After two weeks of having to be up and off to work too early for dreams to rise far enough to the surface that I can actually remember them, this morning I slept in, and now carry the dregs of strange internal landscapes around with me.
For someone who has very little interest in the performance of marriage, that was what I was doing - getting married. On a huge decadent boat, I was the bride, and I knew it was an act of convenience. I did not feel very strongly about the choice I was making, or the vows I was saying, I did not feel trapped or annoyed or relieved. I did not see the groom's face, and I did not stay for the afterparty.
Instead, I stepped off the top deck of the boat into the window of a large, beautiful Victorian house, in its uppermost floor.
Like Peter Pan, I was looking for my friend, but she has taken the steps I have been afraid of, and the toys scattered around that beautiful room were for a child that her husband played on the floor with, not for her anymore. As she cleared a place for me to sit while I regaled her with my exploits, I noticed a vacancy on my hand, and wondered if my wedding ring had fallen off when I stepped across the threshold from boat to window. I wasn't upset, just thoughtful.
Moving through my house this morning, in my lazy tie dye pants and messy bun, I felt a sudden sense of missing something as familiar as my glasses or keys. I instinctively searched my left hand for a ring, and suddenly remembered I don't usually wear jewelry, let alone place much value in physical objects. But there remains that feeling in my belly, a feeling that is somehow connected to a pseudo memory, a bizarre connection between my gut and my hand that became clear in the loss of some constriction, an idea that manifests as a physical claim on our attention.
I can still feel that ghost of a ring I wore in a dream, wrapped around my finger.
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