On nightmares

I'm on a couch. The windows are still black. Night is becoming increasingly stubborn at yielding to morning. 

I've been up for almost two hours because this is when I think, set my day straight, find my footing for the journey ahead. Writing began the day; creating a quiz for my students followed; writing resumes the day. I have an hour before it's time to exercise. 

My fourth child, an eight-year-old boy filled with kindness and a love for Pokémon action figures, lies on another, nearby couch. He needs me visible. A nightmare chased him from his sleep and into my bed. He followed me to the living room when I got up to be about my father's business. His tousled hair protrudes from beneath the crocheted blanket I put on him. He's breathing deeply once again. 

My single prayer growing up was "Help me not dream anything bad." Mom and Dad were good about praying with us each night, and my brother and I were good at remembering how much we hated nightmares. Images of my Dad or Mom sitting on my bed while I looked across the room at Tony facing me, eyes closed, fervently at times and not so fervently at other times praying, "Help me not dream anything bad." As early as Bern Creek Loop. As early as Washington, Indiana. As early as I can remember. 

My father in this memory image looks big. His hands are piously folded. Several fingernails are blackened from aberrant hammer blows. Mom is silent, too, with her head tilted slightly to the side. Her prayer covering always in place. Tony and I have matching quilted comforters in stoplight colors. 

I woke with one, too, last night. Do we not outgrow our fears? My fear was that this path through divorce at age 44 is going to end in failure. That I won't be able to provide for my children. That I'll not make this transition fast enough. Never mind the "thrive, not survive" mantra of personal development gurus. I'll be chasing dollars, not get to travel, not get to live.  

I woke in a sweat. I mouth the words, "Help me support my family" as I move from one entrepreneurial task to another. I still have bad dreams. 

In stronger moments, I tell myself these are just phantasiai, belief-informed images that do not exist. They emanate from my fears and need to be tested to measure the likelihood of their becoming a reality. A philosopher friend reminds me that they are God's greatest gift to humanity according to Epictetus. 

We get through them. We live through the bad dreams. We endure our anxieties on a night run. They're simply our fears parading through a mind that's incapable of responding logically. Painful perceptions before our inner child. Right?

Sleep has its own logic, its own physics. I remember trying to run from a bogeyman chasing me, but I couldn't. The weight of my blankets held my limbs, prevented my escape. I wok e when he was just about to grab me. My adult self feels incapable of outrunning my adult nightmares. I feel the same vulnerability as I did forty years ago. I don't feel capable of facing my grown up challenges any more than my younger self with childhood nightmares. Some part of me deep within persists as a child.

My eyes find Malachi. He’s still sleeping. He’s sleeping still. He feels safe near me, and I realize that I still long to be sleeping near my father, too.