At 2 A.M., I awoke with this dream:

It is night. Only halogen streetlights illumine my situation: alone, anxious, seated behind the steering wheel of a U-Haul 17-foot truck packed with stuff. I’m waiting to make the delivery but need directions. I check my watch. It’s already been a long time. No traffic on the nearby Interstate.

And at 4:30 A.M.:

Again, I’m seated in a box-shaped truck filled with stuff. I wait for directions. It is night.

Mulling upon the message of these dreams led to two interpretations, the first one more appropriate to last week’s stance toward my terminal illness.

Night signifies the end of daylight living, old age, death. The image of being seated behind the steering wheel suggests the need to control my ILD, even to slowing it down with exercise, nutrition, and elimination, rather than surrendering to its inevitable diminishments. I’ve chosen to be alone in this process, despite some wishing to support this critical experience with me.

My stuff speaks of bits and pieces of decades-long behaviors and attitudes deemed unacceptable, their revelation, humiliating, now locked away within the rental. Exhausted, impatient, lethargic, I await directions for the disposal of these unsavory aspects of myself—as if checking my watch would bring the needed directions to do so.

The second take on the dreams suggests the responsible handling of my affairs prior to the death of my body: consciousness of my end-time with its solitary journey into diminishment and death, sequestering my stuff from harming others, willingness to properly dispose of it, and exercising patience as I wait for directions for the next right step.

Perhaps both dreams suggest last week’s glitch that led to yesterday’s willingness to let go of my body, a critical breakthrough that reframes each twenty-four hours, granted by Creator God. I remain in good hands.