Sunday, September 12, 2021
San Juan Bautista, CA
[Candid mid-day conversation in the front room as Frances tells of this morning’s coffee dream]
Tim –
What woke me up just before 7:00 o’clock this morning? Frances crying. Terribly crying, in her sleep, heart wrenching to hear. I was thinking, O my God, she’s having a nightmare about great granddaughter Harlow being in a grave situation. But I didn’t want to cause an outside interruption, waking her up and making her miss the natural conclusion of the dream. Early in our 42 years together I’d learned to avoid that. I quietly got up, made coffee for two, brought it to the bedroom and got cozy. She was just waking, still very disturbed, trembling. After a few sips I asked her what the dream was about.
Frances –
I dreamt I was alone in the kitchen making coffee in one of our little white cups with the wine glass base and ornate handle. I looked and there was nice hot coffee in the cup, but there was no equipment to make it with: no filter papers, no Melita cone, no strainer, no sieve, no French press, not even any grounds. How did I make it? It seemed like the brewed coffee just appeared. There was nothing wrong with it, but I had no logical explanation of how it got into the cup. I had not gone out, it was not delivered, and I wasn’t worried about losing my mind. So why was it so traumatic? Maybe it had something to do with falling asleep last night worrying, what if granddaughter Paris and the kids don’t like it out in the country, where they recently moved? Or maybe it came from the disquieting movie we were watching, Snow Falling On Cedars. Beautiful.
Tim –
And fitting to watch on the 20th anniversary of Nine Eleven. The treachery of xenophobia.
Paris –
Maybe it was from not having a real Melita cone for the paper coffee filters: you gave yours to me and didn’t get new one yet. Or maybe you were having a dream within a dream … where you wake up thinking you should be back to normal, just making coffee, but you aren’t, because you’re still in the second layer of the dream. That can be very weird.
Frances –
Another thing – I’ve been having side effects from the Amox Clav antibiotic, just in the past two days, since my doctor saw signs of a minor infection around the gouge in my ankle from the wrought iron magazine rack that fell on me. Upset stomach, fatigue, shaking. Maybe that contributed to the weirdness of the dream.
Paris –
You should be taking Doxy, not Amox. Maybe you were having a partial allergic reaction.
Frances –
But not as bad as the Cephalexin I took about three months ago when Tim had to drive me to the ER.
Tim –
Would you like me to warm your coffees, mine is getting cold.