This morning I awoke from the loveliest dream I can recall for some time now.
Betsy and I were walking in London and noticed a happy crowd gathering along the Thames. As we drew closer we could see hundreds of inner tubes with smiling waving people were floating down the famed river.
I slowly noticed that the inner tubes were linked together with rainbow colored cords, each carrying a person dressed in spectacular attire not at all as one might be for a lazy float down a river. Slowly, a Pride float came into view just behind the throng of floating revelers.
I quickly maneuvered closer to the river bank, squeezing between joyous people of every shape, color and sequin. I came to a high fence perched just between the party on the banks and the party in the water.
As I stepped on the bottom rail to get a better view, it was then that I saw – no, heard first, then saw – an all-female, Irish choir, draped in gorgeous green robes, singing in the most spectacular harmony just three words as each float approached …
There you are.
To greet the drag queen float –
There you are.
To welcome the leather float –
There you are.
To embrace the old hippie lesbian float –
There you are.
To celebrate the arrival of the voguing float –
There you are.
The air was filled with the most amazing harmony –
There you are.
And I began to weep. No – ugly cry.
In my heart I of hearts, beyond the dream, before and after time, I heard the words.
There you are.
When I woke up the next words that occurred to me were from that great hymn…
I once was lost, but now I’m found.
That’s it, isn’t it? To be seen, fully seen by someone who loves and has been looking for you –
As the morning light peeked through the shades, memories flickered of playing hide and seek with my mom when I was little. The sound of her voice, the look on her face and the knowledge that she really wanted to find me when she said “there you are!”
The memory of that feeling is what makes the dream so complex since later when she could see me for who I really am, that wasn’t the sound of her voice or the look on her face. Now that she’s gone, I’d like to think maybe, just maybe, the choir in the dream was her voice filled with love again.
There you are.
Don’t we all long to be fully seen, found when we are lost, embraced when we are fully inhabiting our own humanity?
There you are!
