Dear whoever, I just awoke from a most reassuring dream!
Here it is:
I saw mother sitting in her chair by a closed door. She was obscured by a shadow but I knew her by the familiar shape of her posture. The door was quite ordinary- the sort that gets you from one room to the next.
There was bright light beaming from behind through the cracks of the jamb.
My spirit suddenly shifted to inhabit her body and I began see through her eyes.
I opened the door and was surprised to find a garden of unparalleled beauty outstretched before me.
Really, words can not describe the scene. The garden reached endlessly toward the horizon and it was so lush and vibrant and humid. The light and the heat came not from a sun, but radiated from a powerful unseen force.
A few yards away from where I stood, in the center of a small clearing, was the strangest tree.
It was really more of a fantastical trunk, roughly six feet in height. I was compelled to walk toward it and I did so with slight trepidation, for its strong pull frightened me.
As I got closer, I could see that it was not like the trees we know in our waking life.
The "bark" appeared to be flesh like...how can I describe it better...it seemed alive almost.
Not in the way all trees live but as if it were imbued with a sort of human quality.
I felt it safe to touch, discovering it was warm and pulsating with movement.
A sharp feeling of despair rushed through my body when I was struck with the knowledge that the tree was in the process of dying. It wanted me to know that it was once a thing of magnificence, tall and proud.
The tree was visibly wasting away and I was increasingly becoming paralyzed with sadness.
But then something happened!
Right before my eyes, two new branches began to grow from the decaying trunk.
The defiant branches swirled upward, green and strong. A heart-sized leaf unfurled from the end of each appendage. My fear and sadness dissipated instantly and I stood there in the hot, bright light weeping with joy.
I woke up abruptly, clutching my chest.
It felt more of a vision than a dream, with meaning so clear it would insult the subconscious to dissect it here.