Nocturnal Visitor

So... I had a visitor the other night in my sleep.

Let me start off by saying this. I believe that when people from my life who have passed away appear in my dreams, that is their way of paying me a visit. I know most people would disagree, saying it is only a subconscious memory that my brain is throwing up on the drive-in wall that is my brain while I sleep. (I'm an active dreamer. Always have been. More active than I'd like, believe me.)

But I prefer to think of them as visits. As discussed in previous posts, as a Jewish girl, I don't really know what I believe about the afterlife. I'm not sure whether we die and our souls go somewhere and are reunited with our loved ones, whether we simply live on in the memories of those who loved us or whether we are just gone. But a part of me has always thought that when people come to me in my sleep, they are just letting me know they are still here for me.

Ever since Poppa died, whenever I feel sad, I have been listing for myself all the people he loved who he has possibly been reunited with. It's a long list. His brother who died of leukemia when he was still a young boy and his father who died a year later from, as family legend has it, a broken heart. My Grandmother. Most of his friends. So many people. And secretly, I hoped when he was done catching up with all of them, he would come pay me a visit. I didn't think it would happen for quite a while, but I think I knew he would show up someday.

The other night, there he was. He looked so young. So strong and healthy. There were no more issues with his legs or his eyes. He didn't look like he weighed 45 lbs with his clothes on as he did those last months. He looked exactly the way I remember him looking when I was a teenager. It was amazing.

In the past, I have had dreams about my other grandparents who are no longer alive. But in those dreams, the fact that they were there even though they were supposed to be dead was a non-issue. My dream self didn't actually pay any attention to the idea that it was speaking to Grandparents who are no longer of this earth. They were simply there, part of the backstory of whatever strange thing was happening in my dream. One time tho, I swear I woke up and smelled my Grandmother's perfume.

But this dream was different. My dream-self knew he was supposed to be dead. I knew he was there for a visit and no one else would understand. He told me he knew how much we all missed him. He said he carried my heart around with him all the time. He gave me two of his sweaters that he told me he had taken with him when he died (???) so that I could have them to remember him by. (One of them was bright orange, which was most definitely not a sweater I remember him wearing, but the other was an oatmeal colored sweater which I have seen him wear many times.) And then he gave me a hug. It was a really long hug. The kind you give someone when you know it is going to be a long time until you see them again. There was no awkwardness to it. I remember in my dream I was crying pretty hard because I knew this was the only visit I was going to get for a while. And then he was gone.

In my dream, I went downstairs holding the sweaters he had given me only to find a television production truck in my parents' living room. Apparently they were filming American Idol on the front lawn and there wasn't enough room for this particular truck on the street. Which in my dream seemed quite logical when my mother explained it. I then proceeded to tell her all about Poppa's visit and as we began to argue about whether or not it really happened, I woke.

It was about 5:45AM. Every instinct I had was screaming at me to roll over and go back to sleep immediately. Which I almost did. But then, in a rush, the dream came back. Every detail came back crystal clear. And along with the memories came the biggest smile I had smiled in a long time. I couldn't wipe it off my face. I was laying there in bed feeling so content and relieved that at last I got to tell him goodbye the way I wanted to. Not the "real" goodbye I gave him where he was barely conscious when I said it. This was a real send off and a chance to tell him when he could really understand how much I love him.

It's been about a week and a half now since he was here. I've told a few people in my life about it. Some have agreed that it was really a visit, some have humored me. But in my heart, I know that he was here. I know he came to say goodbye to me.

I just hope he didn't see all the sex toys in the other room while he was here.