We were in a car heading down from the mountains, my partner was driving. I was talking about the time we had just spent together and how much I had enjoyed it. I was noticing as I was speaking that he was driving a bit recklessly, but I didn’t think about it too much, in general he was a good driver. We crested the top of a gentle hill hugging the steep side of the mountain on our left. Suddenly the road made a sharp turn. He was going too fast and we veered towards the edge on our right. He couldn’t keep the car on the pavement; a couple of tires were now on the thin strip of dirt just before the drop-off. The remaining tires on the pavement squealed as he frantically braked and tried to correct our course. There were no railings on the side of the road, just a sharp drop to the canyon below. In a second, a second that seemed to last lifetimes we sailed off the edge. It was remarkably quiet after all the screeching… just the sound of the wind. I had a moment of crystal clear clarity that we were going to die and there was nothing we could do. Instead of terror I felt completely calm, totally serene and filled with gratitude, even happiness. I reached over and covered his hand with mine squeezing it gently.
As I turned to him I said, “It has been an honor and a pleasure going through this life with you… I’ll see you on the other side”.
As we flew down through the air our impending death seconds away, I flashed on my kitties back home, I felt a bit of regret, I will miss them, but it was ok. I was ready to go.
All this happened so fast, just milliseconds really.
Then, just like a butterfly we alighted on the top of a lower ridgeline. It was soft and spongy, thickly covered with some sort of rust and yellow color lichen. We had made it, we were ok. I got out of the car in shock, adjusting to the fact that I wasn’t dead. “I’ll be darned” I said looking around. The ridge we had landed on was tall, cut like a knife’s edge falling sharply down on either side. Below us was an almost prehistoric landscape. Jagged rocks, volcanic craters… a harsh primordial feeling. It was going to be a challenge to get off of here, and then what would we do? As I looked around to my left I noticed a small baby, a little girl maybe about 4 or 6 months old. She was dark skinned with tattoos on her face, must be from a local indigenous tribe I thought. She was so small and precious, all alone. I squatted down, getting close enough to look at her sweet face with the odd markings on it. Suddenly in a flash I understood that I was to raise her as my own. My heart flooded with love and gratitude. I was to have a child! At that point a matronly looking tribal woman came into sight as she climbed up over the ridge. She looked at us and then told me they had been listening to us, to the noise of our car, the sound of our tires squealing, the engine racing and then they heard nothing… just silence. She said they had been expecting a big boom or the sounds of a crash… but nothing… and now…
“Here you are!” she said with a smile.
As she said this she reached over and picked up the baby. I felt a pang of sadness that the baby belonged to her and was not meant for me after all.
I asked her “is she yours?”
She quickly replied “oh my no… I have many of my own. I was just picking her up.” I felt like she was modeling for me what to do.
At that point out in space a door opened up and another, younger tribal woman curiously looked out. She was in an office with an old rustic desk painted chartreuse green. As she stepped out of her office she reached over and took the baby. Again I felt like they were demonstrating to me what I was supposed to do. Both women also had tattoos on their faces, prominent among these was a dark line drawn horizontally across their forehead. They were adorned in beautiful ethnic jewelry and dressed in simple but rich clothes that bared much of their dark coffee-colored skin. I asked her how do we get out of here.
“Oh my, I don’t know. You would have to dream it. I have to dream it each time I come and go”.
These women were strong, powerful matriarchal women. I seemed to have before me the infant, the maiden and the crone, though the crone was just older, not withered and aged. They were beautiful in their knowing of themselves. I also felt that they had their feet both in my world as well as their own. Part of their work was to bridge the gap between our realities. They had such elegance and stature. Though surprised to see me, they were very warm and welcoming and quite delighted to have me there. They felt almost motherly and very much like family. My sense was that they represented story, embodied story. They were… Stories, many and varied like their children. This baby was to be mine. She was… Story. My job was to raise the baby, create the story, my story. These women were to help me do this.
My partner had been the “vehicle” that got me where I needed to be. As the women and I talked he gently faded into the background until I was left with only the women and the little one… and our stories.
The way in and out of here, this place, where they were, was to dream it.
This was how I got there in the first place, in my dreams… where I died to my old life and was reborn.
I wasn’t afraid to die and so I was able to find the dreamtime.
I have been living partially in this dreamtime for the last few years. Out of it has come immense healing… deep down bone level healing… and a few stories. I am finally emerging out of my dreamtime cocoon and wanting to share my stories with you. Welcome to my new blog and web site. I hope to meet you again here soon, for a cup of tea and another story.
Blessings, Love and Light to you,
Tricia
all images from Pinterest