge, sitting in a little round booth with some hors d'œuvre and glasses of wine. A beautiful lilting voice came over the loudspeaker as we kissed.

"Flight Three for Mbingu now boarding at Gate Seven," it crackled, interrupting the music in the lounge, and our kiss.

"Mmmph... mmm," Marcie said, her hand on my jaw as she stopped. "We have to get to the gate or I'll be late."

I nodded and grabbed her bags, admiring her sleek form in her little aqua camisole and long but clingy white skirt. She was wearing white heeled sandals of some kind, and I remember thinking that they showed off her toenails' little flowers very well as we walked.

When we arrived at Gate Three, children were playing and clamoring around a few smiling adults. A young man stood in a white uniform that looked an awful lot like an Army uniform in Navy white, I noted. Everyone was dressed for summer.

"Marcie," a beautiful Indian (or perhaps Pakistani or Bangladeshi woman, I could only guess) said, beaming and taking her hand. "I am so glad you made it. Why don't you take these four and take them with you?"

She gestured to four little girls, one of them a redhead who immediately attached herself to Marcie's leg, the other three African, dressed the same, in little white gowns, one wearing her hair in hanging braids, the other two, smaller girls wearing little cloths wrapped on theirs.

The taller, braided one showed the other girls something in her arms, "It's my baby," she said. "I saw a brilliant glow in her hands and on her forearms, cradled but translucent, the faintest outline of a baby's form visible.

They murmured and the girl slipped her arms under her gown, smiling a moment at me. I smiled at the smallest girl, who looked at me a little confused, and she came over and took my hand, pulling me. I started to go, but the woman took my arm with a warm and gentle but firm grip.

"No, Serena," she said. "Francis is not going on this flight, but you will see him later, okay? Now go with Marcie."

"Sorry, Serena," I said, and before I could ask why I was not going, Marcie spoke.

"I call him Frank, Niyati, " she interjected, smiling at the women. Marcie stepped in close and her face slipped into a little sad smile. "Honey, I have to go now. I'm sorry, but they said you can't get an entry visa yet."

I suddenly realized that Marcie was seriously going without me, and that is why I had no luggage of my own. I began to protest and Marcie kissed me. I felt a strange electric jolt down my back and opened my eyes, my throat hard and pained as understanding dawned and I remembered.

Niyati rubbed my back as I listened to my little bride and the tears flowed.

"We'll have our second honeymoon, honey," she said. "But not right away. I have things to do, and you have things to do, too. I won't leave you alone. I'll call you, okay?"

I could only nod and then kiss back. The four girls hugged around us until Niyati took their hands and put them in Marcie's or on her skirt gently. Marcie pecked my cheek and Niyati took her bag.

"Okay, ladies," she said. "Time to go now. Marcie, I will see him home after everyone is in."

"Bye for now, honey," Marcie said. "Come see me when you can."

"I will," I said, hoarse but determined to sound strong, which I was not nearly.

They walked into the gate and were gone. Niyati rubbed my back and smiled when I turned to her.

"She waited for you in the terminal so you could see her off," Niyati whispered. "She is very stubborn. But it was okay to let you come here for her. You have been very good to her."

"Why can't I go?" I asked.

"It is rare for people even to come here," she said, "You have been here before, and you knew your way back, and you will know your way here when you don't get to go back again."

She sighed and smiled, stroking my cheek and smiling. "You may have been waiting for your gate call once, but this was Marcie's. Your ticket is expired, and your reservation is for a much later flight, so you can't board yet. You also need an entry visa to fly, and yours is not ready yet."

I nodded. "So I don't get to board until I die?" I asked.

"You will not die, no one really does who comes here, but you cannot be responsible for anything when you do come to depart," she said. "If there is something not yet done, you cannot board."

I was calmer but sad. I stared at the gate and sighed heavily, wondering how I would visit if I could not fly yet.

"Stay here a moment," Niyati said. She walked over to the confused soldier, who waved as she guided him into the gate. I waved back and nodded. I envied his luck.

Marcie walked backto the edge of the gate and beckoned to me sneakily. She bit her lip and looked at Niyati, who was greeting a young woman and a couple.

My heart surged. I smiled and ran to the gate on my quiet step, sneaking rapidly and leaping at the end, but a huge wall of a man suddenly stood before me. The gate slid back from me behind him.

He put his hand on my shoulder and Marcie came over as he spoke. "I know you can't help it, and I know you think you want to take my wrist, and you want to slip by, and you want to go, Francis."

I nodded and looked up at him. He may have been seven feet tall or so, but I didn't care. I considered the best course for a moment but my thoughts were scrambled as Marcie kissed me.

"Honey, you are very brave and I know you want to be with me, and I am so happy you ran to me for one last caper," she said. "But just run to me when you see me somewhere else, okay? We'll have our time together."

The man let go of my shoulder. "Thank you, Marcie."

I had one last kiss before the dream ended. As we kissed, i felt her mischievous delight with me and her passion. I woke and felt her hands on my cheeks and her lips on my own, phantoms of her again acting as company to me.


Sometime this weekend, I will share Chrissy's dream of her. I have been trying to digitize the wedding video. We will see. I may also get the archive of messages from Tanya, and I have found more little notes. Good night, friends. If any of you have dreams to share. please let me know.

Extra note: The name I heard was "Natty," but this is as close as I found from theplace I think the woman was from or supposed to be...

Marcie and redemption

I will return to the places of Marcie's and my early love in time. First, I need to take a trip up to Humboldt (for pictures of our place). I think I should snap photos of it. It was a very special chapter in our lives, if also a tough one for her.

I am having so many dreams about Marcie. I am, in fact, having so many that I somewhat wanted to stay home and sleep all day today. I did not.

I found myself reflecting on some of the more esoteric reasons Marcie and I were so in love with each other today. I overheard a coworker kvetching about her brother.

"Oh, he is not going to change," she said. "People don't change and they can only fake it for so long when they try."

Marcie had a different idea, which I came to share. Marcie thought that everyone could change, but some people simply would never choose to.

"Some people change or they just fix their problems" she said. "Some people are perfectly happy being whatever they are, no matter how mean or dirty or how ignorant they are."

My discussion with Chrissy reminded me of another aspect of Marcie's outlook on people. Some people change, some people don't, and some people medicate.

"I am telling you, it is a total Prozac nation," she would say. "People think they can get away from their problems by just popping a pill and forgetting they have them."

Marcie understood the need for some help in a crisis, but she was disturbed by the number of people around her on permanent regimens of antidepressants. I had a theory.

"Maybe it's the environment that makes people sick," I said. "The drugs might fix a chemical issue caused by the polluted world around us."

I would never have dared offer it if I was on antidepressants. Thankfully, I never was and never will be, short of being forced.

"That's a total excuse," she said, her pretty blue eyes rolling as one hand went to a hips and her other circled dismissively.

"Oh, I was exposed to whatever, so I am depressed," she said. "Oh, I am sooo sad that my mom didn't love me enough. BLah Blah Blah! People need to get OVER it already."

But she was afraid of sounding silly, and she was wise to boot (as well as pretty and clever and well-read, and any number of other good things).

"You could be right," she said as she disengaged from the conversation. "You could be totally right and people might be completely toxic from the world or whatever. But that's just like throwing up your hands and saying nobody is responsible for anything."

But her belief that people could change and be redeemed was most comforting. Marcie had an immense capacity to forgive and to love, even if she was hurt. It was a measure of her tender toughness.

I will not say who she forgave for what. I will only say that, though we fought from time to time, I never did anything that tested her capacity to forgive me. But I still weep at the thought of her pain with people at times.

There were many times she was ashamed or just beyond the veneer of her pride, and it was a privilege to hold her and comfort her in them.

I was so relieved when, as I told her I apologized for anything she was too good to tell me hurt her feelings or that I had done to hurt her, she simply smiled and squeezed my hand.

"You don't have to redeem yourself for anything, honey," she croaked. "I always knew you wouldn't ever even conceive of doing anything to hurt me."

I realized at that moment that some of the things I had heard her talk about and held her in my lap or arms over still, on her death bed, cast a hurtful shadow over her. Like so many times before, I simply enveloped her in my arms and kissed her.

Sometimes, she did not share what her crying was about. In retrospect, I would get frustrated, though I held her anyway. I now know that consoling touch was more important to her than any silly lover's quarrel.

What she was telling me that very sad day was that the reasons didn't matter. That I just made sure to love her did, though.

Little moments of tease

So, Marcie has been making her appearances again in my dreams. But there is a different feel to them now. For one, I am not aware that I am dreaming.

I have had several of these new dreams. There are no surreal or grand visions, no strange transformations of reality or unnerving sensations. There are just relatively simple little chats and cuddles.

The best one was one that happened last week after the crazy spring in our mattress drove me off the bed and onto the couch. I dreamed I was laying with my head in her lap as she sat "Indian style," a rare treat.

Oh, geez, I miss that simple little thing. So you know how it works:

I usually would slide into her lap as I laid on my belly on the couch, wrapping one arm around her hips and the other under her thighs, then lay my head down. She loved to keep a pillow on her lap when she sat, conveniently enough. She only let me when she planned to stay put.

I had a tendency to fall asleep there, actually. I did almost every time.

In my dream, Marcie was stroking my back and leaning down, holding me and kissing my head as she basically petted me. I rolled over on my back and admired her as she watched something on the television.

Her soft little cotton pajama bottoms and the warmth of her body under them always made me want to stroke her, if not always out of my enamored state then for the tactile pleasure of it. She smiled and blushed as I got a bit fresh, but did not protest.

"If you can't behave, you can go," she said, smiling and leaning down, kissing me and stroking my hair off of my brow.

"I don't want to behanve, but if you try to make me leave, I will tickle you mercilessly," I said.

She gave me her look of defiant warning, one of my favorites, and the play ensued. By the time I had her on her back with her arms pinned, we were kissing. I let her hands go and she stroked my back gently and looke dup with such loving eyes.

Eyes I knew. Eyes I very much wish I could stare into again.

"I love you, honey," she said, and smiled. Then a tear rolled down her cheek.

Then I "remembered" she had cancer, and she was under treatment. I kissed her tears and her nose and her face, gently holding her head and stroking her face with my fingertips.

"You'll be okay, baby," I said, holding back tears and gulping at the lump in my throat.

She smiled and nodded, then looked up at me with a strangely calm and happy face. "I am okay," she said. "You'll be okay, too, honey. You'll be just fine, I promise."

I kissed her lips and slid down, hugging her waist and settling my head just under her breasts, kissing her tummy. She stroked my hair for what seemed a long time. Though I did not drift off, she said "Honey, you have to get up."

I pushed up and she sat up and kissed my forehead. "You have to go to work," she whispered. "I love you."

She smiled and stroked my cheek. I woke in our front room, laying on my belly, her kiss of the phantom of it still warm on my forehead and the stroke of her hand's tingle not yet quite faded.

For once, I felt not just loved but undisturbed and not as bereft as I awoke, and I went to work happy and well-rested for the first time in months.

I hope these are the moments I can expect when I take our trip.

Dreams upon dreams.

So, as I have been wrestling with dilemmas and working on the trip, the dreams have become very strong again. They are quite comforting at the moment, too. I intended to write about them tonight, but I have been busy on other fronts and needed to catch up with some friends.

I had an interview tonight for what appears to be a great project.Imagine a startup journalism site on nonprofit issues, growing slowly from a simple but professional, top-notch blog into a much more complex and powerful source of information on nonprofit work than currently can be found in one place.

I'm hoping I did as well as I might have. Make money, do good,all at once in one place? Sign me up! I'll let you all know how it goes. We'll see.

I need sleep. Good night, folks

F.

The secret signal

Marcie and I were, to the day that she suddenly was knocked down and unable to walk, hopeful of her recovery. Certainly, her condition was not good, her setbacks disheartening and her episodes frightening.

But her brain metastases had been shrinking, the cancer had disappeared from other parts of her body, and there was a glimmer of hope. There was also more than a touch of desperate, stubborn and fierce determination from us both. We were alike that way.

But it did not mean we avoided preparing. We did what we could in case she did die, and we let other things that were too hard simply go.

But one night, up in Julian, when Marcie's tired legs had given out in a restaurant and she had been tucked in at the little bed and breakfast we had taken a break at, we talked of what would come after.

It was so difficult a weekend that I journaled it in my reporter's notebook, especially her touching words.

"I don't know what comes after you die," she said. "Maybe nothing, maybe Hell or Heaven, or maybe something more pagan. Maybe we're reincarnated."

She squeezed my hand and I listened, the dark making my tears invisible but my gulps and breathing telling on me.

"I hope there is something after," she said.

I did not know what to say. I have no answers. Faith and belief are not knowledge and I hold more in doubt than I do either of those. But I did think of something to say.

"So if I die first," I said. "I'll send a sign so that you know there is something and I am there."

She squeezed my hand and this time her own breathing gave her away. It was ridiculous, but she understood I wanted her to live, outlive me, or simply not to die without me. I had said it before, long before she was sick

We clung together and let the sadness pass through us. She finally spoke after she cleared her nose, and she tweaked the conversation.

"How should we signal each other?" she asked, squeezing my hand again and sliding herself back into me in a close spoon.

I gulped but maintained and I said, trying to break the tension, "Maybe email?"

She laughed her tired, chemo-strained laugh and rasped "No, honey, seriously. What will our signal be?"

I considered it for a long time. I am a romantic, and she was to a degree as romantic as I was. But both of us were skeptics of most things supernatural and intangible.

Except for ghosts.

Both of us firmly believed in hauntings after a strange sequence of events at our apartment in downtown San Diego. At first, the shower curtain whipped open in front of Marcie while I was showering, both my hands in my hair, covered in shampoo.

I had thought to admonish her, but she was in the hallway looking bewildered. I put on my dirty clothes and we stayed outside for a few minutes until we decided we were being impractical. I must have brushed it open with an elbow.

The next day, during an argument in the kitchen, the stove fell open and we both watched the cookie tray rattle out. We reasoned that away as well. And we reasoned away a remote sliding across the table and onto the floor, and the closet doors opening and cabinets closing.

We admitted once we moved to Humboldt that the place had been haunted.

"No whipping open the curtain to the shower, okay?" I said.

She "hmm'd" and sighed. "I will move something and you will know it is me moving it."

"Really?" I asked. "How about trying to talk to each other? Can we do that?"

"Yes, honey," she said. "I talk to my friend from New York who committed suicide once in a while in my dreams, but that's not easy to tell if it's real or not."

I pondered this, and my dream about my old cat Garfield Siamese, who had popped in to say hi a few times in my own dreams, my dead relatives and their appearances. They all seemed so real. But it was hard to tell.

"Well," I said, tugging on her hip a little. "I won't care if I know it's real or not, you'll be required to resume wifely duties if you visit my twisted dreams."

She laughed at first, but I had miscalculated and the unintended reminder of her state and inability to engage me in our heretofore most bonding act made her cry. I soothed her.

"I will send you my poems in email," I said. "And you won't be able to tell, because if I know I am dying, I will set them up to come on certain days."

"You'll never have to do that for me, honey," she said. "I wish I knew how to do that for you."

We went quiet and I stroked her. She slept the sleep of the exhausted long before I could close my eyes in the dark of our mountain retreat. When we woke, she brought the subject up once more.

"When I die, I will haunt you until you know there is something to look forward to," she said. "If I don't, then I will see you in your dreams and I know that will never be the same, but it's something."

I hugged her and I loaded her into the car. We took the long way home. As we wound our way through the hills, I considered a sharp turn or two gloomily. I pulled over after I took one of several far too quickly.

She had not commented as I had sped through them, but when I pulled over, she did.

"Honey," she said, taking my hand and sobbing. "I know you want to be with me. But you have to live how you are supposed to or it might not happen."

I held her hand and closed my eyes, squeezing the tears from them for a second. "I wasn't trying to kill us, I was just thinking 'what if,' and I guess I wasn't paying much attention."

She shook her head and she mouthed, "I love you" silently. "Be careful," she croaked.

When we got home and I helped her into the house, she laid down and watched me from the couch as I carried in our things. She patted the seat next to her when I closed the door. I sat.

"You are my brave man, and I already know you love me and will be just devastated without me," she said. "But you have to live even if I don't, because you are closer to me than anyone and I want you to be happy again someday."

I could not hold back my tears. I did not want to consider life without her, even if I had accepted she could die, the aftermath was such an enormity that I wondered (and still do) whether I could carry it at all.

"You are a rare man with a pure soul," she said, breaking my heart with each word. "You can't hide anything, you just say what you have to and share what you have in your heart. It's a precious thing, really."

"You took so long to open up, and I can't have you just shut down again over this, because I would feel terrible," she said. "You can't just clam up and hide yourself, because I want someone else to experience you, just how you are now, because I think I helped you get this way again."

We spent the afternoon on the couch, snoozing under a blanket and waking for little snacks, until I helped her into the shower and then to the bed.

And so, last night, as I dreamed, I went to a computer and logged into my email account. I watched the messages load and clicked on one that read "I love you, honey."

I sobbed in my sleep as I read a beautiful poem I cannot recreate, not typed but written on my screen in her hand, and I pondered how she had figured out sending timed emails, or who she had scan and email them, because I forgot I was asleep.

And when I awoke in the middle of the early morning and walked into the bathroom, my foot caught a mesh bag that I had put off to the side, far out of my path, but somehow in it now.

I stopped and put it back, and wondered how it had stood up in its own, but reasoned Seamus was to blame. But I did stop as I returned and felt a chill down my spine, and I asked, gently "Baby?"

And though I received no answer, I am still haunted beyond my skepticism, and this is signal enough.

Marcie's Wisdom

I never fully woke from Marcie's passion. But I remember a distinct transition from the lingering touch of her lips on mine to a warmth all around me as I came close to waking but fought to sleep.

I woke suddenly to her voice.

"So, honey, what are you going to do?" she asked, taking my hand. her own was warm and her fingers were strong, supple my hand.

"I don't know," I said, and felt hot tears with it. "I guess I'll go see you in Europe and Africa when I can, and you can come see me."

She whispered hoarsely, "Okay, Frank, you do what you think is right."

It was a stock answer, or so I had thought over all those years. Her hand squeezed a little, and I looked at her.

She was of an age I had never known her in. She looked to be 19 or so, and she was dressed in a familiar outfit I knew I had never seen her wear, a long black lace gown that went down to her ankles.

She stood and I did as well, and looked down and saw the suit I had never worn before her memorial. She smiled and we danced.

"If you do what you think is right, you'll be fine, honey," she said.

I nodded and she went on. "I hope you do everything you want to, honey," she said. "You need to get out there and do your thing. I really meant what i said."

And I gulped. It was all old words, words she had said before. The idea that I was in a dream, asleep began to intrude on our little, fantastic reality, and then it fled.

Marcie was glaring at me.

"You need to listen to me," she said. "You need to do all these things you say you want to do. Because from now on, I am not there to blame for what you don't do with your life."

I nodded and took a deep breath. The heat of tears again on my face, and this time I imagined my vision blurred with them. She stopped dancing a moment and wiped my face, kissing me lightly.

"I love you," she said. "I told you what I wanted from you."

I nodded and she recounted her wishes for my life. She gave me oddly specific instructions about myriad events I don't clearly recall but apparently should expect.

I do recall that she told me to avoid the home in Big Sur, it was going to slide into the Pacific after an earthquake. But then she reminded me of our situation with a single sentence.

"I want you back for myself," she said.

I felt a great pain in my heart as she said it, and felt as if I could not breathe from the pain. But it soon passed and I closed my eyes in the dream, though her voice continued.

"I said I will love you forever, and you said you would love me forever, too," she said. "I'll come get you when it's time."

She looked up so sadly at me. "When you have to go, remember I am here waiting and that this all only does us part in body, sweetie."

I nodded. "I'll see you soon?"

"You come find me," she said.

And I woke to the alarm, which I let run for a while in the bedroom. After I turned it off, I slipped under the covers and slept dreamlessly. More importantly, I slept in our bed for the first time in almost two months.

A Moment of Marcie: Jane's Dream

Jane, who everyone here knows from many entries in the blog and many of our other from Marcie's loving tales of her, wrote me an email and told me I could share the following dream she had. I hope you enjoy her gift as much as I did.

From Jane:

Hellllo Francis,
I had a Marcie dream finally. I'm sure I have them all the time, but I haven't had easy access to my dreams for quite some time now. The details are a bit sketchy, so I'll just tell you that it was in a big beautiful church that was full of light, and it was a memorial for Marcie.

The pews were full of family and friends, and people were sharing stories. There were some heartbreaking moments, but the overall feeling was one of love and community.

The crazy part is that in the midst of all this in comes Marcie. All beautiful and radiant, she walked into the church and she started singing.

In my head I was thinking that I'd never heard Marcie sing, and that it's so unlike her to sing in front of a large group of people. But sing she did.

And it was beautiful. That's all I remember, but I was grateful to have that dream, no matter how vague.

I guess she (I) is (am) not done with me (her) yet

So I have had an unusual weekend and have been wrestling with it. I have tried to wake up a little and open my eyes, to slip out of my little cocoon of the familiar and be out and about. I needed to see what was out there.

I have been avoiding just being home because it's sucking me in and I am afraid I will just shut down, but...

I tend to go to extremes in my life. This weekend was no different. I went to a coffee shop/wine spot on the way home and saw a pretty woman smiling at me from across the place. I ordered my glass and went and sat near her, wondering why she seemed familiar.

I could know her from my time at another publication, before The Star-News. Or not, as I try to remember more clearly. She had attended a massage school that I handled ads in CityBeat for. It didn't matter, really.

She was nice, we chatted a bit and I eventually got uncomfortable, then told on myself. "I lost Marcie in October," I blurted out. She had asked when I became a widower, I had been direct. The conversation changed, to my rather mixed relief.

I guess that I was intimidated, or chickening out a little. More honestly, I am just not ready, knew it, and I wanted to not go there yet, as she gave me signals that we might. Whatever it was, I went home and left half a glass of wine at the restaurant after she made her exit. Leaving me her card, that is.

But that was not the end of my strange weekend. I went to the Chula Vista Chamber of Commerce installation dinner with my former editor and we were seated with a nice group of bankers from Mission Federal. I took a card from one, a woman named Michelle, and was told to give her a call.

I was surprised when she handed it to me. We were just passing time as I worked on ambushing the politicos and saying hello to old pals. I did, since she gave me a card, ask her to dance, but she was off to pick up her son's girlfriend at the airport. I am definitely not ready to call anyone, though.

I may have given a sigh of relief, or perhaps not. It didn't matter. I did dance, though, with a group of women from Sweetwater Union High School District, to a few really good Latin dance hall favorites. It was fun, it was relaxing, and I was pretty amazed that only two other guys danced in a crowd of a couple dozen women (some very cute) on the little dance floor.

I ducked out on drinks afterward when I was asked by a couple of ad representatives from the Union-Tribune. They seemed nice, but I was almost immediately uncomfortable and had that same feeling I had gotten in the coffee shop. This time, I didn't blurt anything but said I had to feed Seamus (I did have to), and went home.

I ran into the woman from the coffee/wine bar on Saturday while I updated the blog over a nice drink of strong coffee. I gave her my cards. One has the blog on it, the other is from the school district. There's nothing like full disclosure and time to chew on things to scare people off.

The uncomfortable feelings weren't done with me.

I went to Hot Monkey Love Sunday for salsa classes, which I am taking with a specific friend in mind. They're free and the venue is an alcohol-free club. It was fun, I learned a few new steps and some basic but salsa-specific spins. I enjoyed the whole thing.

We kept rotating partners as a group until the dance lesson ended and the floor was turned over to the DJ. I was about to go when one of my partners, a pretty brunette, pulled me back out. We danced, some of it probably legitimate salsa, the rest just rhythm. I took my leave after some time. She could not have been more than 25.

I was complemented when she said she hoped I would be back. I said, smiling, "Maybe." But I may go get lessons somewhere else. I could not shake the feeling that I was definitely doing something bad behind Marcie's back as we talked.

I dreamed Sunday of Marcie scolding me. It was very French, and I only caught bits of it, but the word "salope" was uttered often. That I understood. Whatever else was said, I know I was behaving badly. I needed to be home and grieving a bit more, not running from it and certainly not flirting.

I ran into the woman at the coffee/wine shop again on Monday and pretended not to notice her. I couldn't figure out if that was because I had seen her three times in one short weekend and did not want to freak her out, or if I was just hoping not to talk to her again yet.

It worked out. She left the coffee shop. I felt a good mix of regret and relief. I had a rough night last night, and it included a dream with Marcie. I broke down in it and she stroked my back as I held her, comforting me.

"Oh, honey," she said. "Oh, baby. It's okay, honey. It's okay."

She is not through with me yet, even if there had been so long without dreams of her. Waking up this morning, that was comforting enough to make it hard to stay awake and not seek more sleep, to get up and go to work.

It sure was nice to know that I am not limited to dancing with my baby's also-mourning girlfriends, though there is the added bonus of not feeling any guilt (so far) in that case...

But I wish Marcie would/could/will dance with me again.

G'Night.

Marcie's Passions

I drifted to sleep with the sound of sparrows in the bushes outside. They lingered loudly and somehow the awkward, angry cheeps and peeps, flutters and tussling sounds outside became more distant. Sleep came again, though I had thought it would be impossible to enjoy after so many interruptions.

The soft furry feeling under my feet was wonderful and soothing. I walked down a hall full of books. Again, endless corridors of objects branched away in the distance, and I smiled at the open sky above, the birds flying by against a blue deeper than I have seen in decades.

I ran right into Marcie and held her, kissing and nuzzling her as a stream trickled from my sore, burning eyes. She kissed back furtively but soon pushed me back just a bit and took my hand.

She did not so much lead me as pull me behind her. She flew down the aisles of titles I both knew and did not, books then movies, some of which seemed to have titles written in some alien script.

I lofted like a kite behind her, just above as she ran, the books and the ground a blur, and a bright sun, embedded in the ground, loomed large before us. And then she ran inside and I fell, long and gently. She fell with me and grabbed my hands.

She pulled me into her arms and I felt her clutch me tightly, holding my head to hers, my mouth to hers, kissing mew deeply and then tucking my head in her neck as i had done to her so many times before.

I felt us land in silk and cushion and sensation that rose and fell around and on me, her hands and her body indistinguishable from the sea of soft warmth. I was drunk with lust, and we emerged in a kiss as a room slowly formed from retreating folds of red and white satin.

She laid me back and I felt warmth on my ears and cheeks as I dreamed a blush. Marcie's laugh was inaudible and deafening in me at the same time. She reached over to a nightstand and drank some water, then read a poem from Yeats.

The Sorrow of Love
by William Butler Yeats

The quarrel of the sparrow in the eaves,
The full round moon and the star-laden sky,
And the loud song of the ever-singing leaves,
Had hid away earth's old and weary cry.
And then you came with those red mournful lips,
And with you came the whole of the world's tears,
And all the sorrows of her labouring ships,
And all the burden of her myriad years.
And now the sparrows warring in the eaves,
The curd-pale moon, the white stars in the sky,
And the loud chaunting of the unquiet leaves,
Are shaken with earth's old and weary cry.


I touched her thigh, knowing it a ghostly one again, and I let my hand slide down her leg as she watched me, rueful smile on my face. It was the most direct correlation between the world and my dreams yet.

"It doesn't mean it's all in your mind, honey," she said. "Everything, everything is shaped and everything is flavored by what we have passion for."

I was sad, wordless as she kept speaking, but still listening. I wished more than ever that I did not know when I had dreamted but only knew the dreams themselves. This was a dream I had wanted to be more than that by being less. I wanted to not be lucid and to wake in full memory, untainted by doubt and aglow.

She took my hand. "Oh, honey," she said. "You just need to accept that you are who you are. I loved to travel, I loved my books, and I loved my movies. But I would have given any of them for you."

And before I could answer, she whispered, breaking my heart with her strained little voice, which echoes in me now as I type, "I know you wouldn't make me choose, but I would have if you asked."

As she put the big book aside and I remembered the poem, remembered reading it to her and remembered its name, she obliterated it, and my dream, with a kiss too demanding for refusal, too long for doubt. But I remembered Yeats.

I did not wake, but was wakeful, and I can only vaguely remember what transpired beyond that kiss. But as unaccustomed to everything afterward as I was, and to the aspect of her she had shown so rarely, I never awoke more fully consumed but content.

Marcie's Enterprise

I was almost loathe to sleep after my dream of love. Too much and too many tears for one night had come. I thought of Marcie's relics. Lists of tasks, containers of spices, a gigantic file folder chock full of cancer notes, handout materials and medical information she had decided were useful.

It was her clipped articles, some about the surviving family of victims, which I had found hard to look out, cropped and printed or torn from every source. And they sat in my mind as the pre-dawn cold tickled my exposed fingertips again.

I sighed and Seamus chose that moment to plop against me, driving his furry back into my nose. I manipulated him, pulling him purring halfway under the blanket, almost more mitten that kitten as I drifted off and he burrow into the blankets against my chest.

"Oh, honey, that is so cute," she said, rubbing my hands through Seamus's fur as he purred. "He's like a little pair of gloves. Aren't you, pooter pie?"

As she pet him, the odd, smaller Seamus with fur so loose it hanged over my hands and wrapped my fingers in his warmth began to meow softly, still purring. I remembered all of her little names for him.

Pooter pie. Cutie patootie. Honey bunny. Bunny bear. Baby bear. Lovey bear. Lambikins. Little lamb. Lovey dovey. Sweety bear. Lovesponge. Lover. Furling. Sweetling was one I made up to describe him as a little kitten, constantly trying to nurse off of Marcie and purring even as he failed. She kept it.

I heard typing as I reflected. It stopped as i looked up for her.

"Honey? Honey, I have your patent ready," her voice called out. "Go mail it before someone else does."

I started to run to the post office and she stopped me, stuffing a bundle of letters into my hand and my laptop bag, checking a list on the wall that I now noticed was covered in them.

The Seamus-glove cat slid off my hands and landed on all fours, wandering off as I read the lists of mostly crossed-off items. Take chemo... Make grocery list for Frank... Make list of bills... Call for Kathy tickets... Marcie crossed a few things off the list and turned back to me.

"Honey, I know you like your free time, but maybe you should try to make some money while you have so much of it," she said. "Little stuff, too. Don't hide behind the grand schemes. Make a list of little things and do them."

She kissed me, she whispered she was proud. I realized that I was talking to my dead wife in a dream, or simply hearing her, but that she was always full of things to do and always doing them in life, many of them for me or us.

I tried to say something but my mouth would not respond, though I was unconcerned. She took the initiative and put her hand over my mouth, shushing, then leaned back into me.

"You need to just get out and get moving, or I will never see Morocco with you," she said. "And I have some ideas for you, so just come back when you're done with these."

I started to speak again and croaked out an "I love you" before I lost the dream I was now cognizant I was in. She did not fade from view, as I feared she would. She smiled.

"I know you know again," she said. "I know, too. You can't hide anything and you don't have to, especially what you feel, honey."

Her tone was teasingly accusatory, but gentle and sweet, as she always was when she was happy. She looked down and took my hand as Seamus meowed loudly.

"It's not as loopy up here," she said, motioning behind herself as she did at a now-endless tunnel lined in notes and lists. "But I have a lot of things to do here, and a few things are for you, so you have to go."

Her kiss felt like a puff of fur against my nose and lips. I awoke, of course, to Seamus repositioning himself against my head again. He meowed low as he realized I had awoken.

I gently nudged him until he hopped down off the couch and listened to the morning wake a bit more and birds argue over their spaces in the tassel flower plant outside.

The Dream of Love

The most difficult dream I had was what I have determined was a vision of love. But there was no ravishing greeting, no long rest in each others' company in a faraway place. The dream of love started in a long bedroom hallway.

There were pictures from the floor to a tapered ceiling a few feet over my own, the scant lines of white between them the only evidence of walls and ceilings beneath. I stopped at one and stared into the eyes of my great grandmother, Grandmommie Girvin, in an old metal pressed frame.

It was my first funeral and I remembered it vividly. The somber words, the massive turnout of the bereaved. My aunts and uncles, not just from my mother's side, but from my father's gigantic family, too.

But I moved on and came across the picture of my cat Garfield (named by my littlest sister), who I remembered jumping up into my arms when I got home, his well-groomed long hair a soft coat of Siamese-pattern points. had the face of a domestic cat, gruff and brawny, and he was like a blanket on cold winter's nights.

I moved on to a picture of my mother, from a year I did not remember well at all. But I remembered peach trees and orange trees, and I remember disappointing her by bringing home a traded-for car she thought i stole from Fed Mart. Her disappointment, mislaid as it was, was my first, six-year-old, heartbreak.

I was suddenly moving again and looking at old pals, former lovers and relatives I knew were all doing just fine, and whose pictures were flat. They hadn't uploaded yet, I thought.

And then I saw a picture of my friend Neil Roberts, from San Diego Naval Company 145. He had been my Recruit Leading Petty Officer, or RLPO or "Ral-Po," in boot camp, and a close ally in the boot camp politics, as I was the Athletic Petty Officer. These constituted important "command staff" boot camp positions that were somewhat political. He was killed in Afghanistan in heavy combat.

Pixie, my first cat, bumped his head under my palm and I told him how glad I was to see him, or her, or whatever, as I was only a small child when Pixie was alive and did know what gender, then, was all about. But greet Pixie I did.

When Grandma Pruett sauntered by and poked me, motioning with her typical Grandma grin, full of her former mischief and happy energy, I got the message, "Move on, keep going... there's something special ahead." But no words, just that smile.

And then finally I opened the door and the room beyond was nothing but pictures of Marcie and I, Marcie and Seamus, Seamus and I and all of us, pictures impossible because no one could have taken them, but see them and know them I did, each for it memorial.

Then I turned and looked on a full-length portrait of her in her blue dress. Her right hand was out in it, as if to dance, to be led. I reached to touch the glass and found myself dancing with her and smelling her again, feeling her under my hands as we spun in the soft light of the picture frame.

"You always stop and talk to everyone," she said. "But I am not worried about it anymore. You take your time, baby."

We danced and we spoke for what seemed hours, never once mentioning her death. Finally, I kissed her as the music died out and our steps clacked on the floor beneath us. She smiled and we retired to bed, wide awake.

I awoke far too soon and the sound of the paper carrier walking away from the neighbor's steps made me feel very sad.