Dreamland

There was a time in my life when mornings had a shape.

They began at 5 AM, without negotiation. The world was quiet, as if it had not yet decided what kind of day it wanted to be. I would lace up my shoes and run two miles around the lake, the water still and patient, holding the early light like a secret. Then back to my apartment, onto my bike, five miles across town to a swimming pool that always smelled faintly of chlorine and determination. An hour of swimming. Then work.

It sounds ambitious now. At the time, it felt… natural.

I never questioned it. I never resisted it. The routine held me, like a steady current. All I had to do was move with it.

Later, on the East Coast, I recreated something similar. No bike this time, just long walks that carried me from one obligation to the next. That rhythm lasted two years. It quietly saw me through graduation, like a reliable friend who never asked for recognition.

Then life shifted, as it does.

Terry and I moved to this high desert town, where the air is thinner and the sky seems to go on forever. I arrived with the same quiet intention. A routine would take root here too, I thought. It only made sense.

On my first visit to the swimming pool, I found the doors closed. A sign explained that someone had contaminated the water with an illness. The pool would be shut down for weeks.

I stood there for a moment, reading the notice twice, as if it might change its mind.

It did not.

And that was that. The routine never began. Life, apparently, had other plans.

I still miss swimming.

The body remembers what it once loved. Even when the mind moves on.

A couple of nights ago, something curious happened.

I dreamed.

Terry and I were in our home, though it was not quite our home. There were people everywhere. Strangers, mostly. And in the center of our living room, as if it had always belonged there, was a large swimming pool.

Not just a pool. A whole small world.

There was a walkway around it, and in one corner, something like a beach. Children played there, their laughter bright and easy. The water was clear, almost impossibly so, yet I could not tell how deep it went. People reached into it and pulled out fish. Others brought up antiques, as if the bottom held pieces of forgotten history.

It felt busy, alive, slightly absurd.

We could not find Jolie.

Terry, calm as ever, said, “She is a smart girl. She will find her way back.” He spoke of her as if she had simply stepped out for an errand.

I was less convinced.

I kept searching, growing more concerned by the minute. “She will be late for school,” I said, which made perfect sense at the time.

Then I woke up.

Or so I thought.

Last night, the dream continued, as if someone had pressed pause and then play.

This time, it was just the three of us. The house was quiet. The pool remained.

Terry was already in the water, swimming with the kind of ease that suggests he had been there all along. Out of nowhere, Jolie leaped in, confident and joyful. I followed.

It felt wonderful.

We swam. We laughed. Then, without question, we found ourselves on a small island in the middle of the pool, cooking. Not simple cooking. A feast. Food appeared as if it had been waiting for us. We ate and ate, yet never felt full.

There was no urgency. No schedule.

Just presence.

Then Jolie looked up and said, “Mommy, look!”

I did.

Terry and Jolie turned toward me, smiling with great satisfaction. And in perfect, synchronized timing, they both burped. Loudly. Directly into my face.

So loud that I woke up for real.

I lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling, somewhere between amusement and disbelief.

Well.

If there is a message in all this, I suspect it is not about discipline or lost routines. Perhaps it is something simpler.

Life changes its shape.

Sometimes it takes away the pool. Sometimes it puts one in your living room.

And sometimes, if you are very lucky, it gives you a moment where nothing makes sense, everyone is laughing, and you are exactly where you need to be.

Even if it ends with a burp.