DREAM SAGA 2

This second dream is like something out of Ancient Greek literature . . . S.L.

In the previous Dream Saga post, I described how the Ancients had all kinds of beliefs about dreams, from astral travel to glimpses into the future to supernatural visitations. I believe there are three types of dreams. Most of them are quite simply deprogramming of all the mental garbage that goes through our cerebellum each and every day. That is why it is so difficult to remember them - they simply dissolve into the ether.

Some dreams, however, have deeper significance.

These are the dreams that you never forget. They stand out because they are exactly what they appear to be; an intersection between our conscious life in the physical, material world and the plane of the supernatural.

There IS a supernatural world - it is exactly what the word means; over and above or greater than the natural world. From an engineer's frame of reference, the natural world consists of that which can be recorded and measured and then replicated under controlled circumstances; laboratory conditions as it were.

The supernatural world, or the spirit world, or whatever you want to call it, represents itself to us in those phenomena that we can observe but cannot replicate. Think of ghost sightings, UFOs, crop circles, voodoo and the spiritualism of primitive peoples, the sixth sense, out-of-body experiences and other paranormal activities. These events do occur, but because we have extreme difficulty putting them into a frame of perspective, we do not understand them and therefore we tend to deny such a dimension exists.

And yet it does exist, and it manifests itself each and every day.


Background

This dream took place within two weeks of my mother's passing away, in September of 2000. My mother had a lot of class and a definite style that was all her own. What happened was while I was overseas on one of my adventures, she'd had a stroke. I contacted her and asked if I should come home early. She said she was fine, she'd had a complete recovery and to complete my mission and come home on schedule, in six weeks.

I remained overseas, but when I came home the first thing I did was go and visit my mother. Good thing I did, because she had another stroke. The next day I was visiting her at the hospital, and she was sitting up in bed, full recovery, seemingly no effects of the stroke. The only after-effect of the stroke was she kept referring to an item she'd seen on the news about some kind of wild animal that had appeared up in the Northeast, but she couldn't put her finger on what exactly it was.

We all asked her, "Was it a raccoon?"

"No."

"Was it a coyote?"

"No."

"Was it a possum?"

"No."

"Was it a groundhog?"

"No."

We went through the whole menagerie from aardvark to zebra but nobody could help her figure out what the thing was. This was the only after-effect of her stroke, thankfully.

Then the next morning she sat up in bed, went "Oh! Oh! Oh!" held her hand to her head and fell back. Massive brain hemorrhage - she was gone. But she was in such good physical shape that it took her another 48 hours to expire.

We all have to go sooner or later. Mother's passing was the Gold Standard of checking out - fast and relatively painless, surrounded by friends and family, after a long and satisfying life.

Like I said, my mother had a definite style that was all her own. Immediately after her passing away, my sister-in-law commented that there was such a presence of her in the house. She was absolutely right about this. Everywhere you looked were reminders of my mother's personal touch.

The dream came a couple weeks later . . .


The Second Dream

I was sleeping when I felt a deep cold move like a wave over my entire body.

Despite the fact I was asleep, I felt like I was wide awake, as if I were under some kind of anaesthesia that keeps one conscious but unable to feel or to move one's body. It was a definite out-of-body experience.

I was in some kind of subterranean cavern, a large, gray chamber with dark passages leading off to parts unknown. It was cold, dark and lonely.

I became aware that my mother was there, pale and gray.

By this time I was certainly wide awake but in a sleep-like state, if that makes any sense. My mother didn't say anything at first, she was just there, a presence.

"Mother," I finally said, "What's it like? The Land of the Dead?"


"Oh it's cold . . ." she replied.

". . . so cold . . . oh so cold . . ."



That's all she said. Then I drifted into a deep, dark slumber.

I will never forget this dream.


Dream Interpretation

This dream was obviously a form of astral travel, and a supernatural visit from the Other Side. There is no doubt in my mind that this was my mother in spirit form visiting me. I definitely had the sensation we were in a holding area - an antechamber of Hades - that this was not my mother's final destination. I am quite sure of this, because I sensed my mother's presence one more time, about six months later.


Epilogue

It was in Kuwait and something went horribly wrong; a friendly fire incident involving a Navy F-18 and three 500lb bombs. Six were killed, including the man who at the last minute went forward in my place, and two were maimed. I immediately felt that my mother had interceded to keep me from harm.

My mother was always worried about my military activities. After the incident in Kuwait, I felt that my mother had served her post-mortum purpose, and that she moved on past the waiting place where we had met. I never sensed her presence again.


The final Dream Saga 3 follows . . .

STORMBRINGER SENDS