what dreams may come

What follows won a contest and was published in an anthology of real-life ghost stories last year. So you don’t have to buy the book, I thought I’d post it here. Since I wrote this for a contest, it lacks the “flava” that I normally bring to my stories, but it is 100% true. 

***

Groggy with sleep, I shuffled to the kitchen where my sister was already making herself breakfast. Our mother left the day before for a business trip, but I was in my mid-teens and my sister in her early twenties, so fending for ourselves was not a problem. I sat down at the counter and tried to clear the lasting images from a very vivid dream from my mind.

I was contemplating breakfast when my sister sat down next to me and said, “I had the weirdest dream last night.”

I turned to her, surprised. “Really? So did I.” Breakfast forgotten, I asked, “What was your dream about?”

She told me she dreamed she wore a dark green sweater. It was thick and warm and, although she had never seen it before, she instantly loved it. As she walked through our house, sections of the sweater began to glow. Looking down she saw sparks jump from the fabric. Frightened, she pulled the sweater off and threw it into the fireplace where it became engulfed in bright white flames. She shielded her face from the heat and when the fire burned out, the sweater was gone. The dream was unusual, but the striking realness of it all was what made it memorable.

“Your turn,” she said.

I told her that in my dream I was dressed as a 1920’s flapper. My short, green dress was covered in rows of silky fringe that swayed as I walked through my bedroom. Already late to the costume party, I stopped to check my hair in the dresser mirror and adjusted my sequined headband. Finally ready, I grabbed my green wool cloak from the bed and wrapped it around my shoulders. Just then, in the mirror, I caught a glimpse of a face superimposed over my own. It was gone in a moment, but that was all the time I needed to recognize my grandfather who died when my sister and I were very young. The sudden appearance of his gray, wrinkled face should have startled me, but instead I was comforted. I stood in front of the mirror hoping that he would show himself again.

It was common for my sister and I to have realistic dreams, so even though we noted the appearance of the color green in both of them, we did not feel there was any meaningful significance. However, when our mother arrived home later that day, the dreams were still fresh in our minds. We felt compelled to tell her about them.

As we described our dreams to our mother, she was silent, her eyes wide. After we finished, she said in almost a whisper, “Did I not ever tell you the story of your grandfather’s sweater?” Our confused looks told her that she had not.

When our grandfather was young, during the early 1920’s, he was basically a vagabond. He traveled the rails with only a satchel on his shoulder and the clothes on his back. His green wool sweater, more than just an article of clothing, was a beloved possession. One cold night, he stopped at a hobo camp to warm himself by a barrel fire. Chilled and weary, he did not realize just how close he stood to the flames. Sparks landed on his sweater and the fabric ignited. He yanked the burning garment from his body and threw it to the ground, stomping on it to extinguish the flames. The sweater, one of the few things of value he owned, was ruined.

“Your grandfather was trying to contact you, connect with you both in some way,” our mother said, eyes welling with tears.

My sister’s dream with the color green, the sweater and fire, and mine with the 1920’s era and grandfather’s face were just details, a skeleton. Our mother’s recollection, a story passed down, added flesh to the frame and made it come alive.

We all turned to look at the brass cube on the fireplace hearth that contained grandfather’s ashes. Many times over the years we had touched that cube and thought of him. On that night, he reached out and touched us back.

***

If you have a real-life ghost story, I would love to hear it!

leave your body at the door

I had to leave town unexpectedly last Tuesday.  My grandma, my mother’s mother, was very ill. According to everyone who saw her, she was not going to last much longer. So, my mom, my sister and I flew up to Michigan to say good-bye.

Well, in typical mid-western passive-aggressive fashion, she got better right after we arrived.  I’m not complaining.  I hope she lives forever. But, it did make for a stressful flight up there.

I love you grandma.

Adding to that stress was my grandfather. Normally, someone who has been dead for over 30 years shouldn’t be cause for much concern. But, this is my family we are talking about.

See, my grandfather was cremated. Half of his ashes were scattered around the property of the house that grandpa and grandma built together. The other half was put in a brass urn that stands eight inches tall and about five inches across.  His urn was displayed on the fireplace hearth of my mom’s house. When she moved, he went to my sister’s and rested on her hearth.  When my sister moved, he was passed on to me, because at that time, I had the fireplace.

Grandma, being a Seventh Day Adventist, does not believe in cremation and wishes to be buried. As some sort of compromise, the urn containing grandpa’s ashes is to be buried with her.

You see where this is going, don’t you?

Yes. I had to fly to Michigan with grandpa in my carry-on.

Surprisingly enough, I’ve never flown with human remains in my luggage before, so I didn’t know what to expect. I did have the presence of mind while booking my plane ticket to ask what would be required to get grandpa on the plane. After a short pause, I was told that all I would need is his death certificate and/or cremation certificate.  By some miracle, my mom had both of these pieces of paper and scanned them then emailed them to me.

I get to the airport, put my purse and shoes in a bin at the security station and lay my carry-on bag on the belt to be x-rayed.  With my boarding pass in one hand and grandpa’s paperwork in the other, I walk through the scanner.  On the other side, I display my best non-threatening smile (minimal teeth, maximum dimples) and get ready to explain that the large brass cube in my bag will not explode.

The TSA agent took one look at my bag on the monitor, yawned, and sent it on its way without a word.

My first thought was, “Are you kidding me? My grandmother’s slightly soggy diaper was treated like a pound of C4 explosive by the TSA, but a heavy, metal box doesn’t get a second glance?” Maybe it’s common to travel with dead relatives these days.

My second thought was, “This is going to make a really boring blog post.” I wrote the post anyway.  Sorry.

Well, I’d rather have a boring blog post than get my family on CNN.  Again.

Grandpa was a cop. He could have shown those TSA whippersnappers a thing or twenty.

One housekeeping note: My WordPress blog reader suddenly doesn’t want to display any of the WP blogs that I subscribe to. Yesterday evening, I went through and checked to get email updates whenever any of you post from now on, however, I have no way to know if you posted while I was out last week. I want to try to catch up on my blog reading, but I don’t know if it will be possible.  If you posted anything particularly brilliant and/or hilarious in the past six days please include a link in the comments and I’ll be sure to check it out.  Thank you.

 

it’s better to burn out than to fade away

In my last post I mentioned that I don’t think those car window stickers are a fitting memorial for loved ones who have passed on. 

Well, since then I may have taken a different stance on the issue.

When I shuffle off this moral coil, I think that I would very much like to be memoralized with a car window sticker if it looked something like this:

Now that’s a sticker that celebrates a life, instead of mourning a death.  That’s a sticker that says, “if you didn’t know this person, you missed out.”  The funeral of a person with a sticker like that would be full of laughter and people telling outrageous stories while looking though photographs.  I can only hope I deserve a sticker like this when I die. 

By the way, I also coined the word “deathiness” in my last post and I think it deserves a place in our lexicon.  Feel free to try it out with your friends.   

And, for those of you paying attention, yes that is the same electric guitar playing kitten from the Kick-Ass Marriage Certificate I created some time ago.  I love that damn kitten.

 

road kill

Work has been quiet, my family hasn’t done anything crazy and life is chugging along at a semi-normal pace.  Damn.  

So, in lieu of any true stories to share, I thought I’d post a snipet of a fiction story that I am working on and maybe get some feedback from you fine people. 

Don’t roll your eyes.  I’m not asking you to write a book report on it or anything.  Thumbs up-thumbs down Roger Ebert style will suffice. 

If you are overly sensitive to animals meeting their maker via vehicle (hence the name) you may want to skip this one.  Did I mention that this is a work in progress?  So, no judging, okay?

And, action . . .

*

Gary stopped his Toyota Prius in front of Emily’s apartment and tapped the horn. He was early. Maybe he would have enough time to talk her out of this whole carpool arrangement. Not that it didn’t make perfect sense; he had to pass right by her apartment on the way to and from work. Emily usually brown-bagged her lunch and hardly ever ran errands after work which eliminated her need for a car during the day. However if Emily ever needed to go anywhere, Gary would gladly take her. She was one of the few people at the office that Gary talked to, and the only one he sincerely enjoyed being around. No, it was not Emily’s fault that he dreaded carpooling with her. It was the stupid animals.

Emily emerged from her apartment wearing a bright green blouse and navy skirt. She waved cheerfully and trotted down her entrance stairs, her blond bob bouncing with each step. The sun appeared to have come out from behind a cloud. He was so distracted watching her walk to the car that he forgot to unlock the passenger side door. After she tried the handle and the door didn’t budge, she bent to look through the window and tapped on the glass with a smile. Gary fumbled for the door-lock button and apologized as she settled into the seat.

“Oh, don’t be sorry. I’m just glad you’re here. You really didn’t seem keen on doing this yesterday. I was afraid you’d change your mind.”

“No. I told you I’d be here. I wouldn’t stand you up.” Gary shifted the car out of park and navigated through the parking lot.

“This is a win-win for the both of us. And you know that I will pay you every week for my share of the gas. In cash even.”

“Em, I told you, it’s not you.” He came to a stop at the road and diligently looked both ways, even though he was turning right. “It’s just that I’m kinda,” he paused searching for the right words. “Accident prone.”

Emily laughed. “You? You’re the most careful person I know.”

Gary pulled out into the road and eased the car up to a speed slightly lower than the posted limit. He tried to keep his line of sight straight ahead, but couldn’t help glancing to the sides. The road was four-lane, but it sliced through a wooded residential area. There were no curbs or sidewalks, and the grass at the shoulders had not been cut recently. Sunlight sifted through the leafy branches of oaks and poplars and the shadows gave the illusion of movement. Each shifting shadow caught his eye and he had to struggle not to tap the brake. All the roads to the office were surface streets and were similarly tree-lined.

Emily was saying something about the new billing system at work. She knew that he wasn’t talkative in the mornings, so he could get away with only half listening. He had to keep his attention focused on scanning the roadsides as well as just making his way through traffic. Paying close attention had never helped before, but he was willing to try anything to avoid an incident with Emily in the car. If he knew how to pray to more than one god, he would have.

Five miles into the trip, over half way to work, it finally happened. From the left, a squirrel, all nervous energy and twitching tail, darted from the undergrowth and into the roadway. The critter managed to dodge two cars before making it to the center lane where it paused. Gary saw it right away and eased on the brake. It did no good. The squirrel sat on the centerline and appeared to wait for Gary before finally leaping out in front of his car at just the right moment to be flattened by his left front tire. There was a soft thud as rubber hit rodent. Gary hoped that Emily had not noticed, but no such luck.

“You just hit a squirrel!” She turned around in her seat so she could confirm that the poor creature was dead.

Gary knew already, but he glanced in the rear-view anyway and saw the fallen squirrel, flat on the asphalt, tail buffeted by the breeze from passing cars.

“Oh, that’s so sad.” Emily turned back around and looked at Gary. “You did the right thing by not swerving, though. With all these cars around, that would’ve caused an accident.”

Gary only nodded.

“Still, what a bummer of a way to start your day, huh?” Emily gave him a little nudge with her elbow.

Gary managed a smile, for Emily’s sake, but he was already on the lookout for another animal.

*

The next section explains Gary’s unfortunate circumstances – he can’t stop killing animals with his car no matter how hard he tries.  I think that the squished animals are going to be a kind of metaphor for Gary’s life and how people treat him, but I haven’t really worked it all out on paper yet.  Anyway, thanks for reading!

karaoke kills

“A Malaysian man has been stabbed to death for refusing to stop singing and hand over the microphone at a karaoke bar, police say.”

Malaria, typhoid, poisonous snakes, peasant uprising, tsunami, Opium deal gone wrong:  all things that I imagine could kill me while visiting an Asian island nation.  Now, I have to add bad karaoke manners to this list.  One night in Bangkok may make a hard man humble, but one night in Sandakan could leave a Patsy Cline wannabe bleeding in the gutter. 

Note to self: do not get drunk in Malaysia.

mauled by puppies

Puppies maul abandoned cancer patient (click on link to read the full article)

Am I just sick, or did anyone else kind of giggle while reading this?  Yes, it’s horrible that this poor, sick man was abandoned by his own daughter and left to die.  She should rot in hell.  But, holy crap, people!  Mauled by puppies!? 

Mauled.  By.  Puppies. 

The picture those words paint in my brain make it physically impossible for me to keep a straight face!  Maybe if it were my mother, or grandma, who was the victim of a vicious puppy mauling, I wouldn’t find the situation so amusing.  Maybe. 

I gotta tell ya, if given a choice of tortures, I would have to pick being mauled by puppies.  What could be a more adorable way to die?  Raped by bunnies?  Suffocated by kittens?  Trampled by baby elephants?  I think I would pick any of these over being slowly eaten away by cancer.  If anything, people would remember my death and smile.  I would like that.

Day of the Dead

I’m fascinated by the Day of the Dead as celebrated in many parts of Mexico and South America.  They set aside two days at the beginning of November to celebrate deceased children (11/1) and deceased adults (11/2).  I particularly like the imagery that is associated with this holiday.  Skulls and skeletons are decorated with flowers and bright colors, candy skulls are given out as treats to the children.  Death is celebrated, the dead remembered and honored.  So different than our Halloween, where death and the dead are something to fear (don’t get me wrong – I loves the Halloween, too!).  Instead of rotting corpses, they have dancing skeletons. 

Here are some Day of the Dead skulls that I made while I probably should have been doing other things. 

Life in most industrialized countries is so far removed from death.  It used to be that family members were in charge of preparing the body of a dead relative for burial.  The body would be displayed in the home for people to come and pay their respects.  Now, we pay someone to take care of these details for us.  If the deceased is cremated, many relatives or friends may not even see the body. 

I touched my dead grandfather when I was about five.  I stood on tip-toes to reach into the casket and touched his chest.  I hadn’t yet learned to be afraid.  And that fear is learned.  Supersitions, religions and society in general teach us to be afraid, to turn away, to let someone else handle it. 

Part of that fear comes from knowing that one day, we won’t be able to turn away because Death will be there for us.  He will be smiling.  I hope that I am, too.