Dancing With Shoulders

 

I dreamt last night about my soul mate for the first time. Well, okay. I know we all “dream” about our futures and the men in them, but this time it was more specific. It was only about him. He didn’t have a name or a face. But I dreamt of his shoulders, he was wearing a suit and we were standing very close facing each other. He was looking down at me, but I wasn’t looking up, I was looking at his shoulders, which were big and strong and attached to the arms he had wrapped very tightly around me.
 
Anyone who has ever had a dream knows that they are typically relevant to whatever is going on in your life. Recently I’ve noticed that the more I’m on Facebook, the more often very random people I haven’t spoken to in years pop in and out of my dreams – I attribute this to the fact that my subconscious mind sees their names on a Mini Feed or a friend request and, since I don’t have time during the busy day to stop and wonder what they are up to, they swirl around in my head, waiting to enter my thoughts until I fall asleep. This dream was not totally unprompted however.

This dream was from something I remember very consciously. My father remarried almost exactly one year ago and my then-boyfriend came with me to his wedding. Following a messy divorce, a screenplay’s worth of family drama, and a hasty engagement, my dad moving on so fast was less than perfect. I needed ThenBoyfriend there to support me, to hold my hand, and to basically take my mind of the reality going on around me.

ThenBoyfriend was especially sweet to me all night, even during a brief low point with a few tears, and as the party was winding down we realized that we hadn’t been on the dance floor once. ThenBoyfriend dragged me, or more likely, I pushed him, out the back door. We both needed fresh air anyways.

The band was playing a slow song, and because the reception was at my dad’s house, the dance floor was in our back yard. It was early May and the weather in the tent felt like air conditioning.

So we danced.

We were the only people outside. It was the happiest part of my entire night. My heels had come off and I felt short {which I loved because at 5’ 9” I never feel short}, compared to ThenBoyfriend’s 6’ 2.”

There is a scene in Father of the Bride that I compared this moment to in my mind. At the very end of the film, George and Nina are surveying the damage at their post-wedding reception house, and he takes her hand and they dance as the credits roll. {I don’t like that comparison so much anymore, because that is my favorite movie of all time, and the person I shared that moment with is, well, not quite my favorite person of all time.}

But the memory stays on my heart. In the months after my dad’s wedding, before we broke up, I would play that memory back in my head as I fell asleep. I probably looked like an idiot, wearing a polka-dot eye mask and a huge smile on my face as I drifted off. But it soothed me. Being in a relationship meant someone to dance with, someone to hold me up.

Last night my roommate slept over at her boyfriend’s apartment, something she does often, so I tend to find myself alone most nights. I enjoy my own company and I don’t mind being alone, or even single. It makes me feel independent.

But last night, I succumbed. Maybe it was because it was raining. The thing about being lonely is that it leaves room for you to think about an ex, or worse, kinda sorta miss him. I let my mind wander to that memory again. It was somewhere between conscious thought and that weird limbo state that happens as you are falling asleep that I must have begun to dream. Only this time my dancing partner was faceless. I used ThenBoyfriend more as a prototype, a template. Not to appear as if I have brushed ThenBoyfriend aside too easily, but we have both grieved our relationship and moved on, so I think it’s only fair that I dance with someone else.

That’s when I saw him, we will call him Shoulders. Shoulders really loved me. He was smiling with his eyes, even though he didn’t have eyes in my dream, but I knew he was smiling with them. He was older, maybe I was older too, but I couldn’t think about me, I was too in awe and overwhelmed by happiness. The room we were in was enormous and white, and Shoulder’s didn’t have a face. I don’t mean to say he was a headless horseman type, but his face was fuzzy, like there was a cloud in front of it. The things I knew about him I just knew without seeing, like the fact he was looking down at me. The strongest thing I remember was an understanding that Shoulders and I were close. Our friendship was more important than any romantic-y infatuation I’d felt about boys in real life. Shoulder’s was the best friend that I’d ever had.

But we didn’t dance for very long and I didn’t have any other dreams last night, just this one. This morning I was in a fabulous mood... although it took me an hour after I woke to remember why I was so happy.

I am writing this dream down now because one day, when I know my husband, I want to show it to him. Because I’ll want him to know that he is not my Shoulders.

My Shoulders last night was Christ. It took me that long… it’s 3 pm now… to figure it all out. He loved me unconditionally, He brought me incredible happiness, He comforted me with His warmth and strength. I think that is why this dream was so short, even my unconscious brain couldn’t handle all of His glory.

So why did I need to suffer last night in loneliness? It’s simple really, because Jesus needed to lead my mind to Him, and since He couldn’t reach me subliminally by being tagged in a Facebook album and popping up on my home page, He lead me through this route instead. Loneliness led me to longing, which led me to sleep. And there in my dreams, He reminded me that my loneliness wasn’t necessary at all. I have Shoulders to dance with, and He’s all I need.

So, future husband, now you know. I hope you too dream of Christ and long for Him. I hope through each other we live in His image and come to know His love.

And at the very least, I hope you take some dancing lessons from Him.

- Dream Weaver