"You aren't supposed to pick the flowers," she said to me. My ebullient and golden, near-perfect friend said something so strange to me.
"But you are. You ARE supposed to pick the flowers. Papa taught me to pick the flowers."
I was standing in her driveway having this conversation, looking down the gravel road at the fields of flowers.
And then I wasn't.
I was somewhere else staring ahead at the sidewalk in front of me.
There was a grey vertical cloud a bit of a distance away, almost planted on the sidewalk.
It began to take form, shifting itself, shifting itself, ethers into human.
Clearer and clearer.
He stood there with his white hat on, big as the benevolent, beneficent, broad and face-splitting glorious smile on his face.
He covered a mile in a moment.
He wrapped me up, a hug as deep as they come, the kind he'd always given me.
He poured his strength right into me, filling up my cracks, crevices and gaping holes, all of the dark and scary places.
I hung on for dear, sweet life.
I hung on to the shared, the remembering, the now, all that is good, all that is sacred.
And then, he was gone.
I woke up, I could not remember where I'd been.
I breathed, it was easier. I laid there, it was quieter. I looked at the day, I had enough courage.
I remembered.
Papa had come to visit.
He had shape-shifted ether to form.
He had heard my only call, the one a few weeks back when I had finally whispered to him, "I need you."
He had wrapped me up in the big "it came to pass it didn't come to stay" hug and made me right.
Like always.
Spirit world "come" home to me, a visit in the guise of a dream.
I do not have enough thank-you's.
Not this day, not any day.
There are never enough thank-you's for the love of this world, of the spheres and for the love that never ends.