+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I was looking for something a friend had asked me for today and found, in a very unlikely place, an envelope that included my first grade picture, first grade report card, second grade report card and others.  Against my own wishes, I scanned them in and post the links to them here.  I really can’t say at this moment what the point of this even is.

What I did discover, as mentioned in the link for my first grade report card, is that I was absent 23 days in my first grade year of school.  I was not a sickly child, and even if I had missed a few days here and there for normal childhood sicknesses, 23 is a lot of days.

What is confirmed for me here is that my mother kept me out of school throughout my childhood on occasions when she was in a beating, abusive frenzy.  Part of me says today, “Well, I don’t want to even know that little girl.  I don’t want to know anything about her.  She was not me.”

Yes, she was me.  Yes, I am she.  Obviously what she/me experienced is what this blog is about.  But I don’t want to think about any of it today.  Not one single part of it except to scan in this information and post the links.  Not particularly helpful to anyone, I don’t expect, but it will have to do.

++++

The other thing that’s been on my mind today was a dream I had last night that I actually remembered having this morning when I woke up.  I died in my dream last night.  I don’t remember how I died, or the actual dying itself.  But first in the dream I was alive, and then later in the dream I was dead.

I find it interesting that the whole dream took place at the home of the woman who found my mother dying in her shabby motel room in 2002.  This woman, I call JV, first met and befriended my mother when we moved to Alaska in 1957, and was the only person that maintained a relationship/friendship with my mother over all those years.

JV was strong enough in some unusual way to stay my mother’s friend for 45 years.  In my dream I was with a group of friends and family at JV’s house when I died.  Nobody could see me then but her.  I could see everyone else.  JV didn’t act like anything had changed, even though I knew she knew I was dead.  I’m not going to worry about the ‘meaning’ of the dream — just having it and remembering it is unsettling and strange enough.

So for now, I will go do my 45 minute walk-jog and then do simple things, like eat supper.  I wish everyone well — and I’ll be back here perhaps more chipper tomorrow.  (PS – I hit ‘publish’ for this post and my Firefox crashed.  Glad it saved the post FIRST!)

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

*Age 5 – kindergarten 1956-57

*Age 6 – 1st grade report card 1957-58

*Age 7 – 1958-59 2nd grade report card

*Age 9 – 1960-61 4th grade report card

*Age 10 – 5th grade 1961-62

*Age 11 1962-63 6th grade class picture

*Age 11 – 1962-63 6th grade report card

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Well, this does come to mind:

I used to remember my dreams.  Now I remember remembering the dreams.

Years ago I belonged to a circle of women who met with the elder Grandmothers to learn about teachings.  One time I traveled to a Canadian reserve with some of these women to visit our Grandmother elder, Mary.  I brought Mary some tobacco so I could ask her about a dream I had a few days before.

Mary accepted my tobacco.  She sat across the living room from me on her couch, staring down at her shoes while I talked.  I told her my dream about the group of Native American men that stood talking among themselves on the sidewalk across the street from where I stood talking with a group of women.

Suddenly I looked down at my palms and saw each of them had a hole in it I could see through.  Shocked, I turned to my friends and showed the women, “What happened to me?” I asked them.  “What can we do about this?”

None of the women had a clue.  As I looked up I saw the most handsome young man with long black hair glistening down his back crossing the street toward me, looking straight into my eyes.  When he reached me he gently took each of my hands into his, one at a time, raised them to his lips and blew his breath through each hole, never taking his eyes off of mine.

When he released my hands, the holes were gone, and the man turned and sauntered back across the street without saying a word.  Oh, I was in LOVE!  I wanted to follow him more than anything, but the women restrained me.

“Oh, no, Linda, you can’t go where the men are.  The men have men things they have to do.  We women have our women things we have to take care of.  Stay here.  You cannot go to be with that man.  Leave that man alone.”

So, I didn’t follow him.  I dutifully stayed with the women, glancing across the street now and then, until finally I saw him get into his car and leave.

++

At no time while I was telling Grandmother Mary about this dream did she move a muscle.  She did not look at me for a few minutes after I had stopped talking, either.  I sat, barely breathing, waiting for her profound interpretation of what this dream might mean.  Finally, Mary shifted her weight, turned toward me and said with the straightest of faces, “Well, honey, all I can tell you is this.  Next time you have that dream about that man, you call me.  I’ll help you get into his trunk.”

The whole room lit up with her laughter.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++