More Evidence for My Insanity Plea: Premonitions

Look, I'm not saying I'm clairvoyant or anything.

What I am saying is that sometimes I have dreams, and they come true. My grandmother was known to read tea leaves and, by all accounts, was quite accurate.

Most of the time, I don't actually remember the particulars of a "seeing" dream until I'm in the middle of the situation the dream foretold. I'll be having a conversation with someone and realize I've had the exact same conversation before - in my dream. It's a weird déjà vu-like thing that's happened to me since I was a kid, and I've learned to mostly ignore it.

Sometimes, though, I have dreams that I do remember, and they seem like things that COULD happen in the future.

Last night, I dreamed that for some reason, Mr. Wright and I were in separate cars before we went to the airport to fly out to Japan. He was one place, and I was another. We were both engaged in last-minute activities (I was dropping the toddlers off to stay with their brother, Omri, and his family; I have no idea what Mr. Wright was doing) that needed to be tended to before the flight.

We were not close to one another in distance or driving time, by the way.

Upon arriving at Omri's house, I discovered that the bags I'd packed for the girls were, in fact, in Mr. Wright's vehicle. Checking the time, I realized there was no possible way to wait for him to drive them over. I called his cell, and he said he'd drop the bags off with a relative, who would deliver the bags to Omri's house.

The next thing I remember is meeting Mr. Wright at the airport. Only then did we realize that we'd left my bags in Mr. Wright's car - where he parked it, OVER HALF AN HOUR AWAY. That meant an hour, round-trip, to retrieve my bags. Oh, and we'd miss our flight, of course.

When I woke up, I pushed the dream out of my mind. How silly! Of course, we'd be in the same car. We wouldn't get separated, so there was no danger of bags being in the wrong place... unless we actually forgot to put them in the car to begin with.

What a relief!

So... I just got a call from Mr. Wright. "Listen," he said, "I have to take the displays for the home show over to my brother, so I'll drive the SUV on Monday, and you can take the girls to Omri's in the sedan. We'll leave the SUV at my brother's house, and we can meet up..."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" I screamed, not letting him finish. "Trust me. I KNOW how that idea will turn out."

We've formulated another plan: I'll follow him to his brother's house, then we'll go to Omri's together.

Do you have any "gifts" for seeing things before they happen? Tell me all about it, so I won't feel like such a freak.



Photo credits:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/44835687@N05/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lopolis/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Sometimes, I'm the One Who Sucks

When I auditioned for Crimes of the Heart, I sort of secretly hoped I wouldn't get cast.

It sounds awful, I know, but I really have a lot going on. I kept thinking about the seven kids who needed help with homework, rides to and from therapy appointments, a mama to cook dinner for them and make sure they got their teeth brushed at bedtime. I stressed over the rehearsal schedule, my column deadlines, publication dates for my magazine, Library Board meetings, Friends of the Library meetings... It was all too much.

When I got the call from our amazing director, asking me to take the part of Lenny, I called Mr. Wright... in tears. "How can I take this part? Who will feed the kids? How will I ever find time to learn my lines?" I wailed.

"It will be fine," he soothed. "I can cook, you know... and I'll help you learn your lines. I'll run lines with you. Take the part!"

Mr. Wright and I both have a history in theater. He knows as well as I do the commitment involved in a show, and yet he was reassuring me, encouraging me to return to the stage. Feeling better, I accepted the role.

After the first couple of read-throughs, I was serious about learning my lines. I brought my script home after rehearsal and handed it to him. "I'm ready. Run lines with me," I insisted. Ever supportive, an exhausted Mr. Wright took the book, opened it, began reading (to my delight, with different voices for each character), and... promptly fell asleep halfway through the first scene.

It wasn't an isolated incident. As it turns out, Beth Henley's script is the answer to any sort of insomnia problem my husband may have had. It never failed. He'd open the book, and within the first five pages, would fall dead asleep in an inexplicable fit of narcolepsy. As a result, I learned my first five lines really, really well... The others? Not so much.

It was frustrating, to say the least. With ten days until opening night, after a particularly horrid rehearsal that had me dropping lines throughout the show like proverbial hot potatoes, I called Mr. Wright on the way home from rehearsal. "You've failed me," I announced. "I don't know my lines, and I'm pretty sure it's your fault. You said you'd help me, but you don't! You fall asleep every time I need to run lines, and..." On and on it went, for the entire twenty minute drive home.

As I pulled into the driveway, my much-berated husband met me with a hug. "I'm sorry. I will help you run lines tonight. I've made a whole pot of coffee, and I'll drink the whole thing if that's what it takes to stay awake and help you." He put his arm around me and walked me into the house. "I'm serious. I'll stay up with you for as long as it takes. Now, where's your script?"

Backstage at the Performing Arts Center, of course. Oops.

Last night was particularly grueling - the first night of Hell Week. Again, I arrived home from rehearsal in a state of irritation at forgotten lines. Miraculously, I remembered to bring my script home. "I've been waiting for you to get home, so I could help you run lines," Mr. Wright offered.

He was good. He was so good! He ran every single scene with me, right up until...

Losing It

It will come as no surprise to me when I wake up one morning to find our laptop computer, our Ford Expedition, and every piece of identification my family owns have been stolen in one fell swoop. It’s a loss just waiting to happen, and there is nothing I can do about it.

We live in a technological void. No high-speed cable. No DSL. No fiber optics (“coming soon,” they tell us). The lovely little store on the hill provides wireless access to guests who sit on their wide porch with an espresso or hot fresh apple cider, and Mr. Wright brings his laptop home from the office every night; in case the children need to do homework research online.

After several morning-hustle incidents that resulted in Mr. Wright getting to work without his computer, the designated home for the machine is now in the back of the Expedition. So what if our tax and business records are on the hard drive? Some things are more important than security – like getting to work with necessary equipment.

My family is genetically programmed to lose keys. The house-locking ritual is easy enough, but requires a stringent amount of breaking and entering to unlock, because we don’t often know where the key is. We had a locking mailbox, until Mr. Wright had to bust the lock off to retrieve three weeks of mail after the key was lost. The key to the Expedition, too, serves as the source of much grief. Many frantic searches for said key have been conducted while calling Snugglebug’s therapy center to tell them she would be missing group therapy, because I lost my keys. Again.

Now, we keep the key to the Expedition in the cup holder. In the Expedition. That worked until Pepper got something out of the car, then locked it. “What were you thinking?” I shrieked. “You locked the car?” Poor Pepper. She just wanted to make sure a minimum level of security was in place. I apologized for yelling at her, while I called Curlytop’s physical therapist to report we would be missing her appointment. Again.

The Ford dealership made me a key that will open the door, but not start the car. The “spare” key is now duct taped in an inconspicuous place outside the vehicle. Should any diligent thief choose to locate the spare key, he should have no problem driving away with the ignition key found in the cup holder.

Our family loves British Columbia. The first time we planned a “run for the border,” I crashed through the house, looking for birth certificates, and came up with maybe three for our family of nine. “No problem,” I reasoned. “I’ll go to the Department of Health and order new ones!” We got over the border with no problem. By the time we planned our next trip, I’d lost four birth certificates. Once again, I ordered new ones, and declared they would never again leave the glove box.

My older kids sometimes worry – as I toss the car key into the cup holder and step over the laptop to unbuckle the babies – that someone will steal our car and, by extension, our identities. Scrutinizing the floor littered with soccer shin guards, wrestling shoes, volleyball pads, football cleats, two Tickle-Me Elmos, my bag of materials for the journalism class I teach and two sippy cups, I realize our identities really are in this car.

I assure them, “No one would take our car, darlings – they’d have to clean it.”