A Meeting & A Wedding Dream
Dreamed I was at a fancy business dinner. Large, round white tables set across a ballroom, bar in the corner. I’d just arrived and set up was underway. Two of my previous bosses were there. The fete was due to begin in an hour or so.
Participants, including me, had been asked to create some entertainment. I’d created a word jumble. Then my former boss said, “And please provide an answer sheet.”
Uh oh. I hadn’t created that. I went to get the notebook where I’d made it, knowing that I used one of those black and white lab notebooks that I always favored. I’d thrown it away because the notebook was full. I went to a gray, wheeled, large garbage cans sitting there and began going through the trash. People asked me to explain. I reluctantly did, with a grin, and was met with sympathy.
One unfamiliar elderly woman came by and said, “I know what you’re going through. I’ve done that.”
Shrugging, I replied, “If I can’t find it, I’ll just have to solve the jumble.”
Dad was there, putting silverware on tables. He said, “Maybe you used one of these notebooks, Michael.”
I knew I hadn’t because the ones he showed me weren’t the right kind. But I said, “Good idea, I’ll check.” And made a show of checking a few.
That dream segment ended. Another began.
I went to a counter crowded with product and was a little confused. My wife was there, along with several others, including a man behind a counter. I learned they were talking about my hair! Some products had been ordered and had arrived.
I had my own things to do/try for my hair, here and back home, so I was a little puzzled and annoyed. My wife said, “Everyone wants you to look pretty for the wedding.” I think I dimly knew a sister was getting married but didn’t know who.
The man wanted me to try the products. I wanted him to back off but didn’t say anything. I suggested, “Let me brush my hair so we can see what it looks like first.”
I didn’t have a brush, mirror, or comb, so I used my hands, and then asked my wife, “How does this look?”
She hemmed and hawed, not able to decide, which vexed me.
Dream end.
Sunday’s Theme Music
Ashland, Oregon — Sunday, March 1, 2026. It’s raining and foggy in Ashland, with temperatures tottering around 50 degrees F. Not a shred of sunshine out there, and a high of 57 is expected. Spring is muscling in.
It’s a day of questioning for me, starting with what’s going on with Mom to what’s going on in the world and the nation.
I learned yesterday that another sister — our youngest — had been going to visit Mom, taking her things, etc. The youngest has been designated as our contact with Mom because she has the best relationship of everyone living nearby. I reached out to her to see how Mom was doing.
The youngest related that when she arrived, Mom was playing bingo with five or six others at a table and apparently laughing and having fun. Mom told the youngest that she’d gone to church, which she enjoyed, and seemed pretty content and happy.
After wheeling Mom back to Mom’s room, the youngest found clothes all over Mom’s area. Mom complained she didn’t have hangers. Sis pointed out that they’re in the closet, and told her, you need to look, and helped Mom tidy.
Then, though, today, Mom asked the youngest to bring her cookies — “Anything but chocolate chip.” Oatmeal raisin cookies were brought, which made Mom mad. She then gave my sister ‘mean faces’ and quit speaking with her. The youngest rolled Mom to the dining room so she could eat, and then left.
The youngest sister also related that Mom’s roomie is 95 years old with congestive heart failure and two ‘bad shoulders’. She had a hospice aid visiting. My sister suggested that maybe we should get Mom a hospice aid. That took me back, because there’s nothing indicated to me at this point that Mom is ready for hospice.
It’s just as troubling and confusing elsewhere in the world. Trump ordered the U.S. to attack Iran, a joint operation with Israel, “Operation Epic Fury”. While Iran’s supreme leader was killed, Iran retaliated. Americans were killed and injured. More critically, is this the opening that will explode the area into another war? Trump and his advisors seem to think in terms of gunship diplomacy and regime change.
Trump — the peace president, a self-made assertion that has Orwell laughing in his grave — said that the attack was to protect Americans. “Our objective is to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime,” Trump said in prerecorded remarks posted on White House social media accounts early Saturday morning.”
Back in 2011, Trump said President Obama would start a war with Iran. “Our president will start a war with Iran because he has absolutely no ability to negotiate. He’s weak and he’s ineffective.”
Who is weak and ineffective now, Trump?
Protests in Baghdad broke out, with “Death to Israel, death to America,” being shouted. This smacks of the 1970s and 1980s, so it sickens me that we seem to be going into another war spiral. I hope to hell that’s not true.
As I sat with that information, news arrived of a mass shooting in Austin, Texas. Next came updated information about deaths in Iran where 85 are reported killed: “The majority of the dead are schoolgirls aged between seven and 12 years old, according to the regime-controlled news outlets Tasnim and Fars.”
Senseless killing, once again. I expect anger and hatred in Iran to rise in response. This is exactly where we were before, using violence and killing to win hearts and minds. It did not work then; I don’t expect it to work now.
BTW, remember when Trump vowed no more wars when he campaigned? Guess that promise meant as much as Mexico paying for the wall and lower food and energy prices.
The song in my morning mental music stream came when I first looked out the windows, before reading any news. “Rainy Night in Georgia” came out in 1970. The Neurons put it in there when I thought, “Another rainy day in Ashland.” I didn’t remember who performed the song and looked it up to learn it was Brook Benton.
I call again for peace and grace to find its way to us, and maybe it will someday. Right now, it feels less likely than it did last week. But things will change. It’s really just question of how and why.
Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 