I’d like to share a dream of my son, Aidan. I had this dream a bit over a year ago, a few months after we lost him, some time during the winter of 2017/18.
I had a couple of other dreams of him before this one, but with very few words spoken that I could remember. In one, I got to hug him for a long time and tell him how much I love him and miss him. I don’t recall if he said anything back. While hugging him, I pressed my nose against his shoulder, inhaled, and was able to smell him. I recall that very clearly, because he was at that age where he was starting to smell like a man. (We already had the deodorant talk.) It’s a common belief that you can’t smell in dreams, but not true.
In another dream, we were all together as a family, visiting Aidan in a sketchy ramshackle house where he was staying for some reason with a mysterious woman. The front yard was filled with a mix of toys of various ages and random junk. I got to hug Aidan again as he came out from the house. Isabel went off with him, and it gave me great joy to see them together again, figuring out different games to play with each other. At one point, Aidan wanted to ride on a swing, but there was no tree limb that would clear. Instead we found one of those wicker basket chairs lying around, the kind you see hanging from the ceiling of a sunroom. Somehow I was able to extend my arm and hold the chain out from me so that he could swing back and forth in the chair. Wheeeee! My arm hurt holding the chain, and my hand trembled as I had difficulty maintaining my grip, but I was so happy to see him playing that I was able to keep it up. A bit later, it was time for us to leave. I gathered up the kids, and we were about to go, but the woman said Aidan had to stay so he can keep playing. I asked her, what do you mean? Izzy was playing too, so why just Aidan? Why wouldn’t you also want Isabel to stay, too? And then as the words came out of my mouth, it hit me. Hard. I woke up, shaking, breathing shallow.
Except perhaps for that last dream, each dream I had of Aidan was semi-lucid. I was aware in the dream that we had lost him, and the great significance of seeing him again, but I was not aware I was in a dream. In some other dreams not involving Aidan, I was aware I was dreaming, and could occasionally steer the plot line to keep it from becoming unpleasant. As a young man after my father’s death, also abrupt and traumatic, my father would often wander silently and ghostlike through my dreams. I would speak to him, but he would never respond, and I became frustrated because I was not aware he was gone. These earlier dreams of my father were not as lucid as the ones I had with Aidan.
In this dream, I was in a large hotel complex where I was staying to attend a business conference. I left my room and walked to the rather large landing with its plush carpeting and four elevator banks on each side. Many people were milling around, a mix of other professionals and ordinary guests, some with their kids. I took one of the elevators down to the lobby, where I walked for quite a bit through various passageways to a different building that housed the conference hall. Unfortunately once I got to the desk at the main entrance, I had to turn back, because it was one of those conferences you needed pants to get into.
So I walked the whole way back up to my room, put on some pants, and walked back down to the conference area. But again I had to turn back because I needed to wear a shirt to attend. So again, I went back up to my room, put on a shirt, and then went all the way back down again. And once again, this time the problem was I wasn’t wearing shoes. You get the idea here. Apparently even in dreams, the comedy rule of three applies.
So I walked back with my bare feet and took one of the elevators up to my floor. As I walked across the landing towards my room, suddenly I spotted Aidan. I called over to him, weaved through the crowd, and gave him a quick hug.
I said, “Aidan, it’s so wonderful to see you. We’ve missed you so much.”
“Hey, dad.”
“How are you? You’re looking real good. Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Doing good.”
“I can’t believe it. It’s so good to see you. I’ve missed you so much.”
“Yeah, sorry about that. But hey dad, I’ve been learning a bunch of new stuff. Wanna see something cool? Check out what I can do now.”
“Okay.”
And as I looked, suddenly he turned into a llama.
“Aidan. You’re a llama.”
He switched back into Aidan. “No, dad. It’s an alpaca.” (He said the word dad with two long syllables, the second one dipping down, in a very familiar tone to indicate: daaaa-ad, you are such an idiot.)
“Okay, alpaca then. Aidan, that’s amazing.”
“Cool, huh?” And he changed back to an alpaca.
“Yes, very cool.” And then back to Aidan again.
“So Aidan, I gotta tell you, we’ve been really sad you’ve been gone. It’s been really hard.” Changes back to alpaca. “Lots of people have been missing you.” Changes back to Aidan. “And we’re…” Then alpaca, then Aidan. “Could you stop doing that for a second? I’m trying to talk to you, seriously, Aidan. Just give me a second and hear me out.”
“Okay.”
“So, I’m really glad to see you, and that you’re okay. But we’ve been having a really hard time. Mom’s worried sick about you. Could you please get in touch with her? She’d really love to hear from you.”
“Oh. Alright.” (His tone was: oops, forgot.)
“And all your friends really miss you. I’ll tell them all you’re doing alright. That sound good?”
“Okay.”
“Hey, I have an idea. It would be so cool if I could take a picture of us. You up for a selfie? That way I can show everybody I saw you and that you’re doing well. It would make people so happy to see you. You okay with that?”
“Yeah, sure.”
So I take my phone out of my pocket and open up the camera. I’m not used to taking selfies, so I struggle to find where the button is where you reverse the camera so it points back at you. And then there’s the delay setting, and I’m trying to figure out how do I set off the delay. With the regular shutter button? Okay, that seems about right. And I’m careful to get it right, because I know if I mess up, Aidan will really let me have it. So I hold up the camera, put my arm around Aidan, smile, press the shutter, and try my best not to blink.
The shutter goes off, and I’m so glad it worked. I pull the camera back towards me to take a look at the picture on the screen. And I say to myself, ah shit. Dammit.
“Aidan, could you, like, not be a llama for a second?”
I look over, and it’s Aidan again, and he starts to chuckle. Huh huh huh huh huh.
“Dammit, Aidan. DAMN IT!”
I wake up angry, my heart racing, and then I’m laughing. Good one, Aidan. And then I’m crying. Then it’s a mix of both. And then all of them at once.
Understand, nothing could have brought his presence to me better than being pranked. That was Aidan. He got me real good once when I opened a kitchen drawer and suddenly my entire upper body was covered in a thin layer of flour. For a while there, you would open a door, and things would fall on you. And that laugh, that was him too.
About a half hour later, I’m thinking about the dream, and one detail starts to bother me. I open up my laptop, look up the wiki page, and read it very carefully. It’s puzzling. Honestly, I’ve always thought an alpaca was a type of llama. It never occurred to me before that they’re actually different species. I don’t recall ever having that thought in my head. How did that ever get into my dream?
I don’t think about the afterlife, and I don’t have any investment in the idea that a dream like this might be an actual visit from my son, but I’m certain of one thing. Instilling that unsettled feeling, where I’m confused and don’t really understand what’s going on, that’s just the sort of way Aidan might get a kick out of pranking me.
P.S.: Aidan eventually got in touch with his mom.
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