DREAM
I awaken this morning feeling scared. My fingers hurt. This has something
to do with the dream I experienced last night. I am walking in an urban
neighborhood somewhere, not the pristine one where I live now, but in my
childhood neighborhood in Baltimore. I am walking along Park Heights
Avenue, the street where I live. I can feel the cement against my feet.
The
cement is hot, so it should be summer; but I have a warm jacket on. A
sweet
slender dog about the size of my German Shepherd, Daphne, walks alongside
me. I am looking straight ahead, determined to get to where I am going,
determined to shut out the noise around me, from inside my family, from
the
hustle and bustle of the fruit and vegetable stands on either side of Park
Heights Avenue, an arterial that runs I-don't-know-how-many miles north
and
south through Northwest Baltimore. Jewish Baltimore, where I have lived
all
my life.
I am walking quickly, not only because I want to get to the next block and
the next and the next but because the dog walking waist high beside me is
gnarling on two fingers of my left hand. His teeth are embedded in my
skin,
but she is smiling. (The dog is both male and female). I don't know if my
fingers are hurting or not, but I grab the dog's snout with my right hand
and try to pull her and him off me. To no avail. The dog is as determined
to stick with me as I am determined to get to where I am going. In the
next
scenario, I am in a therapist's office. As I walk into the room, the
therapist looks quizzically at my swollen fingers. He says nothing. I say
nothing. My body is filled with confusion. The dog is no longer with me.
I awaken.