My Daughter Can Save Herself

 

Last night I dreamed that I was on a beautiful island somewhere in Tahiti. I was down on the beach which somehow was a level below the area where the hotel was. I felt like it was odd but, like so many times in my life, I just accepted it and enjoyed the beach. A woman came out of the very clear water holding a gigantic frog and gathered the attention of people on the beach, myself included.

As we all walked towards the watermelon-sized slippery, brown, and yellow-spotted creature I noticed in my peripheral vision a fog of gray coming down from above. At first, I thought it was fog but then I realized it was a very light falling of sand. Before I could connect the dots, my intuition told me to run. I ran to the right, towards the water. I could hear screaming and feel the rumble of the sand crashing all around me. In my dream, I was with my daughter and a few friends; I hoped they were safe but I had no idea where they were or how they would manage this catastrophe.

The next segment of my dream had me on an electric bike riding on an island road somewhere away from the beach. At some point, I realized that I needed to find my daughter so I turned around. I expected to see people panicking around me but everyone seemed normal. There were bikers and drivers and walkers on the road with me and everyone seemed content. No one was panicking like me.

At some point on my electric bike ride, I realized that I could go much faster and I would be able to get back to the beach, and to my daughter, much faster. I don’t like speed. I don’t like feeling out of control, so when my bike got too fast I tried to break. My brakes didn’t work so I put my feet on the road which had turned into orange clay. I dug my heels into the earth to slow my bike down and as I did my wallet flew out of the bike basket into a water-filled ravine. Now I was really in trouble.

I spoke to a man sitting by the ravine and he pointed to my wallet. It was way down and there was no way for me to retrieve it. The man seemed happy though and, laughing, he assured me that no one else would be able to get my license and identification because my wallet was so far down.

I got back on my bike and rode in the direction of our hotel. Now I was really worried about my daughter. Even though she’s sixteen, nearly an adult, I still worry about her. I will always worry about her. In my dream, I worried as I do in my waking life. Was she buried in sand? Frightened? Lost? Dead?

As I rode my bike, I passed through a town and slowed down. I realized that somehow through the chaos I still had my phone. I stopped my bike and pulled it out to call my daughter. I dialed and, as I waited, I looked to my right. There, sitting on a bench in a navy blue sweatshirt with wet, sandy hair was my daughter. I watched her reach down into her bag to answer her phone.

At the moment that she answered her phone she looked at me. We were so surprised, relieved, and happy to see each other. My daughter was okay. She’d survived. In my dream, I was overwrought with emotion to see her alive. But also, in my dream state, as I looked at my daughter sitting on the bench, I saw a competent, capable almost-adult, not a helpless, lost, child on the beach. While I ran in one direction during the landslide, she had run in another, making her own decision that resulted in her safety and survival.

Being a mother is a lifetime of wonder and worry. This week my daughter will be seventeen, almost an adult. Last week when I was out of town she stayed by herself for two nights. I was so worried. I worried someone would break into the house. I worried she would have a party. I worried someone would take advantage of her being alone. But she was okay. She was great. She loved it!

My daughter has a job. She drives a car. She navigates a whole world of school, friends, relationships, and struggles that are completely outside of me.

My dream is telling me, reminding me, that my daughter is okay; that all signs point to the fact that she will continue to be okay. That long electric bike ride out of town and back again is a metaphor for my worry. It symbolizes my fear that my daughter will not be okay in the big, bad world.

In my dream, my daughter survived. And in reality, she is surviving too. She is thriving.

A friend of mine says that her mother’s love language is worry. I think it might be mine too. But I would like it not to be. In my dream, in that moment where I saw my daughter on the bench, okay and alive, plotting her next move — where to go, what to do — I experienced a sense of wonder and awe.

Last night at dinner, after a cold, wet, soccer game in the rain, my daughter rattled on about a new club she’d joined at school, about the birthday dinner she was planning with her friends, about her plans to get more hours at work. Then we all did a crossword puzzle together. Dinner doesn’t always happen like this. Often my daughter barely speaks and when dinner is over she goes to her room.

But last night was one of those rare nights where my daughter let us see her in all her glory. She’s okay. I don’t need to worry so much. If there is a landslide, or a car accident, or a heartbreak, or an earthquake, I am not going to be the one to save my daughter. She’s going to save herself.