FAIL

I have reoccuring dreams of failure. OFTEN! It generally (although not always) revolves around my children. Frequently it involves holidays. For instance, the sun is setting late one afternoon when I suddenly realize with dawning horror that its Halloween. And my children have NO costumes. There are NO decorations, or candy....Trick or Treaters are already knocking at the door and I am desperately trying to figure out a way to come up with something ingenius in 30 seconds or less. And I am failing miserably. Or, the sun is setting when I realize with yet MORE dawning horror that its Christmas Eve, and there is NO tree, NO cookies, NO presents...etc. You get the idea.

I don't get it. My kids are grown, and doing fine. The only time I even came to close to anything like that was the year that Bruce got sick and our trip to Jamaica for Christmas got cancelled at the last minute. And somehow, with the help of my kids, and a small Christmas miracle of finding not 1, but 2 Nintendo Wiis at Best Buy on Christmas Eve (when these things were next to impossible to come by), we pulled it off and didn't suffer tragic deprivation. We had a nice dinner (thanks Erica), and goodies, and sangria (thanks Stephen and Hannia)...and Bruce got well (Yay! Thanks Bruce AND God) and we all lived happily ever after. We even had a wonderful trip to Puerto Rico over Easter to make up for it.

Last night, I dreamed about my daughter. We got word that somehow, due to an oversight on MY part, she had missed 2 credits in elementary school (Chicod). She had to come home (from her job in England) immediately and take 2 classes at her old school or all of her other education, from high school to her PhD from UVA would all be rendered null and void. It was awful. She took an overnight flight to be at school at 8am the next morning. She left in such a hurry that she didn't bring anything with her. Just the clothes she was wearing. She made it home by 7:30 am, went to her closet to find something to wear to school....and her closets and drawers were all filled with the clothes she had worn in like 2nd grade. Nothing fit....and it was a huge fiasco because for some reason it never occurred to us that she could just go on to class wearing the clothes she had worn on the flight back home. ???? No idea what any of it means, but there was panic, and distress and a feeling that I had failed in some huge way.

I am a pretty cautious person. I don't live recklessly, I don't leave bills unpaid, or leave holiday celebrations to chance. I plan menus. And table settings. And costumes, when required. My children have more than fulfilled their educational requirements.....so why in the world do I wake up in the middle of the night in a panic that something has been left undone? I want to just dismiss it as a crazy dream. But a part of me keeps wondering if my subconscious is trying to tell me something....What in the world could it be?