A Vision

I had a vision once. I dreamed that I was standing in a lush redwood forest. It was quiet and still. The trees were beautiful and the air was fresh. I heard a noise and turned to see a man walk out from behind a tree some distance from me. As he walked toward me, I could see that he was dressed as a jester. His clothes were old and he wore a colorful but worn hat. At first I was frightened, but as he moved closer I could see that his eyes were kind. He walked right up to me and slowly put his face directly in front of mine - we were nose to nose. His face stretched into a wild smile.

Then, he reached his hand down to the ground and began to lift the grass up. It was as if reality itself was a curtain - the kind of curtain you would find on a big stage in a theater. The trees, the dirt, the ferns - everything around us began to lift up to reveal a blinding white light shining from beneath. As he lifted the curtain higher, the light grew and grew - until I realized that my eyes were actually beginning to open. I was starting to wake up from my dream. The light I saw shining beneath the curtain in my dream was actually sunlight streaming through a window in the room. The curtain that was being lifted was actually my eyelids beginning to open.

As my eyes fully opened, I heard the jester whisper in my ear, “Welcome to the show.”

And there I was, laying on a friend’s couch. My wife was sitting across from me, sunlight was streaming through the window and the birds outside sang their song.