Not sure why I am writing this today.  Perhaps when we are in the most turmoil, our moment of hair-thin breaking weakness, we need to speak the most?  Or bury it.  Either way…  When I look back on this post I say, oh boo hoo, poor baby, did we have a wittle bad dweam?  Think about how others are suffering, their hearts and homes broken, and all you’ve got is this?  Well, yes. I try to keep the whining in perspective, and as far as I know, this is my page to rant or whine, rage, suppose, imply, and wonder at will, never forgetting those who have gone before us in these days.

So I can’t breathe lately.  I think it’s because of the cat I was sitting for a week and all the things that come along with her like fur, dander, and her dusty litter box.  There was a lot of extra hand-washing this week because not handling her would have been cruel: it’s the reason her mom asked me to watch her in my apartment, because she’s so needy for love and company.  Of COURSE I petted her while I was on the toilet, she wouldn’t have it any other way!   I have limits to how much my feline affection will go, especially if you try to scale my bookcase and knock over some super-precious figurines.  But she’s home now, and all that’s left is cramped lungs and sleepless nights trying to breathe.

I woke on the cusp of dawn in terror.  I did not recognize where I was. I was propped up by many pillows on my pretty twin bed, the room looked sterilized white, I did not recognize the doorways, I thought I was in my father’s room the day he took his last breath.  I was the one in that bed. This is my final resting place.  Then I remembered the dream, the dream that never stopped.  Godzilla was coming for me, and I don’t know why. (I never know why.) I offended him somehow, and there was no chance to repay him but in death.  And I remembered seeing myself get out of this bed, go through that doorway, seeing male twins sitting at my card table, oblivious to the destruction going on outside the window.  I opened the door and watched the crowd in the dark street, their faces and bodies reacting to the horror happening in the window upstairs from me.  I was holding a large knife, like a bowie knife, only made of crystal, and apparently I wasn’t supposed to have it, but I refused to give it up.  I ran and ran and hid, climbed, crouched, did everything I could to keep myself and the knife away from the monster, but it never ever failed to find me.  I awoke in my bedroom disoriented, I didn’t recognize where I was and my heart raced, adrenaline rushed, I was so scared because I lost all my bearings.  I studied the door frames trying to make sense of it all, wondering why I was in the hospice room soon to die.  The room became lit with pale orange and I coughed a lot and realized it was a dream, and it was time to stand up.  I haven’t been that afraid since I don’t know when.  I write here today to try and understand it all.