I woke up this morning with a dream still vividly playing on my mind. A slightly bizarre and somewhat hysterically happy dream. I’m sure I laughed out loud in my sleep.
It was a bit like Alice in Wonderland meets pub crawl meets Euro art tour… I was heading into the cinema with my daughter and a couple I know when an old friend appeared… next thing he and I are in a horse and buggy going round NY central park laughing, throw-your-head-back deep belly roaring laughs, then we’re giggling and sneaking into the back entrance of the Louvre… running around old ruins and gardens until we’re out of breathe but still laughing… it was ridiculously funny really… we were having such a good time… all quite innocent… like two naughty truant school kids…
I told this old friend about my dream and he said it sounded like ‘Bande a part’… an old Godard film which features a dash through the Louvre…
My dream was a little more Alice and less Kafka-esque than Godard’s but it did have a similar feel to it…
Such comfort and joy in old friends… We’ve day-dreamt lightly a few times together about running ‘away from it all’…
We were once a little bande a part ourselves I guess for a short while… when we first met. We worked together with another woman… a little trio we were. We were all in relationships with other people but had an immediate and close bond and hung out after work frequently… After one rather wild evening which ended hazily with tequila shots, we found ourselves on the sofa at the other woman’s house and I discovered in the morning that she and he had become we… sometime before that evening in fact… oh the betrayal… Strangely I was never upset with him, only with her. Upset that she’d spoiled this beautiful, perfect trio of ours. That she’d said nothing to me. We disbanded quietly, without drama. I just withdrew and lost touch with them both although he did come to my wedding the following year.
He and I found each other many years later and long after he and she had gone their separate ways… We don’t talk about her and I have never told him of how betrayed I’d felt.
I am so grateful for this man, for his friendship and the light he brings to my life now in so many ways. A very special person and a dear friend who always, whether near or far, holds my hand and runs through the Louvre with me in spirit…
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