The Joyful Dream of June 22nd

Now, this dream was a joyful experience for a few reasons - first of all, it was the first dream that I've had for about 2 months that I can remember in depth; as you've probably noticed, it has been several months since I've reported a dream on here at all, so this is big news (though not surprising, given that last summer yielded a greater amount of dreams than the previous school year as well). It was secondly a joyful experience because it was one of those dreams where you wake up feeling inexplicably cheerful and full of good will, even if the dream itself wasn't entirely cheerful. Finally, it was a cheerful dream because it was very artful, and most of the people in the dream (one could say) are and/or were.
As per the background behind the dream, ever since this past Monday, I have regained a routine and this has greatly relieved the slight monotony of summertime - I've been going to a day-time Biosciences camp, which has been really interesting; it's taught by Mr. Putnam and Ms. Chandler, and the program is run by Mr. Clifton - most of the program is spent on the campus of Wake Forest University, though we've toured many locations in the Triad Research Park downtown such as Targacept, Wake Forest Institution for Regenerative Medicine, and Wake Forest's PA school. On June 22nd, we had listened to two speakers - Dr. Ski Chilton and Chris Perry, who discussed genomics as it relates to obesity and biodiesel, respectively. Later on in the afternoon, as my mother and I exited Target, we were walking by a slightly-balding man and a little brunette boy who was skipping around the shopping cart. I was then struck by the epiphany that if my mom ever dated again, she would probably have to date a single-father, because she had mentioned the other day that she hated dating because most dates don't pay any attention to children from previous relationships - however, of course, a single father wouldn't have this attitude, given that he has a child himself. My mom is convinced that my memory of this event was manifest in the dream.
The dream itself began with my mom and I, walking down a gravel road between thick groups of trees. We seemed to be in the midst of a sort of forest, but the road signified the presence of Industry - we knew that we were not isolated in the wilderness. The sun was starting to set and we were merrily discussing our destination. The excitement was palpable, just like the comfortable heat that drizzled over our skin as we walked along, crunch crunching as we went. As we walked, a small restaurant slowly came into view at the end of the road, brightly illuminated from within by cheerful lights. As we drew nearer, I checked my cell phone and saw that my dad had texted me, asking me about how the camp had gone that day - I replaced the phone in my purse, knowing that I was far too excited to get back to him at the moment. My mom was nervous; we were coming to see one of her friends that she had not seen for a long time - I had never met him, but I had heard favorable things about his character. I had decided that I'd let her talk to him alone first before I entered the room and introduced myself - I figured that they might want to have a chance to reminisce before I made them feel obligated to discuss the present, and I also wanted to see what he looked like from afar, and to try to determine his personality thus. We had traveled to the restaurant because he worked there as a waiter.
When my mom and I entered by the main door, there were two rooms that could be accessed by swinging doors off of the foyer hallway - the one on the right (which actually had no swinging door but was an extension of the foyer), though full of tables and dining space, was empty and slightly darker than the one on the left. Behind that door, you could hear old jukebox music and chatting people waiting for their dinner. My mom slid cautiously up to that door and looked through the glass window in it, searching for her friend. She turned to me and said, "Well, aren't you coming?"
I pulled out my cell phone, "My dad just texted me a couple minutes ago; I'll reply to him real quick and then join you guys in there."
She nodded her assent, gave me a hug, and then wandered into the main dining hall. In the next couple of minutes, I restlessly wandered about the dark foyer area, trying not to peer through the window. Meanwhile, I had decided that I was not well-dressed enough for such a momentous
occasion, and I was able to withdraw from a sort of armoire a dress of my mother's which was short and black and semi-formal. Of course, there is no explanation for why an armoire with my mother's clothes in it was being housed in a restaurant.
After changing, I became impatient, and so I entered the main part of the restaurant by the swinging door, hoping that my timing would be good - however, I walked right in on my mom kissing one of the waiters, a tall fellow wearing casual clothing and a medium-length black hair-cut. Figuring that this was the friend and that I probably should not interrupt their interaction, I turned and left the room and decided to wait outside since the weather was so nice.
Eventually, my mother rejoined me on the gravel, looking happy but simultaneously troubled. I was also frustrated, because she had returned alone and I had wanted to meet the fellow.
"He's working," she said somewhat impatiently, "He can't just leave his job to come outside and meet people."
Feeling slightly resentful, I shuffled my feet as we walked back across the gravel path. After 20 yards or so, we heard the creak of the front door opening - the man dashed out onto the steps and scanned the distance with his hand over his forehead. Spotting us, he ran down the steps and across the gravel until he stood about two feet from us. He took a long look at me, seeming to compare me with my mother.
To break the awkward silence, I said, "Hello!" rather more jovially than I had intended.
He responded with a small wave and a fond smile, and he quickly fell into step between my mother and I as we walked away from the restaurant. At this point in the dream, something about his hair and his mannerisms reminded me of Robert Smith from The Cure. Underneath the reddish sky (the sun had mainly set) his skin seemed to be even paler. Looking at him, I was struck by a sense of familiarity, like when you get along miraculously well with a stranger or when your expectations of a person slide perfectly into place upon meeting them, as though you had known them all along.
One could tell that he was silent because he was overwhelmed with joy and could not find words, which was a strange thing to realize. This and the way that his eyes assumed a sort of gray sadness when he reached for my mom's hand made my heart break: he was transitory - it was here that I realized I was dreaming. Perhaps sensing this (and my imminent awakening), I quickly reached over and embraced him, silently thanking him for showing her such kindness and love. He was surprised; his eyes widened slightly but he seemed very proud, and he said something that I don't remember before I awoke with the 5th movement of Beethoven's 13th String Quartet stuck in my head, a very exquisite and sad sounding piece. I felt very happy when I woke up to have had a dream that was not anxiety-driven. Ah dreams. . .how I've missed thee!

Childhood Memory: George Washington's Breakfast and the Cherry Tree Myth

This is a story about my gullibility as well as my hatred of tea.

When I was in elementary school, especially in the early years of Kindergarten and first grade, our founding fathers, presented to us in pictures of their heads immortalized in the stone of Mount Rushmore, were veiled in a sort of lofty majesty. I was very patriotic when I was little, jumping up every morning to say the Pledge of Allegiance, trying to sing "My Country 'Tis of Thee" the loudest, and sitting rapt with attention when they told us about how we beat the British in the Revolution because our soldiers could only afford tattered green and brown clothes, which allowed us to blend into the landscape while the British marched proudly in their distinctive red-coats.

In Kindergarten, they told us a couple of days in advance (my teacher Ms. Gaither and her assistant Ms. Brown) that we would be reading a piece of literature called George Washington's Breakfast, which would reveal to us the morning diet of the first president of the United States. I was enormously excited, particularly when the teachers told us that we would be celebrating his memory by actually eating his breakfast one day in class.

So, the big day came, and we all ran over to the circular carpet, grabbed the square pillows from the heap in the corner, and sat down in preparation for story time. Ms. Gaither sat in her rocking chair (I think that it was a rocking chair; this is how I remember it) and read us the book, which included some interesting facts about Washington, including the names of some of his pets and his shoe size. The book was about a boy who was named for the President and who is desperate to find out all that he can about Washington - especially his preferred breakfast. His family promises to cook him the breakfast if he can find out what it was through research. His epic search extends across the pages until - finally - the moment that we cross-legged kindergarteners had been waiting for with bated breath - the last page, in which it is revealed that George Washington's breakfast of choice was. . .tea and hoe-cakes.

A couple of the more crude vocabulary-savvy boys giggled at the concept of hoe-cakes, at which point our teacher hastily explained that hoe-cakes are like pancakes. I mused and mused over the food. . somehow I had expected it to be grander, like the breakfast of kings - with lavish french toast and sugar dusted fruit or something like that - but I was excited all the same. I had never tried tea before, and some of my Southern-bred classmates told me, "Oh, tea is the best! I can't believe you haven't had it before. It's even better than milk!"

"Nuh-uh." I said, "I don't think there's anything better than milk."

They shrugged. "George Washington thought so." And they had a point - tea had to be excellent if George Washington liked it.

So, the next day when we came to school, we sat patiently at our desks while Ms. Gaither passed out little plastic plates of hoe-cakes (which were basically pancakes without syrup) and little Dixie cups of some sort of medium-brown tea. I fidgeted during this process: they were very strict, and in retrospect I think rightfully so, about not letting anyone eat until everyone had been served. I gazed into my cup of tea with great anticipation, and when the time came to begin, I took a couple of bites of the hoe-cakes, imagining that I was sitting across the breakfast table from Washington himself like the little boy is on the cover of the book. I gagged a little bit due to the dryness of the cakes (they really were no more extraordinary than pancakes) and took a huge gulp of the tea, expecting sweet fruitiness for whatever reason. The bitter, sugar-less liquid I swallowed was not at all what I expected, and I coughed and coughed and swallowed some of it down the wrong pipe, so to speak. When I had recovered, I wondered if I had tasted it right, and so I tried the tiniest little sip again, and was once more disappointed. I looked around me and saw kids eagerly downing their cups of tea and munching on their hoe-cakes. More than being disappointed in the tea, I was disappointed (and knew that George Washington would be disappointed) with myself. I didn't like the food of the founding father I felt so strangely close to after the narrative that we read - we never would have been able to eat breakfast together and talk about different types of tea that we liked. As I grew older, I came to have more self-esteem, and as I continued to dislike tea, I attributed that early disappointment to George Washington's lack of beverage choices back in the day, as opposed to a failure on my part to have good taste.

Next, for the Cherry Tree Myth, which is, in fact, a myth (I think). Most everyone has heard the story, I'm sure, of Washington's childhood act of bludgeoning his father's beloved cherry tree with a hatchet that he had received as a gift. When his father comes inquiring after the perpetrator, Washington bravely steps forward and says, "Father, I cannot tell a lie - 'twas me." or something like that, and his father immediately forgives him because of his honesty. Now, this story, I feel, is fairly plausible - I mean, George Washington didn't go dragon hunting or anything like that - the story could actually happen. So, I accepted it without question from my early years of elementary school onward; years passed, and no contradiction in present time reared its head and cried, "The Cherry Tree Story is a LIE!!!" even when that same contradiction, sometimes called reality, reared its head and devoured such things as the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus. I'll be quite honest here (in honor of Mr. Washington) and admit that the question of the validity of this story never actually troubled me until a few weeks ago, when I was sitting in Civics and Economics and someone mentioned it playfully in reference to what we were discussing. Something in the casual quality of their voice made me do a minor double-take. I had to think if I believed the story or not, and I realized that I had never really had reason to question it. But then, as I thought about it, the story seemed a tad absurd, and at that point, I ceased to believe it a little, and the little bit remaining of the child that inhabits my soul died. Suzy Evans, PhD, had this to say about the myth: "An early nineteenth century American book peddler, itinerant preacher and author, "Parson" Mason Locke Weems is best known today as the source of some of the most beloved if apocryphal stories about George Washington. The famous story of George and the Cherry Tree is included in Weems' masterpiece, The Life and Memorable Actions of Washington, which was originally published in 1800 (the year after Washington's death) and was an immediate best-seller. Reprinted in ever more inventive editions over the next twenty-five years, it contained, according to historian Edward Lengel, "some of the most beloved lies of American history, including the famous cherry tree myth" and other exaggerated or invented anecdotes that extolled Washington’s virtues and provided an entertaining and morally instructive tale for the young republic." I just skimmed through her blog, and it is pretty fantastic, so here is the link for it: http://lincolnslunch.blogspot.com/2011/03/cherry-tree-and-invention-of-george.html. And so, sadly, our first President lifted his veil of mystery and shocked me with his choice of food and the realization that he may never have raised a hand against any foliage or greenery - and that is how I came to hate tea.