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I must have been dreaming. There I was, floating around in ethereal form, filling in family and coworkers about my unfinished to-do list, now that I no longer walked in the land of the living.
They say that dead men tell no tales, but in my dream, I wouldn't shut up. I hovered five feet off the ground, explaining everything that needed done, how to do it and in what order to prioritize all the tasks.
I'm way more organized in my afterlife than I am in my during-life.
I'm sure that my survivors would have found it more useful if I would have said, "Ooh, now I can see where the treasure is buried. Write this down..."
I finally could schedule time to run the vacuum cleaner. However, dead men don't run sweepers, either. Besides, it really didn't matter anymore if the carpet was dirty, not while I was hovering around like a... well, like a ghost.
I don't believe dead dudes pay bills either. And I had the best excuse ever for skipping work. "Sorry, boss, I can't. My warranty has expired, and me with it."
But dream death isn't all a bed of lilies. For example, I could no longer be the life of a party. I never had been the life of a party when alive, so not much changed there.
The alarm yanked me back to consciousness. I woke up, still alive, still with a pile of bills to pay and still with expectations of others that I'd show up for work and do my own jobs myself.
On lunch break (not actually being deceased, I could not desist going to work), I asked Google, the Knower of All Things, what did the dream mean?
Relax, Googled cooed. Dreaming about The Big Sleep rarely foreshadows that you're about to make The Big Exit.
According to the dream experts, those dreams mostly are the subconscious dealing with change. "Death" reflects anxiety over a new chapter in your life or uncertainty about your future.
(How does one become a dream expert? Sleeping on the job? I can do that.)
The most common dreams are about falling (losing control or fear of failure), taking a test for a class you forgot to attend (imposter syndrome, self-doubt), being naked in public (vulnerability or fear of exposure -- but judging by the way people dress today, I'd say it's unjustified confidence when you're awake), running late (missed opportunities and deadlines), being chased (avoiding things that need attention), flying (freedom, or, if you can't take off, being stuck, weighed down or exposed to green kryptonite), and your teeth falling out (fears about aging or anxiety over one's appearance).
I'd never heard of the teeth-falling-out one. But I can barely fall asleep without showing up bare somewhere in a dream -- often when I'm late for a class I forgot to attend all semester but now have a big test.
TV shows love dream episodes, especially when they can bonk somebody on the head. "Newhart" had the coolest dream episodes ever, revealing the entire eight-season run as one long, crazy dream -- after Bob got bonked on the head.
Musicians from the Everly Brothers to Aerosmith to Supertramp encouraged us to dream on. Then we dream up what seemed like a genius idea in the middle of the night, and the next morning, the buddy you tell rolls his eyes and mutters, "You gotta be dreaming."
Heart's 1985 hit "These Dreams" keeps bouncing around in my brain: "...These dreams go on when I close my eyes / Every second of the night, I live another life..." Or in my case, another afterlife.
My friend Laura (what a dreamboat, er, dreamer) said, "Why doesn't someone come up with an invention to orchestrate our dreams? You could pick from a menu to learn a foreign language or memorize facts for an upcoming test or meeting."
I'd use my Pick-A-Dream machine (patent pending) to replay the ones in which I dunked a basketball or ran three miles, uphill, without either huffing or puffing.
Let me sleep on it. Perchance to dream. In this life or happily ever after.
Dream a little dream with Burt at burton.w.cole@gmail.com.