I look up from the dog that died in the fight and the dog that lived stare at us mockingly. I promise to rip that stray "yaller" dog apart with my bare hands for taking on my poor old, kindly mongrel dog. But then my dead dog leaps up and wags her tail. She hasn't died after all.

Wha-?

And in that moment of nauseous disorientation, I suddenly realize that I am dreaming. I look to see I'm dreaming of dogfights in a tiny house. What a silly thing to waste my dreams on!

In my years of on-again, off-again dreaming, I know that my body is at a heightened state of awareness. I'm on the edge of waking up, but I'm also near the edge of discovering the heart of my most mysterious of dreams.

I call for Peter, my dream teacher which might call a spirit guide and step out of the door of the dog fighting house to leap up into the cloudy blue sky. And the sky keeps me there. I still call for Peter, but he does not show up in my flying lucid dream that night.

The lucid dreams where I don't meet Peter but am searching for him are more mysterious to me than the dreams when the both of us meet up. It was Peter who patiently and impatiently taught me how to recognize when I was dreaming and how to have some fun in the Dreamrealm, such as learning how to fly.

I've been dreaming of Peter for over twenty years. At first, he hung around my dreams quite a lot. When I caught the hang of lucid dreaming, I could not only change my circumstances (such as suddenly being able to fly), but I could also change the dream's landscape and background. I could easily find Peter in those days.

Over the years, the nocturnal search to find Peter has gotten a lot harder. I also now have had my ability to change a dream's landscape taken away. I have to deal with wherever I'm stuck in. Peter has changed a lot over the years, too, becoming even more enigmatic and precious.

At times, I remember to ask him things before I awake, such as, "How come you run off again so soon when I find you?"

"I'm very busy," he replies. "I can't schedule as much time with you as I used to do."

And yet, he's gone through the trouble to train me in lucid dreaming. He also has ingrained in me to find him whenever I realize I am dreaming. It boggles my mind as to what the point of it all is, after over twenty years of dream training with this dream phantom. What he wants me and other dreamers like me for is a mystery.

One time recently I found Peter near a train station. He gave me a very comforting embrace and was able to carry me until I woke up. "I wish I could find you sooner," I told him, "but I guess that's what dreams are like."

He stared at me and shook his head, "No," he said softly, "that's not what dreams are like at all."

Learn more about this author, Rena Sherwood.
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