Dreams.....

Dreaming is such a surreal experience.  Consisting of vivid, emotional pictures and feelings that some times make no sense.  Some times we dream in short little spurts, or none at all.  But other times we have those dreams that seem to go through the entire night. Even after slightly waking to roll over or adjust in the bed, the dream continues.  At least that was my experience last night.

My dream last night was similar to one I used to have consistently for many years after the death of my brother.  Tortuous dreams, consisting of bits of reality and pieces of nonsense. Yet parts of it made me long for it to never stop.  Parts of it made life feel like it used to, he was alive, smiling, handsome as ever and happy. These dreams are so realistic that they envelop all of my senses.  I swear I can even smell him during the dreams.  Last nights dream started so nice and happy and ended again in torture.  There was no one scene I can pinpoint from the beginning of the dream, just warm and happy feelings and knowing he was alive and OK.  Talking to him, being brother and sister again, surrounded by love and warmth. Then the war happened.  The military showing up again saying this time he was only "wounded" but no more.  Days of wondering what happened and the honest feeling of terror while sleeping.  Then calm happened again, JR showed up at my door and he was fine, whole and amazed to find that I would not let him go.  He explained he had just gotten in a small scuffle and showed me he had not a scratch on his body.  All I could do was cry and try to explain to him he was already dead. Then my daughter woke up and pulled me out of hell.  This dream was so realistic that at 4am while searching on hands and knees for a pacifier I had to over and over again tell myself "he is gone".

I get back in bed and snuggle my 4 year old and think I might get another hour or so or good, non-torturous sleep, but no.  I go back to another form of the dream, now I am in Iraq in the back of a car with terrorist driving through the desert.  There is gritty, dusty sand everywhere, it is blowing in the windows and around the outside of the car.  They are yelling stuff in Arabic or Kurdish, clearly very mad at me.  They pull out a portable DVD and make me watch a video.  It is JR, telling me to find him, they are going to kill him.  He is begging me and I am crying not knowing what to do, or how I got here.  Then I wake up.

These dreams are so tumultuous.  I go from the best feelings of being with him and things are normal again and right, to being the one that has to save him, and clearly I can't.  You literally wake up feeling like there is a hole in your heart.
I hate that my brother died, I also hate the way he died.  So violently and at such unease.  I know JR knew he was going to die.  We chatted on instant messenger the morning (for me) before he died (the night before for him).  He was so scared.  He had dreamed he would die, it was too real and he could not sleep anymore.  I will never forget what I told him.  I said that in all my life I had never seen him scared, that he was the optimist not the pessimist, his glass was always half full and through-out life he had gotten through so many situations the average person never would have.  I told him I had no doubt that he would be home safe again, but that he needed to shake these feelings and get his head back in the game.  We ended the conversation with him typing/saying something he never had before,   "I love you, you know that right?" That's the last thing my brother said to me.