Where you stumble and fall there you will find the gold.

Sam Keen

I AM A RHINOCEROS

To dream that you see a rhinoceros, foretells you will have a great loss threatening you, and that you will have secret troubles. To kill one, shows that you will bravely overcome obstacles.

The nature of the rhinoceros is to be alone, walk alone, live alone, intent on its own affairs and more or less oblivious of what does not concern these.

__________ __________ __________

Last night I dreamed of my father. I have not dreamed of him since the week of his death three years ago.

I tried to follow the jumbled pieces of the dream and I finally allowed myself to just be a spectator. I was working in a school, preparing a classroom. The setting changed to the Leatherwood United Methodist Church in the Land Between the Lakes area where my father grew up as a boy. I was sitting in a pew on the right side of the church with my daughter and sisters and we were watching the tragic comedy of his wedding to his third wife Annie unfold. She looked grotesque, she was wearing an overdone wedding gown too young for someone her age to wear and her face was painted with Tammy Faye Baker makeup that was running down her face. The acolytes were friends of theirs. They were drunk and promptly fainted with the backs to the altar. One was holding a large gold cross, the other a candle snifter. I remember thinking how inappropriate the whole affair was when sensing this my father turned to us. He looked like Orson Welles in "Citizen Kane" and he addressed us by succintly stating "I am a rhinocerous." I heard him say it twice.

I woke up confused. I was relieved that I was able to dream about him again. Since he died I feel like I haven't been able to fully accept his death. In the beginning this feeling was unpalpable as if his dying was yet another long absence from my life that I had experienced since childhood. As I drove into work, I realized that this dream was not about my father but something my psyche was trying to communicate to me. My father had merely been the messenger. I went to a dream interpretation site and typed in rhinoceros. I gasped when I read it's interpretation. No mistruths lie between me and my psyche.

I do have issues troubling me. I find myself in legal limbo in this never ending custody case involving my daughter. I have this unrealistic fear and anxiety that the police are going to pull up at my doorstep and take her away or serve me with legal papers. I keep my blinds closed and the sunshine and unknown intruders out. He has caused me to live in fear again. And yes, I want to kill that fear and overcome this obstacle. He has threatened to take away the one thing I treasure most. I know it's unrealistic. I know his words are false. I can't voice these fears to anyone and make them understand.

Right now I walk alone.

I am a rhinoceros.

Nightmare in Shining Armor

He left a message on my cell phone.
His tone acidic.
More threatening, ugly words.
Venom spewing.
Spoken solely to cause intentional hurt.
Attack her weakness, he thought.
Try to scare her and inflict more pain.
He would always say to me...
"The Opposite of Love is Hate."
He meant all these words as a threat.
It was all he ever did.
Threat, threat, threat.
Bully, bully, bully.
Brag, brag, brag.
He told me he was getting married.
To a woman with 4 kids.
She would be our daughter's mother he said.
They would be her brother and sisters.
Our daughter would be flower girl at their wedding.
I was not invited.
As if I would want to witness another unsuspecting woman walk onto his battlefield.
I feel euphoric. Please make it to the altar.
What's "The Opposite of Indifference?"
The target will slowly be moved from my forehead.
Onto hers.
A heavy burden is lifting.
The fog is slowly fading away.
I'm finally awakening.
He will become someone else's worst nightmare.
A nightmare in shining armor.


He was never patient. Never kind.
He was envious. He would always boast.
He was proud. He was rude.
He was self-seeking. Always angry.
He kept records of my wrongs.
He is evil. He speaks no truth.
He never protected me from himself.
He never trusted me. I lost my hope.
He did not persevere.
Love can fail.

When I left him I gained back the three that will forever remain: faith, hope and love.

Because the greatest of these is love.

He will never take that away from me. No one will. Ever. Again.