The Dream

In the hazy state of consciousness between being fully asleep and fully awake, when the colors of the room are all in shades of grey, Mitchell's mind slowly separated the layers and images of the dream from the early morning chirps of warblers and tanagers outside his window.

In his dream, Mitchell had been riding on a school bus. It was the kind of dream that seemed so real that the realization of it as something his brain had created in sleep was startling and disconcerting. He'd felt the vibrations of the bus as it rolled down a dirt road, felt them course through his skin, muscle, and bone like that of a bass guitar whose regular hum buzzes steadily below a melody. Through the windows, he'd clearly seen the woods whisking by - strobe images of strong tree trunks interspersed with ferns and saplings. Mitchell was seated toward rear of the large bus, but other than the driver, whose face he could not see, he was alone. He had the distinct feeling that there had been other people, children, on the bus before, but that he was the last passenger. This had been the case when Mitchell was in grade school and he felt sure that this was the case now. Though in his mind he felt he was all of his 40 years, in the dream he felt he was looking through the eyes of his younger self.

As the bus dipped into ruts and bumped over the uneven road, Mitchell felt his body alternate between pressing firmly into the vinyl seat and losing its weight. The smells of summer were rich in his nostrils and Mitchell recalled wondering why he was riding a school bus in summer. The verdant trees formed a cathedral canopy over the road and light filtered in as if through stained glass. There were occasional bright reflections of sunlight coming from the bus metal that drew Mitchell's attention. It was as if there were someone flashing nautical morse code signals to him; the light flashes were regular and specific, but Mitchell couldn't decipher the message. He felt a sense of regret, but couldn't assign it to anything in particular. The fact that it was broad and vague lingered as Mitchell watched the woods go past.

The trees nearest to the road were blurs, but when he widened his gaze, everything seemed to slow down. In the distance, deep in the woods, he thought he saw a face. Somehow the face kept pace with the bus. It came and went with the alternating reflections of light peering down through the trees. Then the face came closer and Mitchell saw that it was his own adult face and that it was being reflected in the glass of the window through which he was looking.

All of a sudden the woods receded from the road. Just as on a high speed train, where the terrain changes quickly - like you're stationary and a vast panoramic scene drawn on a broad canvas is flying quickly past. The woods were now far off and between Mitchell's window seat and the trees a field appeared, grew, and widened until it filled his entire span of vision. The field began as tall, wispy grass and then instantly became filled with bright wildflowers of purple, yellow, and orange. Then he saw a lake. Somehow the lake stayed in the center of his view even though the bus continued forward. The water's surface was wrinkled by wind blowing across it.  On the opposite shore of the lake was a solitary dock harboring a small rowboat. From this distance, Mitchell could only see the figure of a person reclining in the vessel. The hat adorned head was resting in the crook of the bow and crossed legs were visible as they stretched toward the stern. Mitchell could feel the undulating water below the boat as if it were him in the boat. Then he felt that undulation as the bus bounded down the country road.  The lake finally began to move and passed from view giving way to open meadows and infinite rolling hills rising one behind the other in the distance.

The bus began to slow and Mitchell's attention turned toward the windshield. Past the seats in front of him, which now appeared as pews, past the driver who now wore a minister's gown, through the windshield which now was stained glass (though somehow still transparent) Mitchell saw ivy covered iron gates, ornate and grand. He couldn't see past or through them and to either side were Robert Frost stone walls. The walls were grand and obviously ancient - the sort that made Mitchell wonder at the skill of the craftsmen who assembled them so long ago.

The bus continued to slow and as it did Mitchell could now make out the individual notes of sound that had been filling his ears. The rushing of wind past his window ceased to make its whoosh. He could hear the bus engine, the squeaky leaf springs of the suspension. He heard the the sounds of individual rocks and stones being crushed into the hard-packed dirt road below the tires. Then the bus creaked to a stop. The driver reached to his right and pulled the door lever handle slowly. Mitchell saw the rubber closure of the two bus doors separate and widen. The driver didn't turn around but Mitchell understood he was to exit.

Mitchell slid from the window to the aisle and pulled himself up by the back of the seat ahead of him. He walked forward. He felt his hips brush against the alternating seats as he passed them. As he neared the driver, he could now see the his reflection in the rearview mirror above. It was the face of an older man, deep crow's feet alongside Paul Newman blue eyes and several days of white stubble were the indelible features. The old man winked, kindly and knowingly. Mitchell ducked down low to try to get a better look at the gates through the windshield. Above them he was able to see only the long frame of a slate roof atop a building far behind the wall. When Mitchell reached the front of the bus and turned to address the driver, he was gone.  This did not cause Mitchell any unease. He simply turned to his right, gripped the hand rail and stepped confidently down the stairs out of the bus.

When his feet touched the ground he became aware that he wasn't wearing any shoes. He felt the pebbles and dirt between his toes. The earth was warm from summer's heat. Smells of lilacs, wild berries, pine, and grass enveloped his senses. As Mitchell approached the gates, they slowly began to open. Through the widening gap, he saw a long gravel drive bordered by a wild and unkempt garden on either side. It led to a large and wide two story stone manor. Stairs from the drive rose to a front porch that stretched the length of the building, wrapping out of view around its sides. Six granite pillars supported a roof shading the porch. There were six empty chairs on the veranda, three on each side of the stairway. The chairs were wrought iron with pristine white and comfortable looking cushions. Next to each was a small matching round table. The chair to the far left was the only one upon which the afternoon sunlight shone. On that table, Mitchell saw a pitcher of what he knew to be iced tea. A glass full of ice stood next to the pitcher. As Mitchell took this all in, a figure appeared at the top of the steps. It was a woman, also barefoot, in a sage colored dress  and a wide brimmed summer hat.  The hat covered her eyes from view and all Mitchell could see was a beneficent smile.  Though she did not speak, he understood that she'd long been looking forward to his arrival.

From behind him, Mitchell heard the bus doors close. He heard the bus shift from park to reverse. The bus began to to beep loudly - the reverse warning alarm.  Beep...beep...beep.  Mitchell turned back to look. The sun's reflection in the windshield was blinding and Mitchell could only manage to squint at the diminishing outline of the bus. Beep...beep...beep. Mitchell stared as the bus slowly and steadily faded from view, disappearing backward  into the woods. Strangely, the sound of the bus' reverse alarm wasn't becoming more quiet as it receded. Instead the beeping grew louder and louder. Beep...Beep...Beep. As Mitchell tried to make sense of all this he turned back to the manor just in time to see a thick fog roll swiftly in and obscure his view of the barefoot woman in the summer hat and sage dress. The beeping grew louder and the fog thicker. Finally he couldn't see anything but shades of grey.  BEEP...BEEP...BEEP.  Then all turned black as if Mitchell's eyes were closed. Only the sound of the alarm remained.

The alarm. Mitchell opened his eyes, saw his bedroom in the grey light of dawn. He reached to the nightstand and pressed the button to silence his alarm. Mitchell's wife stirred briefly beside him and then he heard her exhale deeply in the manner he knew meant she was soon to be deep in sleep again. As Mitchell became conscious of what was real and what had been a dream, he closed his eyes to try to cement what he'd just experienced. The sound of bus, the sight of the woods, the lake, and the man in the boat. The kindly bus driver with white stubble and crows feet. The feel of the dirt between his toes and the scent of lilacs. And the woman in the sage colored dress. The harder Mitchell tried to imprint these images in his mind the faster he felt them slipping away.

Then the cat on the bed stirred and rose to press her head lovingly against Mitchell's shoulder as she purred. The dream that had just been so real - the sounds, scents, and sights - faded from Mitchell's senses and were replaced by those of his bedroom. He smelled coffee being automatically brewed in his kitchen. The sounds of the morning birds outside mixed with the occasional whir of a car or truck of an early riser passing down the road. By the time Mitchell heard his young son plaintively calling "Daddy" from his bedroom, the last visceral sensations of the dream were nothing more than crumbs - so minute as to barely resemble the whole of which they'd just been such an integral part.  Mitchell rose slowly and slid his legs off the bed.  The once familiar smooth, cool hardwood floor pressing against the soles of his feet now felt strange, though he no longer knew why.