Dream Journal - January 1989 - Warm Winds of Death

Last night I dreamed I was back in the military and things were not right with the world. I was part of a special forces unit that could come and go as they wished as missions allowed. I was trying to find my way home to my family before it was too late. Too late? Too late for what? All I knew was that time was running out and the sense of urgency was making my heart race in both the dream realm and in my physical body that was beginning to sweat between the thin sheets of my bedding.

I was hitching a ride on a train and watching the landscape speed by through an open boxcar door. I was dressed in camouflaged fatigues and when I removed my cap I saw it was a brown beret with a lightning bolt crest upon it. (Note to reader: This dream was unusual in the sense that at times I could see myself as if I were someone else observing me or as if I were watching a movie of myself. Other times I could only see my hands and such like “real life” or my “normal” dreams.) I had a standard Army-issue pack and wore a web belt with full gear attached. I won’t belabor the point of the accessories it held as they don’t play in this dream but the items were specific and detailed and odd. Odd in the point that I was unable to grasp why I would be wearing so much combat gear while traveling alone in obvious civilian surroundings to go “home”. For some reason I really remember the detail of my knife. It was the only weapon I had. A weapon I knew was pretty much useless for what I was facing.

I felt healthy and full of life, yet saddened. I observed that the land was dressed in the colors of Winter but it felt so much warmer and more humid than Winter should. Everything seemed parched and dead. I didn’t see any people at all as the train continued on its course. The train passed through a very large city filled with huge domes and spires but there was no traffic or pedestrians. All of the scenery appeared to be bathed in the light of dawn and that never changed no matter how many hours passed.

I noticed there was another soldier with me but i could only hear him and not see him. We talked softly to each other in a hushed tone about the apparent destruction that was becoming more obvious as the train moved on. The city of domes and spires had once been beautiful and the pride of its people. The domes were now covered with jagged cracks with large chunks missing. Bridges were partially destroyed and everything seemed to be covered in a gray powder.

“Neutron bomb?” I asked my unseen partner.

“I don’t think so, not enough residual radiation still in the air. Whatever it was it killed everyone and didn’t do a whole lot of structural damage.”

All of this was spoken in near whispers to my unseen comrade and I began feeling dread that I was already too late. Late for what, I still was not certain.

Suddenly, I was off the train and walking along the tracks carrying my pack at my left side. My traveling companion was not revealed to me as we parted company and he told me he would miss me. I think I was afraid or ashamed to look towards him and identify him. As assuredly as I knew he had been with me to that point I knew that he was now gone and I was alone.

I felt strong and fragments of memories started flitting through my brain. Memories of recent encounters with the “enemy”. Mental glimpses of fleeting images that I could not muster an emotion for.

I turned off the tracks and was walking down the street of an older suburban housing area that seemed to be located in the Mid-West or the South. There were telephone poles lining the street and all the lawns seemed to be well manicured even if the grass was gray and dead looking. I was on a sidewalk and turned onto a walkway leading to a home that had a large porch. I knew I had reached my destination.

I walked onto the porch and knocked on the screen door noting how nice the older home had been kept up during these troubling times. At that moment I actually had no idea who, if anyone, would answer the door but I seemed to intuit that I was indeed at the right address. I knocked again and the door started to open. I felt anticipation grow inside of me and heart beat even faster as the door opened and revealed K. (my ex-wife) peeking around its edge. I was surprised but not shocked. K. displayed a big smile and pushed the screen door open and invited me into the house.

I tossed my pack onto the living room floor and turned to her. She grabbed me and hugged me tightly. Not a wifely sort of hug but affectionate nonetheless. She was wearing blue jeans and a peasant blouse and appeared to be around her mid twenties. Was I also that age range? Don’t remember what I looked like on the damn train. Not important now.

I remembered we did not kiss and I was relieved that we didn’t though I felt myself becoming somewhat aroused. I’m not sure how but we were suddenly sitting on the couch and she was comfortably sitting on my lap. She asked me something about pictures but not sure what. S. (my daughter) walked into the room and said, “Hi” very matter of fact just as if I was always around. I asked her where her brother R. was and she said at a friend’s house. I told her to hurry and go get him and she promptly left out the front door.

I told K. I needed to call “work”. I eased her off my lap and onto the couch then reached to pick up the receiver of the phone. It was one of those old black heavy plastic phone with a rotary dial. The receiver was heavy in my hand. I dialed a number and put the receiver to my ear expecting to hear a ring but instead heard a shrill and wavering tone. I couldn’t figure out what it was at first and started to hang up but then suddenly realized that it was the “Warning”. I froze for a moment with the realization and then slammed down the receiver and turned to K.

“It’s happening,” I said with a dull lifeless sound to my voice. Her eyes widened in horror and my heart hammered harder in my chest. “I want to wake up now,” I said to myself. I didn’t.

We both ran outside in panic screaming for the children. She was calling for S. and I was calling for R. We ran down the steps to the walkway and onto the sidewalk then down to the street corner where a telephone pole stood all the while frantically calling for both the kids. I felt totally helpless. I didn’t see anyone else around as if we were the only ones left on earth. I called louder and louder and could hear my voice cracking from the strain. I could also hear my “real” voice croaking weakly trying to wake myself up. Neither of us (my dream self and my physical self) wanted to continue with this nightmare.

I noticed a deep wail of a distant siren and a calm feminine (yet robotic) voice issuing from hidden speakers all around us coolly counting down seconds. “Twenty… nineteen… eighteen… ” the disembodied voice chanted.

Suddenly, I heard R. calling me, “Daddy! Daddy!” I turned and saw him running down the sidewalk toward me with his little eight year old arms outstretched and terror in his eyes. Oh, the terror in those innocent boy eyes pleading for me to save him.

Then the soft, almost sexy, monotone female voice said, “Zero… Detonation.” With “detonation” you could hear the ‘kiss your ass goodbye’ smirk in her machine-produced soulless voice.

Silence. Time stopped. For everyone except me.

R. was frozen in mid stride. His look of absolute terror worn like a horrible mask upon his little face. He wasn’t moving and I couldn’t move toward him.

Silence.

I turned toward K. and pushed her to the ground while yelling for R. to lay down and close his eyes. I don’t know if he did or not. I don’t know where S. was. Time stopped for everyone.

The silence persisted and as I lay on the ground beside K. I knew I should close my eyes. But, just like Lot’s wife of the Bible I had to look toward where I knew the city was. The light of a thousand suns flared above the residential trees rapidly followed by a terrible earthshaking BOOM! that hurt my chest like a vice squeezing the life from me.

K. started to stand up because the light had faded fast but I pulled her back down almost forcibly explaining that the winds would be coming next. It was too late for R. and S. It was too late for all of us.

The winds would finish us. The winds would carry the invisible death to smother us. I was useless and helpless to do anything to save them or myself.

The wind began to blow warm against my face and I woke up gasping for breath with the sweat soaked sheets sticking to my nakedness.