Communicating Courage

My dreams for the past few weeks have been vivid and thought-provoking as usual, but I have had a difficult time finding time to write about them because I have been training an intern fresh out of high school and scrambling to get my own work done before taking Friday the 13th off to spend with Anthony.

Last friday, Anthony I went to the Hummingbird Inn in Ojai and enjoyed a leisurely swim and a Mexican dinner replete with Agave wine. It was very relaxing and an excellent bonding experience. On Saturday we drove to a couple of our favorite wineries for wine tasting and picnicking. We sat in the grass and rejoiced in the savory delights of Trader Joe's mustard, goat cheese, poppy seed crackers, fresh ripe peaches, apricots, grapes, Greek salad, gourmet peanut butter cups, and salami sandwiches. Yum. We also spent the remainder of the weekend lounging about watching "Minority Report", "The Zodiac", and "The Beach". To top off the weekend we spent Sunday night celebrating Susan's and Avi's one year wedding anniversary with wine and a replica of the top tier of their wedding cake.

Monday I went back to work to face a growing list of tickets to complete and almost two hours of the phone ringing off of the hook because we had a companywide Outlook and Intranet outage. I just about lost my mind. Thankfully, after I left work, the day lifted with a fun outing with my roommate. We perused funky clothes, interesting books and ate delicious sushi.

Last night I went to bed exhausted, but satisfied. These feelings surely led me into a very strange dream that said a great deal about facing my fears with courage and decreased worry. In one frame my older brother found a spider the size of my forearm chilling by the head of my bed. It was black and furry. It's size meant nothing of its character. It was as docile as an old feline. Adrian held the arachnid in his hand belly-up and it looked up at us with several serene glossy eyes. My brother, my cousin Samantha and I stood around and chatted about our find like we were talking about an episode of The Cosby Show. "Way back when..."

I walked out of the room and bumped into a crying woman. As she lifted her head I instantly recognized her as Sarah Silverman. She immediately began to unleash stories of people close her passing away. I gave her a hug and she thanked me.

I left her and walked through a crowded room with familiar faces and heard their thoughts. I felt like the sun surrounded by sunbathers. They all stood at a safe distance as I elevated their spirits with my mere presence. I radiated warmth and power because I was happy and smiling. I was thinking about these fears I had just faced and I was gleeful that they were as docile as kittens.

If I spell this out for you maybe you will understand what I mean. A fear can be obvious like arachniphobia, but the real fears that one faces can be more subtle like being in the same place with people you know and communicating courage without a word.