Twice I had dreamed of dying my hair. On the second night, I came downstairs from dying my hair auburn and struggling with two overflowing bathtubs. My husband lay asleep on the sofa in the center of the room. As I approached him, I heard a noise in the kitchen. I shook my husband, but he wouldn’t awaken. So, mustering up my “Nancy Drew” courage, I walked into the kitchen.
A woman whom I did not know walked about as if she belonged in this house. She hung several neatly pressed garments on a hook. I didn’t recognize the khaki skirt. I asked the woman who she was, but she ignored me, and I realized that no matter how she moved, I could not see her face. I walked towards her and tried to walk around her, but she turned each time so that I could not identify her. Something about her reminded me of my mother, except older. I’ve been told that I look like my mother.
That she would not speak or allow me to see her struck me as peculiar. I had to see her face, so I willed myself towards her. I was almost shouting now, “Who are you!” I trapped her in a corner, and this time my willpower was stronger than her ability to elude me.
The face that turned towards me was filled with terror. She did look like my mother… like me… only much older.
I shouted at her. I had the odd sensation of watching myself act irrationally, as if watching from a window in my mind, and being powerless to control my own actions. I shrieked at her, backing her into a corner, “I know who you are! You’re NOBODY!”
The woman vanished, and I was facing an empty corner. I whirled around, seeing her standing behind me. I was hysterical now, feeling violated in my own home. “You better get out of my house before I call the police!” I yelled.
As I shouted, I realized that the woman was shouting also. I stopped to listen to what she was saying.
“Get out of the house before the police—” The woman disappeared. Sunlight shone brightly through the backdoor where she had just been standing.
I stopped, stunned. Her words rang in my ears. Was the woman saying the same thing I was saying? Or had I only heard an echo? Was the woman my mother, or was she another “me”, a possible future “me”?
I dreamed I was driving down a shady curving road. The street sign read “Park Avenue,” and light music played. The car was a pearl gray Cadillac, and the houses on the street were new with well-manicured lawns. I turned a large curve to the right before turning into the brick-paved drive of the last house on the left.
The house was gray stucco, and daylilies lined the drive. I parked the Caddy and got out. Looking back at the street, I paused to watch two skunks and two opossums walking back the way I had driven. This struck me as odd, but I turned back to the house and walked along the brick patio to the back kitchen door.
I was home again. For a moment, feeling a bit like a stranger, I stood and stared at the doorknob.
This was my home, after all, I told myself, turning the knob and pushing the door open.
I walked in, and the house was filled with pleasantly loud, happy music, reminding me of the days when my brother and sister and I turned up the stereo while our parents were out. The music made chores go quickly, and as young teens, we didn’t mind having to shout over the sounds of Boston or some other favored rock group. I paused at the door. Someone was home, and I didn’t want to scare anyone.
The house was light and pleasant. I stood on a white vinyl floor in the breakfast. The adjacent living room was decorated neatly, but still looked “lived in”.
She wasn’t startled when she came down the hall, barefoot and wearing a loose dark blue dress. She had darker hair than I have, and she wasn’t much older than I am. She carried herself well, and my assessment of her was that she seemed very happy.
As soon as she saw me, she grabbed me up in her arms and held me close. She walked to a stack of stained glass pictures she had created, and she showed me what she had been doing. Orange, yellow, and red figurines danced on an indigo blue background. Written in cursive at the bottom was a phrase, and I made out the words, “My daughter.” She had taken several of the paintings and cut away the backgrounds, saving only the figurines, what she felt to be most important.
I held the figurine. Feeling her arm still gently resting on my shoulders, I had the overwhelming sensation of being where I belonged.