Reunion

I had dreamed about her before, the feisty grandmother in the mountains with the white hair always drawn back in a conservative bun. Our paths coincided when I was a child, and she taught me wildflower lore, edible mushrooms, the tangy taste of watercress, and spinning & weaving. She gave me a loom for safe-keeping.

She has been gone, now, for almost thirty years, yet, I have dreamed about her. In the first dream, her soft white hair was long and loose. She was in a white shift that came to the ground. Her feet were bare on green moss, and she was convening a forest coven. I remember thinking, "I knew it. I knew this had to be a part of her." In that night, I communed with her as an adult, learning the deeper and darker part of mountain folk-life.

Last night, I found her again in her cabin, back as she had been before the Druidic evening. I said, "Elizabeth! You gave me the loom, but you never showed me how to thread it."

"Did I give you the dark one or the light one?" She asked.

"The squarish, rectangular one," I answered. "Light."

Her eyes twinkled as she said, "The big one."

"Yes."

"Will you come?"

"I'm not sure I can anymore..." But she did. She came to the cabin, and it was such a cause for celebration that everyone turned up - mom, dad, my siblings, and others long dead and those still alive - and then we looked out and Elizabeth's husband, Marion, was also walking toward the place with his characteristic mustard and brown checked fedora and impish, mischievous grin. We all rushed out onto the porch to hug him and weep with the joy of reunion. 

On the way back inside, I told dad "we need to place another stone here." My mind was already alive with all that could be. Elizabeth began spinning the gears on the loom, cranking it to life, pulling yarn through; Marion was in the rafters before we knew it, weaving ivy and grapevine through for aesthetics and warmth. 

Mom and dad looked on in wonder and admiration, and I felt as though my heart would burst.