I was lying on a table in a morgue and there was golden light all around me. The table was an electromotion conserve autopsy, electric corpse dissection morgue table, but it wasn’t cold or uncomfortable. One of my good friends stood next to me smiling, glowing, her shining blonde California hair bouncing as she spoke.
“Everyone will know you have excellent taste in clothing. I’ll put your beautiful shoes on you and make sure you look exquisite.”
I smiled back at her, basking in her care and love, unworried and at peace in a sort of resigning way. A presence was nearby, a male presence, but I didn’t see his face. He was the doctor, the minister, the mortician, the father, authoritative but kindly; a guide, of sorts, but not a guru. His presence was assuring, I suppose. And then suddenly I was walking in a small city garden restive and lovely.
I spoke aloud, “Can I be buried here?” A voice answered, “There’s no room here.”
Then I was quickly back on the comfy morgue table being given a shot of morphine by the male presence. My friend was gone and I went to sleep for a long time. When I woke up, I got off the dissecting corpse table and looked into a mirror very closely and saw myself changed. I was me, but someone else, too.
“Am I going to live?” I asked the presence.
“It could be,” he said casually.
“A miracle, then?
“Perhaps.”
I woke from the dream and it has clung to me for days. It comes at a time when my favorite pair of shoes has worn out and I need to give up on re-soling. But it’s re-souling that’s happening, this dissecting knife cutting away wounds from long ago, ones that I had bandaged up tightly so there would be no exposure. I kept them hidden from sight, like the scars I have on my stomach that I have made sure no-one would ever see. I’ve never had a dream like this, but I have been on this dissecting table before. Something within dies, something like joy, peace, or confidence…you name it, it happens to all of us. And if we don’t get on the table from time to time, there is no breaking through the winter soil of ourselves. I peeked at the daffodil shoots standing straight and green and thought I heard them say, “Whew, we made it!”
It is the season for rising, for transformation, for waking up and coming home to ourselves yet again. May there be many Easters in our lives!