Last night I returned to my own bed after four nights on the east coast; first to attend a closed workshop on women, Islam, and ethics, and then to meet new friends and see family. Since I gave up on the idea that I would ever sleep something like 8 hours (or even 6 or 7), I was pleased to wake up after almost five hours around 4:30. I was still hours away from the fajr prayer and from sunrise, but could not get back to sleep immediately, because I had had a dream related to the hajj.
I’ve started reviewing some literature in preparation, and just before I went to bed I decided I should probably work a little more diligently to put some of those specific prayers to memory. As I thought about it, even last night, I also realized I would repeat some of those prayers so many times during the hajj rituals they would probably be committed to memory by default. Maybe I should just let that be. It’s just my checklist is so short; I was looking for things to do directly related to this journey.
Still any journey reminds me of this journey, so the dream was more like a cross between some idea related to the hajj and something I thought about on this trip. I made a last-minute effort to at least buy presents for my grandsons, who already have a quite a collection of T-shirts from various places, if not from the airports on the way out of those places. It’s one of those “thought that counts” kind of things: a way of sharing something from my time away with them.
In the dream, one of the members of my tour group lands in the holy city with an inflatable Eiffel tower. That’s how I knew it was partially about the hajj. My flight itinerary is set. I fly directly from San Francisco to Paris, and then from Paris to Jeddah, which is like the port city for hajjis. Apparently in the dream, someone was so anxious to show they had gone through Paris, they sort of took anything—because, clearly in the dream, no merit was ascribed to that particular choice. It was worse than my stop at the tourist kiosks near the White House, with big signs “T-shirt 3 for 10 dollars.” In America, any tee shirt at that cost is nothing to write home about.
I remember trying to suggest to them that they could do better; even if only in the airport. But then the dream was over and the sleep returned. At the time I woke up and saw that I had actually slept for 5 hours, I was tempted to get up and get going. It’s not that I felt so well-rested, but the dream reminded me that I had been so earnest in my planning and preparations that I had simply gone astray from keeping the blog going to accompany me. So of course this morning I tried something altogether too much for even me to handle. I think it is better to just pick up in some modest way and not try to make waves this time. Things are in fact in motion at a pace that is once again exhilarating. I have less than four weeks now. Actually I have exactly 26 days and still one more trip abroad before that.
So, in keeping with this new level of excitement, which I am accompanying with a new level of blog-modesty, I just want to say, hello fellow readers, I’m back.
