Pffftt!

Well, that was quick. I’ve had to cancel the Portuguese class. The textbook comes with a disk that unfortunately won’t play on my CD player. The files are in mp3 format. What’s that? Did I hear you ask why I didn’t try it on my computer? Excellent question! Here’s why.

What’s funny is that after I received my textbook last Saturday, I whipped out the CD to play while I was in the shower. It wouldn’t play. I just assumed that the CD was defective and had Amazon exchange it for a new book. When the new CD didn’t work, I knew something was wrong on my end.

I was disappointed but not beyond a feeling of “meh.” And as a new friend reminded me, the theme for this year was to CREATE.  I can’t help but wonder if I signed up for the class as a way to avoid those things I should be doing. Things work out the way they’re supposed to. This little incident served to put me back on the path I should be following.

I’m keeping the book, though.

In other news, thanks to a friend of mine, I’ve become a fan of the BBC program Doc Martin. (I’ve always been a sucker for a love story.) She’s addicted to the show and has been sharing clips with me for the last two weeks. Eight minutes here, nine minutes there and I was hooked. I finally watched a full episode last Saturday and I’ll watch it tonight.

Anyway, I’ve watched so much that it has infiltrated my subconscious. Here’s my dream Thursday night:

I’m at the airport that shows up frequently in my dreams. There’s an escalator that takes me up to the gate and I board. On the plane are two men I know but don’t know — a long-time British pen pal named Nick and a guy I met through Zaadz named Adie. There are just the three of us on the plane. I sit facing them, excited that I’m able to talk to them in person.

The flight is to go to Paris [this is the second time I've gone to France in one of my dreams; maybe the universe is trying to tell me something], but we stop through England to drop off Nick and Adie.

Once we drop off Nick and Adie, the plane takes off. It flies through the U.K. like a roller-coaster — sweeping up and down through the streets, occasionally making loops. I can see my feet flying through the open air, but I’m not afraid because I know I’m on a plane.

We start to approach the English countryside. The countryside of Jane Eyre. The villages of Port Wenn. I’m excited to see it, so I peer through the window. Below I see an overturned vehicle. It’s not a serious accident, but it’s an accident nonetheless. The pilot announces that we’re landing to offer assistance. So we land in the middle of the countryside. And while the pilot offers assistance, I and other passengers (who are there but not seen) traipse over to the nearby village.

There’s a general store. White board facade. Blue shutters. The sign has blue lettering to match. It looks like an old house transformed. I spend time browsing. After a while, it occurs to me that I haven’t seen other passengers in a long time. I go outside only to discover the plane is gone — they’ve gone without me.

The owners of the store are nice. They allow me to stay in the store overnight, until the next plane comes through the next day. There’s a place I can sleep, and I have food available. Late at night, I go outside to lie on the hillside. We’re so far away from city lights I can see virtually every star in the sky. The Milky Way. Nebulae. Meteors shooting through the night sky.

It is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. The sense of marvel, the sense of peace are unlike anything I’ve felt before. And it occurs to me that I could happily lie there forever.

I’m thankful for having had that dream because I received some sad news last night. I can’t tell you how many times in the last several hours I’ve returned to that hillside to recapture the bliss I felt there. (I’m not ready to write about it yet, mostly because I’ll start to cry again. Suffice it to say now that I’m OK — if heartbroken — and will get through this.)

And with that, I’ll close. I have some creatin’ to do.

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