Last night I had many dreams, but one woke me with tears…
My wife and I were driving on a country road. Beautiful cottonwood trees lined both sides of the two lane road, and like many Oklahoma roads, you could see from one stop sign to the next down the straight mile line. We were talking about many things from home and work, we were laughing, enjoying the quiet drive.
As she was driving I was looking toward her, smiling, and that is when I saw the light. A strange red-brown light was coloring downtown Oklahoma City between the trees as we cruised down the hot summer tarmac. For a moment I was in denial, and then I told her to stop.
She slowed the car and the we stopped between trees, looking down on the city skyline which must have been thirty miles away in my dream-mind. We both looked on for a moment as the mushroom cloud grew over the cityscape.
She looked at me, tears starting to flood her eyes, and I smiled at her, kissed her cheek and said softly, “Hey, how about those kids huh, aren’t they amazing?”
She smiled, kissed my own tears, and leaned into my chest as the world was washed away in another mushroom cloud.
I am still shaken.
I’ve had dreams like that too. I always wake up feeling so hollow, and at the same time ever more aware that every moment is something special to attend to.