“He said ‘Keep the $3.55,’ because this triple latte was on him.”

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I had the most vivid dream last night, so much so that I had to sort out what was real and what wasn’t as I woke. As much as I dislike being so disoriented first thing in the morning, I really like dreams like that. It lets me know that my mind is working while I sleep.* The more vivid the dream, the more I like it. Does that sound strange?

Let me explain. (And yes, there’s a Jimmy Needham reference coming.)

In my thoughts and therefore in my speech, in order to explain things, I frequently use metaphors and similes. Sometimes the best way to concisely make a point is to explain it in terms of other things, and I’m all about being concise (this blog notwithstanding).

Also, sometimes I don’t like to talk and I’m just out of words.

So. When I think about the time since my Mom died, I think about it in terms of colors. I have described them as being dark months, weeks, years. And they were. But the days and weeks immediately following her death are colorless. They aren’t black or grey or whatever, but colorless.

In the song “The Great Love Story” Jimmy Needham sings a line that beautifully explains what I was feeling (and for the record, I’m about to take this line out of any kind of context the writer intended…just so you know). At the beginning of the second verse, he sings “colorless life, not even grey…” and when I heard it, I thought “THAT’S IT!” That’s exactly what I felt then, and didn’t know how to say it until now.

The shock of her death was so great and so deep that it’s like (simile!) the first instant after going over a big hill on a monster roller coaster: you’re actually free falling. The coaster makes no sound as the cars, for an instant, float above the track. All you can hear are the screams of the riders. Soon enough, gravity (grief) takes over and the coaster follows its course.

Those first few moments [read: days/weeks/months] after she died were just so damn shocking. I can’t think of another way to say it. I’ve written before that those were the easy days, before grief really and truly set in. It’s different for everyone of course, but for me, seven days out was a picnic compared to seven months out. Those days are the black ones, the-can’t-get-out-of-bed ones. Indeed, I remember very little of the two years following her death. I hear stories and see photos, but the memories are almost all manufactured through the telling of the stories and the viewing of the pictures.

As time marched on, because it must, color slowly crept back into the days. In fits and starts, it reappeared.

When I have super vivid dreams and I’m with my friends and people I love, even if the circumstances don’t quite make sense, that’s a sign to me of color returning. Vivid dreams are fuchsia and yellow and lime green coming back, as if for a visit.

One day, they will be back to stay.

*For all of you sleepologists, I know that anytime we are in REM sleep that we are likely dreaming and that just because I don’t remember my dreams from any given night doesn’t mean I’m not dreaming. Please don’t break my illustration down with your scientific…science.