Crying in dreams

Like most nights, I woke up around 4:00 a.m., stayed up for another couple of hours rolling around in bed, then finally fell back asleep around dawn. It was this three hour period of sleep where I had one of the most intense dreams I've had in a long time — months, if not at least a year or longer.

Dreams are fickle things... They're fleeting experiences that are hard to recapture or record the longer you go after you've experienced it. But what I do remember is sitting down at an upright piano, playing around with the keys like I normally do. Being untrained, I pick away at individual notes and try to build a chord from scratch and then move them around until I find something soothing. Except in this case, I was doing this for a few minutes and suddenly, I knew how to play. I was playing the most beautiful, ethereal stuff. I couldn't believe it.

And then when I turned around, I realized that I was visiting with my mom. It seemed like it must have been a holiday — perhaps Christmas or New Years. I can't remember what was said, if anything, but I remember being in her presence. It felt really nice and peaceful. My mom and I were often in conflict when we spent too much time together, but this experience felt very healing and peaceful.

Later at some point, I'm not sure when, I found myself at the house of a former music colleague and figurehead. I was there with another old friend—someone who walked away from this stuff as I did. We sat there together, chatting. Again, there was a reason to be there; some type of holiday. But just being there in my old friend's presence was very healing and nice.

Eventually, I found myself with my former bandmates. I believe we were practicing together. It was for the first time in 15 years. We were going to being playing a show. Suddenly, I found myself in the crowd at this show, watching the biggest band in the scene, playing on stage with countless people from the old days. There was almost a carnival feeling to it, with a marching band, drummers, strings, and horns.

I just felt so overwhelmed by everything that I burst into tears in my dream. When my alarm did finally go off, I struggled to wake up, but when I opened my eyes, I noticed they were wet. I guess I had also been crying in my sleep as well.