"Life Boat"

Last night I had a dream that my husband and I were fishermen. We had a boat and every day we went out on the water and we fished. We even sported those long yellow slickers that were spotted with disgusting and smelly rotten fish guts.

Just describing it right now as I type on my trusty iPhone, I can smell that rank fish smell that was so obtrusive to my senses in my dream.

But, we were fisherman, and we absolutely loved being out on the waters, together, everyday... Even if it was choppy and black on some days, even if it was so foggy you couldn't see your hand in front of your face - as long as we sensed the other one was near, we were just fine and perfectly content.

But, not all days were bad and smelly. Some were absolutely crystal clear with smooth waters and blue skies with nice tans and sassy swim suits. That's after the boat had morphed into a large and expensive yacht, of course.

Now, obviously, I was not having this dream simply because I adore the water and love to fish. If you know me, you know that it is QUITE the opposite. I am not a "water person," in the least. And I also have absolutely no interest in fishing.

In my dream, it seemed as if we had lived twenty-three years on that boat. We had encountered many "episodes" of close calls with a man overboard. One of us would fall off the side of the boat (or jumped) while the other one struggled to pull them back in.

Or sometimes one of us would spend most of the time on the opposite side of the boat than the other, and the other would wonder around the boat desperately seeking our mate... Knowing they had to just be a fingertip away, but the fog was just too thick to find them. And who was in which position flip flopped from one to the other.

This would go on for some time on occasions before we both ended up back on deck together.

Of course, it all has meaning. Water generally symbolizes "life" when it comes to dreams. And everything in the dream was pretty much right on the money if you were comparing it to all twenty-three years that we've been together.

But, wait...  Suddenly, another has come onto this "life boat" of ours... We have a 3rd mate on deck now and it is our son, Jeffrey, who recently turned 18 and graduated high school.

It appears that since he's now eighteen and out of school, we have asked... Insisted?.... forced Jeffrey to join the fisherman livelihood that we had elected for ourselves so many years before.

And what happened to Jeffrey on his first day onboard? A shark bit his hand right off. We wrapped up his stump arm and pretty much said, "Yep, so there ya go." We didn't even seek medical attention for him.

But, by the end of the dream, his hand had grown back... all by itself.