Kj Hooten | + Follow Poet |
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I Am Not a Victim

I had a dream the other night
Of  walking in a field of cornbread
Golden brown
Baked just right
One solid
Unbroken field

As I softly crunched my way
I looked up
Coming toward me
Was a line of tigers
With a man in the middle
No one was tethered
Just walking together
Enjoying the day

There was no fear
No predator
No prey

I woke up laughing
This was so silly!

I went to the Fair today
And during a break
I asked if anyone
Could interpret my dream

They came up with 
Corn bread = The South
And perfectly baked gold = Coming into riches;
Or at least, no money worries

The tigers = Strength; overcoming fears

Hunh!

As I thought about it,
I remembered a childhood dream/nightmare
When I went to bed angry
A big tiger showed up
I would point to everyone who had angered me
He looked at them and proceeded to eat them up
At the end,
With everyone dead,
He turned and looked at me
That’s when I woke up

And a true story (or from this side of dreaming):
A friend and I went to an outdoor zoo
Somewhere south of Kalamazoo
We stood on a wooden walkway
Looking at an open field through a thick glass window
In the stone wall
We spotted several tigers

Later, as I walked a trail to the next exhibit
I looked up to see a tiger
Strolling through the tall grasses toward me
A mere thin wire fence
Separated us

I gulped and walked steadily onward
As I left the area
I could feel his thoughts:
“Ha!  I freaked out another one!”
Tiger humor

As one grows and hopefully gains wisdom
One learns to handle fear
FDR stated during the Great Depression,
“The only thing we have to fear, is Fear itself”

Recently I’ve been angry
About my ex-husband’s condition
He is slowly and bumpily improving from a near fatal stroke
My/our son flew to help

And I’ve been without him since Spring

They are in the South
Corn bread was a staple in our family

Many things around the house have broken
And wait to be repaired by said son

He says that every time he thinks about returning home
His dad suffers a setback
After months of “I’ll be home in two weeks…”
I gave up
Got the garage door repaired
And am making do with things I cannot fix

The working garage door makes all the difference
I finally have access to rakes, the lawn mower
And snow shovels
The car has a safe haven from the weather
And I feel calm

Turns out I could afford the door
-  With only one person’s groceries
Money lasts longer than it did

God keeps telling  me that I will be OK
Financially and otherwise;
It’s up to me to lighten up
To let Fear walk away
Without licking another notch in his paw

I am not a victim

Copyright © Kj Hooten | Year Posted 2012

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