True Stories
That Changed My Life
My Lifelong Recurring Dream |
Welcome to MyStory! My Lifelong Dream By John of AllFaith © 1997 (last updated 01-17-2009)
When I was twelve years old I had a horrifying dream. I woke up in a cold sweat screaming. That year, and for the five or six years following, I had the same dream four or five times a year. Over the years the frequency and sense of realness of the dream has intensified. Whatever (if anything) this dream means, the time has come that I must try and make some sense out of it if I can. I can no longer shrug it off as just a weird and disturbing dream. For this reason, I offer the following. The dream never changes in any substantial respect. Minor "changes" have taken place but these seem to merely fill in some of the missing pieces as I remember and understand the dream in greater detail. For example I recount hearing someone chanting Kaddish at one point. For the first several years all I understood was that this person was reciting comforting prayers. Later, once I heard the Kaddish Prayers for the Dead, I recognized them as the prayers I had heard in the dream and therefore added the name of the prayer to this re-telling. There are a couple of such revisions. If I tried to rewrite the dream from my childhood point of view it would be less true to the dream than sharing it as it is now experienced. Besides, while I am presenting this for your consideration I'm also hoping that by sharing it my memories will be jogged and I will remember more of it. What follows then is a somewhat modified version of the dream as it is now experienced. The dream takes place in two distinct segments. For years I thought these were separate dreams but have now come to understand that there is a point in the dream where I often wake up (frequently in a cold sweat and sometimes crying out, kicking and shouting in a language I am told "sounds German"). Following that point there is a clear time break in the dream. This occurs after the hallway scene. Despite being raised a Baptist Christian, when I was first exposed to the idea of reincarnation/transmigration I readily accepted it because this "dream" has always seemed too real to be "just a dream." In other words, the intensity of the dream led me to accept the probability that reincarnation was real and that this "dream" was actually a past life memory that sometimes returns in my sleep. I eventually realized that to deny rebirth would be to deny what I inwardly know to be true. Such denial could not advance my spiritual advancement and realization. Today I am certain that we are all individual, eternally distinct living entities and that we all experience one eternal life manifested in countless life forms. Theologically the acceptance of this truth has at times been problematic for me. For instance, as a Christian I would read in the Scriptures that, "... it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment" and yet I knew I had lived before. Being convinced of this I had to assume that in the future I will doubtless live again. I also knew I was nothing special and so if this was true of me it must be true of everyone: WE are not these bodies. WE are eternal beings in temporary habiliments. While this realization provides much peace of mind, for many of us who grow up in religions that do not accept this it also raises many essential doctrinal questions. It is probably accurate to say that my AllFaith beliefs began with this realization. Since I knew I had lived before when my religion taught otherwise, I began to question all the things I had been taught and to delve into other religions seeking Truth. If this was "only a dream" then I'm at a complete loss to explain why it has so haunted me these 40 some odd years. I present this retelling here therefore without further explanation or apology. It is what is:My Lifelong Recurring Dream It is very dark. I am alone, terrified. Stray beams of yellow tainted light filter in through slats of wallboard once covered with stucco and from a broken window near the bottom of the rickety wooden stairs. The stench of urine permeates the hushed air. The slashing frigid air whistles in through the exposed slats running along the outside wall and mercilessly assaults my face. I seek to keep my head covered under what was once a jacket, but the stench is too intense, I must uncover my head and bear the assault of the urine-drenched stilettos of wind. At the top of the stairs huddled on the wooden landing and wrapped in rags and ancient yellowed newspapers we sought the escape of unconscious oblivion. I am not alone, yet I am... utterly alone. It had been months since any of us had known the simple bliss of real sleep. Each night we huddled together like mice on this landing hoping to renew our strength for the next day's tribulations and, most of all, to be safe. There is no time. There is only time. Endless, relentless time and yet whether it is dark or light outside it is always night and they are always feeding, feeding, and we are the vermin they most crave to fulfill their voracious appetites. I doze and soon awake as a knee jabs into my sore back. He grunts, I shift and doze again. Will this interminable night never end? It will. In the distance the sounds of scratching and whimpering and growling and barking drifts into our "Palace" -- that's what someone called our hallway and the name fits as well as any other I suppose, certainly better than words like "home." We have no homes. There is only the sound of the dogs searching, sniffing, scratching. My body emits a cold perspiration that soaks me to my very soul. I shiver, afraid to make a sound. Do I shiver due to the cold or the terror? Is there a difference? My companions begin to stir, some of them. Someone whispers, "You OK?" Pause, then, "Moshe!" Then nothing, except the dogs drawing ever closer. "Shh!" "He's gone," another voice, one of the Yeshiva teachers I believe though I can't be sure, whispers without emotion. People come and go in the Palace; mainly they go. Then the sound of many feet; running, growing louder, shuffling in the street below. I hear the shouts and commands of the soldiers. "I've always hated the Germans. They act so civilized, but they were not; at least not anymore" [this thought is in the dream. I include here for accuracy in the retelling, no offense is intended and I hope none is taken. It does not reflect my opinion today]. We drew closer together avoiding a shaft of light at the top of the stairs as though it were dangerous of itself -- I don't know why. The dogs drew closer as well. Their scratching and sniffing drives me mad! They bark too, fiercely, but it's the sniffing, the whining in frustration that they can not quite get to us vermin to eat us up that drives both them and me nearly insane. The sniffing, the whining and moaning; they drew closer and closer and my body shook despite my determination to "be a man." I was after all a man now! I was thirteen years old and my bar mitzvah was six months past. Yet I was terrified and silently I shook and cried and inwardly I screamed but no one heard me because I was a man and I held it all inside where only G-d could see and hear and I knew that G-d would forgive me if cried but still I would not...! At the door below us a fist suddenly banged like a machine gun: "Open up!" Bam, bam bam. What good was a door? Nothing could stop them! Our shivering ball of humanity tightened like a python too frightened to strike, knowing the danger is too great to acknowledge let alone resist [I think I owned a pet python in the times before]. The pounding fist of the soldier compelled us: "Open up in there!" His voice was odd. It was angry, even enraged, and yet it had a sense of resignation. There was a feeling that this was just another door in just another town in just another country behind which slithered ever more vermin without end to be exterminated. It was nothing personal... but then if we didn't exist his life would be easier so he continued his almost religious Gentile service to his god. There was an almost cannibalistic blood thirst in that gruff German voice -- and in the incessant whimpers of the dogs that served him for their own ends there was pure hunger. For the soldier there was a diabolical excitement like that of a priest in a mythical Kali temple preparing the ritual slaughter of the next young virgin. He was undeniably in a state of religious ecstasy to his god, Adolph Hitler. He would not be denied -- nor would the dogs sniffing below us. It is strange how contradictory feelings can sometimes merge and make insanity seem rational. To them it was just another day on earth, to us, just another day in hell. A darkened figure -- one of us -- struggled onto trembling legs and stepped over our pile of shivering flesh and toward the stairwell. No one said, "don't go," but we were all horrified by the prospect that he would! Yet there was no choice to do otherwise. They had come. The figure, I never knew his name, braced himself along the darkened stairwell wall with his grimy hands and hurried ever-so slowly down toward the door as best he could. The dogs were crazed now. They could smell the rotting stench of our flesh and could hardly bear the moments before the door would open and our emaciated flesh would be placed into their waiting mouths. "Open this door!" the soldier demanded just as it crashed in with a thundering splintering of wood, light and cold fire against the far wall. The madly flickering beams of their torches flooded the lower stairwell searchingly and lighted on the horrified face of the man who had gone down to grant them access. One of the dogs lurched towards him, its fangs long and sharp, but the beast was jerked back by a thick leather leash held by one of the soldiers with a tortured yelp. Our compatriot fell back against the wall, his arms flew up above his head in surrender as a single point of blood exploded from the center of his forehead and burst into the darkness, painting the filthy walls around him. The too-bright redness of his life glittered in the light of the open door and ran slowly down the walls. The soldier holstered his weapon and stepped toward us. Never close the doors I told myself: Never close the doors, and if you do, never ever open them again. They turned toward the stairs as if in slow motion, moving towards us. Perhaps due to the angle of the slanted ceiling or maybe due to my unwillingness to look up out of the fear that had already caused me to soil my sweat-drenched pants, but I only recall seeing their legs. Actually, I only recall their shiny black knee-high boots as they flowed up the stairs like a putrid nauseating black liquid making its way toward us in the dark. Their movements were highlighted by the flickering of the torches and doubtless disfigured by my own tears and the shouts of their harsh voices in a language I had often heard but understood little of. The air was thick as a rancid cockroach paste. The noise was tangible. The dogs remained outside in feral hysterics. They wanted inside in the worst possible way. In their struggles the beasts demanded the spoils of their successful quest: our flesh. One of them suddenly yelped loudly as though struck into silence by the crop of its handler, but for them I felt no sympathy: "There!" I silently screamed, "take that!" [I was doubtless nearing insanity.] Up the stairs the soldiers flowed toward us as we pressed back against the cold walls praying to disappear within them -- but this prayer too went unanswered. For a timeless moment I was aware of my heart beating but then suddenly it stopped. In that unending instant everything stopped: life itself simply stopped as we sat frozen as one in place as the tangible darkness flowed over us. My knees were firmly pressed against my chest. I stared forward vacuously at their boots, blacker than any night could possible be. I was mesmerized by the boots, or by their blackness that seemed to be somehow beyond this world; in that blackness that was... My weakened arms were locked tightly around people I didn't know who could not possibly help me but still I held tightly. I no longer cared to "act like a man." Tears flowed shamelessly if silently from my eyes now like a twin streams flowing toward a dead and wasted sea. I shook and whimpered silently, still not making a sound in the hope against all hopes that even now they might not see me, that I might somehow slip into the walls and cease to be. Then a sound, a glorious sound! Someone was quietly whispering Kaddish -- the prayer for the dead -- ever so softly and then sound returned to the world. The prayers comforted me. Our rabbi frequently talked about how our people have often had to die for being the Chosen of G-d. If this was our turn, it was good that someone was saying Kaddish. I sighed. I was jerked up roughly by the right arm. My left had clung tightly to the man huddled at my side but was easily disengaged. The yank was hard, my grip gave way and I was sent reeling to the right, toward the yawning stairwell. By instinct I grabbed for a soldier's arm to steady myself and...
I open my eyes. I am on a rough floor and I try to stand. I cannot. The world around me is "glitching" violently and the floor is not stable. I am jostled, shaken, cramped. I smell bodies: sweaty and bloodied and nasty. The sky is gray-green and weaving. I feel like I may vomit but I don't... [I am traveling, going somewhere, in a truck. I don't know where. There is blackness.] The pounding, repetitive noise is deafening and my head is throbbing. I am indoors and the extreme heat and billowing flames coming from the machines is overwhelming. My back aches in time with my throbbing head making my consciousness pure misery. Dante's Inferno -- a painting I recall from somewhere -- comes to mind. Am I in Hell? I look at my hands, at my arms. I am shirtless now and sweating profusely. My eyes are stinging as sweat drips into them and I shake my head in a useless attempt to expel the burning moisture from them because my hands are not free to do it. I note that my arms have become rather muscular -- I was always so scrawny. It is then that I realize that I am pushing a heavy cart filled with ... three or four intertwined ... wooden logs ... and then there are more logs and my cart suddenly has cords and cords of logs ... a mountain of wood and I am pushing the logs from one place to another in my pushcart and... ... I am pushing the logs to make the fires burn ever hotter ... except I know it isn't wood at all in my carts ... ... And everything is a daze of red and orange haze and pain and throbbing and vile filth and smoke and flesh-searing heat and death and... and logs...
There's a rusty gray steel desk and someone is seated behind it but of course you can't look at them. I stand before the desk staring at the floor, always at the floor. I don't know why I... am -- I'm confused. I don't know what it is but there is something I forgot or need to forget. Something about me. Something that I've done. Something horrible. Fool that I am for doing it! Or for not doing it! He demands to know but how I can tell him what I don't remember? What I wont remember! What have I forgotten! The man behind the desk demands to know. I feel ashamed, of what I don't know].
The sun is too bright. It beats upon my head and shoulders, blinds my eyes. In the distance are trees, a cool forest. Beneath their branches in the shade is a path. I look at the path. It's so lovely and so cool on the path. If only I could reach that path, I could run forever and ever and no one would ever see me again until I reached the Holy Land. But I cannot. Closer are the soldiers and they would not allow such freedom to anyone, especially one like me. I would only sully the path in the forest. I burned the logs! So many logs. My legs ache and tremble unsteadily. I glance down at my right foot; it is inflamed and swollen. My body has become so thin, thinner for I was never large. I notice without interest that am naked. My ribs are showing through my skin but I'm not hungry anymore. I don't deserve food. I have left such luxuries as hunger behind. There is no hunger in Zion. I am again aware of the path that I can not travel. I cautiously glance to my left and right, being careful not to move my throbbing head too quickly. They're still there: the soldiers. So many people standing in the sun: all naked in the burning sun: we're mainly men but there are a few women too, mainly old ones, someones grandmothers no doubt; I wonder if their loved ones know they are here... How long have we been standing here? I don't know. My body is coated brownish-red with dirt and my hands are stained with dried blood and mud. They burn fiercely but it doesn't really matter. Pain means you're still alive. How I wish I could run to that trail in the forest and never never stop until I get to the Holy Land. Surely the trail leads there... One of the soldiers lights a cigarette and another approaches him, he says something, takes an offered smoke. They both smile. 'How I wish I had a cigarette! Perhaps if I ask respectfully...' The one with the shiny cigarette case looks at me; nudges his comrade who also looks at me. I look quickly down, 'they can't see me, they can't see me' I affirm silently as the sweat in my eyes burns and drips to the loose dirt around my feet and I hold back the tears and force my knees to lock in place and not shake. Again, I will be a man. I will not cry. 'They can't see me. They can't see me...' There's something that I know I know... What is it? If only I could remember I could get away, but I cannot. For the life of me, I can't remember what it is. The memory tortures me... Eternity passes. The sun burns my blistered skin and I hazard a glance up toward the soldiers. The guards have moved on. No one is looking at me now. But then a hand grabs my lower arm momentarily and then releases: "Don't fall!" the voice whispers urgently. It sounds French maybe. It's the man to my left side. I look at him briefly and smile a nod of thanks. My foot feels like it's on fire I note clinically. I look down and see that it has turned purple. How odd, I think, a purple foot; I'm becoming delirious perhaps. How can a foot be purple? My head is throbbing; my gut is painful, empty. Empty like me. Looking beyond my purple foot, craning my neck a bit, I see the pit that lies below us all and it is then that I realize why I am so dirty and why my hands are bleeding and what I have done for them before and I know that I deserve this pit, not the path in the forest, never that... So I look forward at the beautiful cool forest, and then down again and silently, fearlessly I cry. No tears come, none remain to be shed, but inwardly I weep because I can not walk the path in the forest. In my mind I can hear something and I turn my consciousness toward it: its the man saying Kaddish in the stairwell. It's good someone is saying Kaddish. If only I could remember... but I cannot.
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