Often I wake up and it’s a mad rush to clean up in the kitchen (just to make a mess again), wake up Seraphina (who is not a morning person), listen to Matagi tell me about his latest creation (he gets up and starts working at about 3 AM everyday – so by 7, he is usually excited about something), try to grab a few minutes of solitude (note, I said, “try”), remind S to “hurry up and get dressed, brush your teeth, brush your hair, find your shoes, eat breakfast, etc., etc.”, have breakfast, and get Matagi and Seraphina out the door by 8 so Seraphina can go to school.

By the time they leave, I am often dazed and ready to go back to bed! Worse, I often feel like I didn’t “do” the morning right, didn’t move quickly enough to see dad and child off efficiently and cheerily. Then, I question how I found myself in the role of mom seeing the family off for their day while I have been jolted into a busy wakefulness where I feel like a hamster running on a wheel.

My intention has been to leave for the studio at 7 AM while Matagi helps Seraphina get prepared for the day. Three months into school and that hasn’t happened once. I am still in yoga pants and t-shirt, half asleep and burning oatmeal by then. By eight, I am hopefully ready to go to the studio to work.

Morning used to be my personal time, where I’d grab a few moments of quiet to reflect on my dreams and my plans for the day. I like to be informed by my dreams and subconscious self, and it takes me a little time to integrate that information into my consciousness. I need to write a little, and space out with my mug of coffee or tea, and imagine larger than life scenarios and ways that I can make them happen.

Truthfully, my hectic mornings have nothing to do with Matagi or Seraphina. I stopped making the time for my mornings years ago; I just fell out of the habit of self-reflection (probably because my life was not easy to look at for a time). Instead, I have tried to stuff my time with productivity, which, in fact, has managed to have the opposite effect, especially when it comes to creativity. It feels as if the last 10 years were a lost decade, and now that I am (back to) embracing my life (let alone my life as an artist), I need that little time in the wee hours to daydream—and I know from personal experience that taking time for myself works.

If anything, my loved ones are reflecting to me what I need. Whatever I feel I am missing, I need to make happen. No one can day dream for me, no one can get up early for me. It is up to me.

This morning I woke up before dawn with the intention of writing down my dreams and of having time to myself. And that is exactly what I did. I got up at 4:45 AM. Matagi was washing the dishes (oh, happiness!), had made me a cup of coffee, and was off to his studio. I kissed him good-bye and wrote my dreams down (before I was too awake). I checked on Seraphina. I had some worries, so I meditated and sent them reiki. I wrote some more. I pulled a tarot card. I wrote some more. Checked on Seraphina. Checked my email – received a note from Sivananda that spurred me to write this. Made breakfast. Now I am writing, this.

So here are the first few paragraphs of my dream: I walked toward the fields. Behind every haystack couples were making love. Even the smallest clumps of grass were occupied. It didn’t seem possible that people could be so horizontal, almost flat. From certain angles, the fields appeared empty and still. Serene. Serene and inviting.

There was a row of trees I was interested in reaching. The trees were deep within the field. I knew if I could get to the trees, I would find my lover.

Walking was like floating. Floating above bodies writhing in the grass. I walked through the orgy toward the trees. Limbs, breasts, buttocks, torsos sprawled like land mines.