Waking Up

Maggie woke up from a vivid dream. Only faint images remained, but it had a lingering impression. Covered in a light clamminess, she swung her feet over the edge of the bed to put her slippers on. It was the middle of winter in a small rural town in Ontario. The house was so cold, now and again, you could hear its bones cracking with booming resonance.

As Maggie walked to work, she could feel her eyelashes turning to icicles in the fog of her breath. The imprint from her dream was still with her. She felt like the birds on the wire were watching as she walked by. The sound of the morning rural street life seemed distant as she heard the sound of her feet on the hard snow. The automatic door into the grocery store abruptly snapped her back to the present. It was only 8:02 a.m., but the store was active with staff preparing for the day. A few early-bird customers were already there. She heard a customer complaining to the produce manager while she quickly walked to the break room to hang her jacket and put on her apron.

"You are late again."

"Sorry, my car wouldn't start."

"Not my problem. Get your shit together."

Maggie grabbed her cash drawer and set up her till. Her friend Amy was already there.

"What a bitch. People in this town are the worst." Amy lived one town over and always liked to start the day with complaints about others, the town, or both.

"Ya, it's fine. I'm late. My bad." Maggie didn't have the energy to get into a bitch fest. She hadn't even woken up yet.

The customer complaining earlier came to Maggie's till and started throwing her groceries down on the belt with a snarl. Maggie smiled at her, and the woman did not return the gesture. The woman wore a winter hat with an intricate owl embroidered on the front. Maggie realized she was staring at it when the woman stopped loading groceries and was staring back.

"I like your owl," she said as she lowered her eyes. A feeling like Deja Vu passed through her mind. Had there been an owl in her dream?

Customer after customer, the cashiers did their best to smile and receive the dirty looks, snide comments, and rudeness. You would think everyone in the customer service industry was at fault for the world's problems the way people treated them. What had happened to people? Why was it so hard to be pleasant? Amy was going on and on about this person and that person. At the back of the store, you could hear complaints from the bakery staff. You only heard people laughing when they were making fun of how stupid people were. The local keyboard warriors would smile and look you in the eyes while you rang them through, even though they were talking shit the night before on social media. The town was boiling over with a toxic stench that was suffocating everyone.

Maggie was getting numb. She was tired, and the world was heavy.

After an eight-hour shift, Maggie got home and walked through the door. Her three-year-old son, Luke, and the one-year-old dog, Floyd, ran to greet her. The child frantically wanted juice, snacks, and cuddles. The dog desperately wanted to go outside. Her husband was in his home office working, seemingly oblivious to her arrival. She feeds her son and holds him while he eats. The dog lays his giant head on her other knee and impatiently waits for his turn. Once the boy is absorbed into a tv show, Maggie tells Luke, "Mommy is going outside with Floyd, okay? You yell for Daddy if you need anything." "Okay."

The small family has a small house on a five-acre treed lot on the edge of town. Maggie and Floyd head to the woods to walk the "loop," as they call it. Walking in the woods is usually one of Maggie's favorite ways to decompress, but today it just feels like another item on the to-do list. As she realizes this, she stops in her tracks and takes a deep breath. Her legs are burning from the cold. Her face is damp with breath while she scans the woods to locate Floyd; she does so just as he spins three times and poops. "Good poop." The two of them pick up speed on the second half of the loop, the sun is disappearing, but luckily the temperature feels better as the wind dies.

Upon their return to the backyard, Maggie contemplates the simplicity of the life she finds herself in. Is this it? She feels like she should be doing more somehow. Is she languishing? She doesn't know how to find the energy to try harder. Just then, she gets a ringing in her right ear and notices an owl perched in a tree twenty feet ahead of her. She stops. Luckily, Floyd is oblivious. She stands there, taking in every second of the owl's presence. "Hi, sweety," she whispers. The owl makes eye contact—images from her dream and the Deva Vu feeling return, and the two share a moment. The stresses of the day evaporate. The owl flies off, releasing Maggie from her stance, and she heads home.

The evening is like all the others: make dinner, eat dinner, clean up dinner, bath time, story time, bedtime, mom time. The house is finally quiet, the dog is sleeping on the couch, the child is sleeping in his bed, and both husband and wife retreat to their separate favorite rooms in the house to unwind. But, with the owl still on her mind, Maggie opens up her phone.

Google search: types of owls in Ontario

The face of the barn owl was unmistakable: the white heart-like shape was burnt into her mind's eye.

Google search: what is the symbolism of a barn owl

Google search: what does a barn owl mean in your dream

Google search: hidden knowledge

Google search: intuitive insight

Google search: spiritual foretelling

Maggie slowly satiated her interest in the barn owl and then moved on to flipping through videos to quietly zone out. The algorithm had picked up on her newfound interest, and a series of content flowed related to spirituality, manifestation, timelines, and totems. Finally, inspired and tired, Maggie took herself to bed, and as she fell asleep, she followed the direction of one of the short clips; she quietly whispered to herself, 'Thank you for your guidance. I am listening. Thank you for my joy." Maggie didn't allow that last sentence to sit weird, even though she hadn't felt much joy over the past year.

Amy greeted Maggie with her usual complaint about the town. Her voice was a constant in the background while Maggie rang through customers. Maggie smiled and countered the negativity with how beautiful the sunrise had been over the dam. Their boss walked by shouting orders in her usual abrasive way, maybe even more theatrical than usual. The day continued into a frenzied afternoon. Maggie desperately tried to hang on to her optimism. As she did, she saw these angry and sad people complaining about slippery floors, shouts about empty shelves, and multiple complaints that the snow was piled wrong outside. Maggie witnessed a level of desperation in people, even those that 'appeared' happy; there was a tiredness apparent. Maggie looked across the faces and saw things she had never noticed before. She didn't ignore them or allow that feeling of numbness to rescue her. Instead, Maggie allowed herself to be fascinated by it and watch it like a tv show setting up the season finale. Maggie wanted to scream at them to take a look at themselves. She thought of the peace that the owl had delivered to her and wanted to hold on to it. But damn, if this town wasn't making it hard to stay bright.

Walking home in the cold wasn't enough to shake off the feeling of that afternoon. It was unusually dark out for 4:00 p.m. Maggie looked at her watch and saw 4:44; in shock, she picked up her pace. How did she lose forty minutes? The stress was boiling over, and as she walked past the dam, she stopped and screamed. It felt guttural, like all her energy went into it, but she hardly even heard it. Is the dam that loud? She stood there catching her breath when she saw a pair of glowing eyes across the river. She kept her eyes on them as she continued on her way. The glowing dots moved from her and, like laser beams, pointed toward something on the ice. An otter was eating a fish he had pulled up through a small hole. It was so dark, yet, it was like there was a street light on the scene. The owl swooped out of its tree and tried to steal the fish from the otter. The otter held on as the owl flew up and turned to make another swipe. This time, it landed on the ice and fought with the animal. The two exchanged blows, the owl using its talons and beak and the otter jumping and squirming out of the way. Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, something takes hold of both and pulls them through the hole in the ice—the owl, the otter, even the fish, all gone. Maggie's heart was pounding. What the hell just happened? She felt like screaming but again, she couldn't produce a sound.

Maggie wakes suddenly with Luke beside her bed. He is holding a stuffy and pressing it into her face. Drenched in sweat, she kisses the boy and makes her way to the bathroom. She washes her face and feels her pulse slow to a comfortable speed. She can hear her son laughing and calling for her outside the door. A part of Maggie wants to open the door, grab her phone and start googling. What did that mean? And a part of her knows what it meant. She could dive down the rabbit hole, focused on what had just happened, or she could focus on her little boy, who lived oh so presently.

It was cold outside. The house was chaotic. The dog was hyper, the child was full of energy, and both needed attention. Her husband continued to sleep. She chose the warm house. The laughing, happy, healthy child. The sweet dog. As she opened the door to let the dog out, she turned around, and her husband was on the floor playing with Luke. She got down on the floor, and they played together. The parents shared smiles when their son entertained himself by building a slide out of the cushions. There was joy, in small doses. She had to remember to look for them instead of allowing the waves of negativity to knock her over. Little by little, her days changed after she remembered that small act. Curiosity instead of judgment, present instead of past or future, moments instead of days. She felt transformed by this small act, but it wasn't small at all. It was that little piece of energy she had been looking for that she thought would be too hard to engage.