Last night's dream

Last night I went to bed, as usual, and got under the covers. Most of the time when I go to bed I don't sleep right away. I have insomnia. But it's gotten better over the years. I would say I'm still a chicken in the dark. So, I sleep with a little night light. Okay, okay....

So I had this dream last night. My aunt, who lives in Long Island, lived in this house and finally bought a new one. This one was huge. A Cabin like look to it. She says, "I got tired of living in that house and on that block. I just wanted to get away to a place that was quiet." Where she lived was always quiet. Then over the years houses were built near by her, where once it was just a wooded area. My cousins and I use to play there alot. Pretend we were lost and monsters or bad people were after us. Sometimes when cars passed by us, we would run and hide.

So, my family and I are in her new house. There were some weird things going on inside the house. Sometimes it was creepy. Later on, my dad decided that we were going to go home. So I went upstairs to this room where my dad was saying goodbye to his aunt. He was kind of emotional as he hugged her and said good bye. Titi Jiya was her name and she was my father's and my aunt's aunt. She had been sick for a long time. She was lying on a bed that my dad called a crib. But it didn't look like a crib. He asked her if she was comfortable in the "crib" and she said yes. She said, she was small enough for it and besides, she felt good in it. My great aunt was a tiny woman. Maybe 5 feet tall. Or less. She started to talk about how my mother and I came to see her in the hospital and we got there late. But that was fine with her. So my father looks at me and says..."You got there late, huh?" Gives me his mean look. My dad always had that mean look. Even if I knew I did nothing wrong, he made me feel like I was guilty of something. So she gets up and walks over to me and sits by me. She said she wanted to go for a "walk." So we put on our jackets and went for a walk. We were now outside walking. She looked good. She had a long, knee length dark coat on and she walked tall and proud. I could almost feel the chill in the air as we took our walk together. It was nice. Then all of a sudden, as the sky turned grey, she started to feel sick and grabbed my arm. She slowly started to fall along side me as I grabbed her and she passed out. I took her over my shoulders as I held on to a stethoscope and ran to a near by hospital. Why I had a stethoscope in my right hand, I don't know. But I ran with her on my left shoulder, holding her and got to the hospital. That's the end of my dream with her. I woke up.

My aunt died last year in November. It will be a year since then. She was sick for a long time. We all wondered about her. So one day she went into the hospital and the doctor said she was very sick and was going to need her leg amputated or else she would get worse and die. The doctors went ahead and amputated her leg. After the surgery, the doctors said she was doing fine. How hard this must have been for her. I wondered how she would live with this. This was going to be hard for her to deal with. It would be for anyone. I thought that she would be depressed for a long time. A few days later, she died. My mother called me at work to tell me and I slammed my fist onto the desk and started to cry. "Dam it!" I said. I left work to see my parents.

I didn't think she could hold on. She had gone through so much over the years. It was enough. Maybe it was time for her. To put an end to all her suffering. So I told my mother about my dream and she told me to pray for her. So I did. I ask god to help her find her way to happiness in heaven. Shortly after that, as I started to write this, my bag of pretzels fell on to the floor, scareing me. I took that as a sign, since that bag was sitting there for two weeks well secured on the shelf.

Rest in peace Titi. I love you.