Island Of God

As promised, I tried to think of You as I slept. Amazingly, it worked.

The world was surreal and bright. The colors on everything from the trees, to the sand, to the water, seemed to have neon backlighting to make it glow. The air was cool and clear and fresh and…somehow different. It was better.

The ocean lapped gently at the shoreline, trying in vain to reach my toes and retreating each time with gurgles of frustration. The sand under my bare feet was warm and soft and inviting.

I stood. I looked. I breathed. I wondered.

Where was I?

I closed my eyes as I tilted my head back to let the sun warm my face. The grey tendrils of “reality” that were trying to remind me that it wasn’t real were burned away like withered strands of straw in the fury of a forest fire.

Suddenly something gripped my chest and squeezed. I looked down and saw two arms dressed in black, and the aroma that came with them announced the mysterious being gripping me from behind.

I turned and looked at You. There You stood looking back at me, just as beautiful as always and yet…different. There was something about You that wasn’t the same. It wasn’t a physical difference, and I stared as I tried to figure out what it was.

Then it hit me; You were free. I was free. And we were together.

The things in my peripheral vision began to get clear as I broke my stare and looked at the surroundings more closely. In a scene vaguely resembling an episode of Survivor, we were on the beach of an island. A forest covered the island to within a few hundred feet of the white sand of the beach, and nestled snugly amidst the palm trees was a house.

I couldn’t help but smile as You sat down in the sand, pulling me down with You, and put Your head on my shoulder as we began to talk. You didn’t find anything strange about the fact that we were alone on an island with a house on it. I tried to question the practicality of it but You just said, “This is how it is. We’re together, we’re happy. Don’t question it.”

I stared at You, a bit bewildered that You would tell me something like that. I was about to ask where we got our food from and where the electricity for the lights came from, but something on the water stopped me in mid-sentence.

In the distance, something was happening to the water. It looked like someone was taking a huge, invisible ball, and rolling it over the waves and flattening them like a moving crop-circle.

I thought it might be a mirage, and I began to stand up to get a better look, but You grabbed my arm and held me in place. “What IS that?” was all I could get out. You looked me straight in the eyes and whispered, “It’s God.”

One thought popped in my head…”What the hell?!”

The circle of calm on the water got closer and closer until it began flattening the sand as it got closer and closer to us, and eventually enveloped us. Suddenly, all apprehension was gone. All mystery was gone. All hate and bitterness and animosity and hurt were gone.

There we sat on an island on a perfect day, in the middle of nowhere and in the presence of a God that we couldn’t comprehend or understand…and it didn’t matter. The questions we had were either wiped away or were unimportant. We were content and everything was perfect as we just sat there with God, not saying a word and yet somehow knowing a million things.

All we could do was sit there and hold each other tighter and tighter as we were lost in the wonder of the situation. At that moment we were complete. At that moment we were one. At that moment we were alive.

Then there was a faint sound, a high pitched wailing that was still soft but growing steadily louder. The atmosphere began to change and the sky began to darken as I felt You melt away from my arms. It was a siren going by somewhere outside my house, and it was ripping me from a perfection I didn’t want to leave.

I was awake, but I refused to open my eyes. I wanted SO bad to fall back asleep and pick up where I left off, but my mind was racing.

What was all that about?

I really can’t explain it any better than I have, but it does absolutely no good to try and describe something that can only be experienced in a dream. Perhaps it really was just my brain sorting through my thoughts from yesterday, since I spent a good deal of time thinking about You and also a little thinking about God (although mostly just how church-people piss me off, which You know since we were talking about it). Or perhaps sometimes dreams really are more than just dreams, and maybe it was just something to let me know that, “Yes, everything will be okay.”

I’m not the kind of person who puts a lot of stock in things like that, but still…it will be nice if it really does all turn out okay. If someday we really are content. If someday all the shit that’s held us captive for so long fades away like an anchor being cut loose in the middle of the ocean, never to be found again. If we can just be together and always hold each other tight.

*
“Hideaway, take me now
I cannot face another round
And I’m flipping through the pages
For a name to take my place
Close my eyes, wish that I could find a space
To hideaway
Troubled days cloud my eyes
Stole the sun from my skies
And in this darkness I am tossing, turning
Lying wide awake
Hold my breath, wish that I could find a place
To hideaway
Hideaway, take me now
I cannot face another round.”
*
Fuel