The Dream

The moment I saw myself for the first time I was surprised…rather more scared than surprised. Anyone who is “normal” would be. There I was lying on the bed sleeping peacefully my face slightly bent towards the left mouth open and here I was standing by the bed looking at the other me…wondering what to do. After a while when the fear wore off I moved around to see what was different. I even sat on the bed and touched myself…first me and then the “other me”. I wanted to wake her up…but….

Was I dead to see my own body? No I wasn’t. I remembered the day clearly and no where in the memory was I dead. It had been usual at office, hectic and crazy. I had come home, cooked, eaten, washed myself and had then gone off to sleep. Nothing out of ordinary. Suddenly I remembered the article I was reading a few days earlier about time slip (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_slip ) and wanted to know if something similar was happening. To confirm I walked back to the “other me” (thank god she was still sleeping peacefully) and took the cell phone lying by her side. 14 May 2009 – 1:09AM. Yeah yesterday was 13th….I remember discussing with Kriti about the Integration Testing that was supposed to start on 15th…So who was I?

Having nothing to do, I decided to check what Google bhagwaan had to say about my predicament. After a couple of clicks it looked that maybe I was experiencing OBD.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Out-of-body_experience) But rather than feeling relieved I felt worse. Why me? I wasn’t on drugs, I was not in some kind of trauma, then why me? The article didn’t say a word about the “constitution” of physical body but I had imagined the spirit to be formless, shapeless and colorless and here I looked exactly as the other me. Suddenly a thought stuck me, although weird but under such situations everything looked possible. I walked to the entrance of the house that was closed. I closed my eyes and walked right to towards the door. In 4 steps I should have banged into the door but I didn’t. I opened my eyes and realized that I was right. I was the spirit and like those ghosts in horror movies could walk through solid stuff. This was getting interesting. I walked into my neighbor’s apartment and roamed around their house. I wanted to wake them up but didn’t want to explain the new found secret so left it at that. I decided to try this trick with a stranger who didn’t know me. So the next moment found me on the road, looking for a “suitable victim”.

I couldn’t find a soul at the early hour and was a bit disappointed. I decided to go to the tram stop (someone would be there for sure) but then decided against it. I was scared…what would happen if my physical body wakes up? What if something goes wrong and I am left on the roads? Caution made me head back home…but right in front of my house opposite the bakery, I met the harmless madman who lived on the roads. Maybe he was the perfect victim. No one could blame me and I will have my answers. He was old and I knew that he couldn’t run so I had nothing to fear. Plus the house was just on the other side of the road...

He sat on the bench his head on one side. I kept my hand on his shoulders but he didn’t wake up. I strengthened my grip on his shoulder (I realized that just with mere thinking I could decide whether I wanted to feel solid skin or insert my fingers through the skin) and shook him. He woke up and looked around. No he didn’t see me. I stepped closer and took off his cap. He opened his eyes again, felt his head and then looked surprised to see his cap standing in mid air. He looked shocked and said something in Polish and started to walk away from the bench as fast as his old legs could carry him. So I was a ghost…the idea delighted me and depressed me at the same time. I could for sure have some fun. But then what about the physical body? I didn’t want to die…I needed to discuss this with someone. I kept the madman’s hat on the bench and went back to the house.

As I entered the house I realized, that I didn’t feel warm inside the house (usually the temperatures drip by atleast 2-3 degrees during night and the houses are warmer). Rather I felt pleasant, neither cold not hot. The other me was still sleeping (I wondered what she was dreaming). The laptop lighted the room in a bluish white glow. I sat on the chair and logged on to Skype. As expected, Nikhil was online and I decided to chat with him. The conversation went something like it usually did when I woke up in the middle of the nights.

Suhani (I): hello
Nikhil: Hi, Good Morning biwiji. Aren’t you up a bit too early today?
Suhani: Hmmm…Good Morning sweetheart. Yeah woke up…couldn’t sleep so thought I might catch up with you for a while. Howz your day going?
Nikhil: Day is going fine. I managed to write 3 pages for my thesis since morning…aur abhi I am feeling hungry, soach raha hoon kuch kha kar aa jaon. But before that tell me are you ok? Did you have a bad dream again?
Suhani: Hmmm…kind of. I saw that I was dead and was seeing my own body.
Nikhil: Oh…don’t worry, abhi so jao. Hug the pillow, think of me and sleep.
Suhani: Ok…I will try…but suppose if I am really dead and you are talking to my spirit?
Nikhil: I don’t mind so long I have you…I don’t care if you are a spirit or human. Aacha listen, Rinku is calling me for lunch. I am going away. Try to sleep, if not give me a missed call and I shall call you back
Suhani: Ok….sure. Love you
Nikhil: Love you too!!

So my boyfriend didn’t believe me. How could he- when this was strange for me as well. This meant I couldn’t really discuss it with him. I thought of calling Naina, but it must be 5 AM in India…too early…and what would I tell her? Hi Naina, this is Divya’s spirit speaking. That sounded like a joke to me. Suddenly my eyes fell on the sleeping me. Wasn’t the other I the best person to discuss this? Why hadn’t I thought of this earlier? I moved to the bed and shook her. No response. Tried again. No success. I moved my hand over her heart. Yes the heart was beating. Then on the nose- even the breath was coming. Then what? I went back to the kitchen and brought some water. Sprinkled it on her. She didn’t wake. The realisation sank in…I was in a brain dead state…..

The clock showed 2:30 AM now. Almost one and a half hour had elapsed and in a way I was worried about the morning. This was fun but I wanted to live and not go around as a spirit. Yes I hated those busy work hours, I hated my boss but I still wanted to be there. I felt like crying but no tears came in my eyes…all I could hear was the sound of my own ragged breath…

After I had calmed down a bit, I decided to do what looked feasible. If I had to stay that way forever, let me write it down so that atleast people can know….so what if they see only my brain dead body and don’t see the actual me. With this thought, I started typing away about the experiences on the laptop. As more thoughts came on paper, new ideas stuck me. I experimented with a lot of things…I realized I could touch fire and ice without feeling a thing…as if the skin had lost the sense of feeling. I realized I didn’t feel hungry or thirsty. On the other hand, my other senses were enhanced. I could smell and hear more clearly. I could cut myself and not bleed and more than that on desire I could float in the air…though not for long. With this knowledge my first thoughts were to go to New Zealand to Nikhil. We had been contemplating meeting over the past few months but the lack of time and finances didn’t permit. But wasn’t this the perfect time? I couldn’t be seen and could even fly……But on the other side was a wall of doubts. Would he want to touch a spirit? What would happen to my physical body? I surely could spice up things in my life but they needed to wait. First I needed to find a couple of answers, judge the true nature of the situation and self before going anywhere.

By the time I finished writing it was 4:00AM. I was wondering what to do next when,suddenly I heard some moment behind me. I turned and came face to face with Maja (pronounced as Maya). I wanted to scream but no voice came out of my throat. This was getting worse. Ever since I had come to this house in Poland, I had often dreamed about this old lady. She would come and sit on the couch and talk to me about everything. She had told me how she had seen the Nazi atrocities at Auzwitcz during the IInd World War. In my dreams she would come and talk and then go away. Never ever, had I the courage to ask her who she was and what did she want from me. Usually her dreams left me restless and scared- but I had ignored them thinking of them as just nightmares.

But here she was standing right in front of me. I could and couldn’t dispute her existence only as much as I could/couldn’t dispute my own. She looked at me and then went to her usual place on the couch. She said hello to me and didn’t look one bit surprised to see “two me”. In my mind it looked as if she was some family friend who had dropped in and I should be asking her for some tea and biscuits. But common sense told me that this was the most extraordinary thing that had ever happened to me. I was brain dead, I was a spirit and now I was talking to the “ghost lady” who had given me nightmares. God help me!!

She started talking again. I was scared but then after a while, I asked her what was happening to me. She confirmed what Google had told. I was floating out of my own physical body. I asked her why? She said because in my subconscious mind I had wanted to do this always. True, I had been interested in this kinda stuff as long as I remembered. Next I asked her why she came to my dreams. She smiled her grandmotherly smile and said that she didn’t come to me…she had always been there…this was her house so what if for the “living world” that was 23 years ago. She had no obligations to abide by the rules of the living world. She continued the conversation for another 10 minutes and then both of us fell silent. I glanced at the clock and it was almost 5:00 AM. She got up to leave, and then I realized it was my last hope. I asked her...”Can you please tell me how can I be normal again? I want to be what I was when I had gone off to sleep in the night.” She smiled and said “Its simple…you can go back to your body when ever you want. Just go and lie where your body is lying and you would fit in…” saying this she walked out of the room.

I looked one last time at everything and then did what she had instructed. The next thing I heard was the sound of the alarm ringing at 7 AM. I woke up feeling sleepy and suddenly remembered all that had happened. I looked around and saw that there was just one me. So this was again a dream…God! What kind of dreams I have. I logged on to the lap top to say good morning to Nikhil. The skype chat window from the previous night was still open…but then my eyes fell on the last conversation….it was “good morning” instead of “good night”…which meant….what had happened was the truth. I went back to the desktop and there it was….this story….I still dismissed the whole thing as sleep walking/writing until on my way to office I saw the madman prodding his cap still lying on the bench with a long stick from a distance…….as if he was afraid of something