Dream Visit from Mom

Rumour had it that Kew beach was an old sunken treasure site, and that treasure had been found. The remains of a seventeenth century merchant vessel with valuable cargo aboard had sunk beneath its frigid waters. A team of divers hired from Blue Waters Scuba Diving Company had gathered at the shore and were assembling their equipment. Four scuba divers approached the cold waters of the sea and started to walk into the water. The crowd talked and laughed quietly among themselves as the hours slipped by, waiting for the treasure to be brought up.

At last the divers were seen in the distance, far out to sea. Finally, they were within sight and it was clear that they had found something. Between them was a seventeenth century chest made of cedar, it was clamped with large and ornamental brass bands and hinges.

Between them they lugged the chest out of the water and put it on the sandy shore. I stood with the other spectators to await the treasure the divers had retrieved. Everyone took a turn looking into the treasure chest. When my turn came I opened the box and looked inside, and saw gold coins lying on the top layer of the box. I noticed that the box had another drawer below the first, and so I lifted the handle of the first level to peer at the bottom, which held little trinkets of pearls, necklaces, bracelets, gold elephants, and all manner of other golden animals. I sifted my hands through the jewelry and then replaced the first drawer back in place where the gold coins lay.

Suddenly my mother appeared at the shore and came over to where I was standing. I knew she was dead in the dream and as I looked at her I thought she looked remarkably well, younger in fact; She had no gray hair, as she did in later years. It was the same dark colour I remembered from my youth and the same old hairstyle she had worn for forty years.