Waiting Water
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick.” — Proverbs 13:12
Dream 8/1/26
We are hosting a traveling minister for lunch. We have a pool party with a big round above-ground pool. 4 people in attendance: Wife, me, Troy (minister) and Charlotte (older single friend whose husband dumped her tragically 25 years ago for a younger model).
I set up a garage sale so my wife can demonstrate how talk to people about the Bible in informal situations. Charlotte and I pretend to be people at the garage sale, which is set up along the wall with the telephone at my grandmother's house. I pick up the phone just to see the cord waggle. it is 30' long.
My wife asks the minister if it's okay for us to get a second house so we can have some peace. He explains that separation isn't recommended for the health of a close-knit marriage. She then asks if I can live on a small raft in the middle of the pool. To demonstrate, I get onto the raft but immediately fall into the water.
The point feels made.
What it means:
Revolving around: tension between appearances, responsibility, and my need for peace.
The minister represents spiritual authority and organizational expectations. We're hosting him, and I feel like my life is under observation or evaluation. The setting is friendly—a lunch and a pool party—but everything also feels very demonstrative. The garage sale isn't really a garage sale; it's a stage for performance. Even Charlotte and I are pretending to be customers.
I wonder if ordinary life is a performance o ra teaching opportunity rather than simply being lived.
The location being my grandmother's house: A home that symbolizes my roots and the environment where many of my beliefs and values were formed for better or worse. The telephone along the wall: Communication, messages, and connection. And the cord, which was only about 6' in reality, is longe enough keep me in contact wherever I need. The preachig display is a point that communication about faith has been deeply woven into my family history—and I'm 54.
The most emotional part of the dream: my wife asks if we can get a second house just so we can have some peace. She doesn't want to to end the marriage. Both of us are searching for breathing room. Instead of divorce, the discussion is about separation, creating distance while remaining connected. It's weird, because in reality, distance is the problem. We need to be closer, more connected, more one-flesh. More sex. More meaningful conversation. More open honesty. More compliments. More respect. More love. Not less. Maybe this is looking for relief from pressure without abandoning the deeper stuff.
The strange solution—that I could live on a small raft in the middle of the pool—made sense in the dream. Like most dream-scapes do. A raft isn't a home. It's temporary, unstable, and isolated. It's as if my unconscious is asking, “Could you survive by simply floating between two worlds?” The answer comes immediately when I try it: I fall into the water.
Water usually represents emotions. The unconscious. Falling off the raft suggests that trying to live in an unstable compromise isn't sustainable. I can't build peace on something that barely floats. Eventually I end up immersed in my emotions instead of remaining safely above them.
And honestly? I think this my life to date—living unstable but dry, with the possibility of of it all crashing down at any moment.
The pool itself is a contained body of water. Unlike the ocean, it's controlled and surrounded by people. So these aren't overwhelming emotions from the outside world but emotions contained within my family and spiritual life. They're close, familiar, and impossible to ignore.
And I frequently am drowned invisibly.
The TLDR of this? Manifestation of longing for peace while showing that fake or temporary fixes won't fix anything. I can't just live high and dry above the saturating waters of a life that doesn't sustain me. I can't live above a reality that could kill me. Drifting in the middle, isolated and lonely, hoping the tension just goes away.
I wonder what genuine peace would look like instead of looking for escape? A theme in my life. I got a glimpse in the last few years, but it came with its own drowning possibilities.
Like most things in this life: there is no pure solution. Only managing until that hope-for 'real life' I've been promised.
It's okay though. Maybe you're like me: you never had or expected the kind of life that would take care of you. Maybe you're life has been trying to manage and keep your raft afloat. If so, here's a nod from the middle of my wet, to yours.
