Dream
Sequence

We all dream when we sleep at night. I often don’t remember mine. But when I was very young, up to my pre-teen years, I was plagued with two nightmares that were very upsetting, not only for me, but for my mother as well. She told me when I had nightmares, which were frequent, she would walk into my room and I was sitting up in bed, eyes wide open, shaking and whimpering, and she couldn’t wake me. Needless to say, I freaked her out! I can understand why!

I am a strong believer in reincarnation. And I firmly believe those nightmares were past life memories from two separate, previous lifetimes. Several years ago, I met with a psychic for a reading who strongly felt that I needed to know about some of my past lives (actually, her words were: “they [her spirit guides] are telling me you need to know about your past lives”). In all my previous lifetimes, she related, I died young and never reached my potential, so my drive in THIS lifetime to achieve my potential is strong. And at age 67, that drive is stronger than ever.

During her reading, I learned that, in my most recent lifetime, I was a young man, a fisherman somewhere in the British Isles, Ireland, I think. I worked in a boatyard, or shipyard, where there were sheds and equipment that outfitted/refitted boats. I have memories from one of my recurrent nightmares where I was in a long room with floor to ceiling pulleys connected by wide belts. I remember hearing a rhythmic banging noise. According to the psychic, my hand was caught in one of the the belts and/or pulleys and I sustained a serious injury to my hand. That was one of my terrifying dreams, but not as bad as this next one:

The psychic told me that in another lifetime, I was a battlefield nurse in the Crimean War (the same war where Florence Nightingale became famous for bringing her ministry to the horrible triage and hospital conditions, where sanitary conditions were non-existent and the men were dying of preventable diseases such as cholera, dysentery, gangrene, etc.), and that I died of typhoid or another disease on the battlefield. Though this was interesting, and made sense to me, I didn’t connect that lifetime with my second, more frightening nightmare.

But first, a little back story: My mother often told us that her grandfather, a French citizen, fought in the Crimean War for England. He was wounded on the battlefield and was treated by Florence Nightingale (or realistically, probably one of her nurses). He survived, was awarded the Victoria Medal for his service, and returned to France to resume his life.

In that dream, I saw part of a field. There was a wooden post (which I had equated in my child’s mind to a mailbox post), and near the post was a single flower. I remember hearing a thunderous booming noise in the distance, and the noise got closer and louder until finally, the flower and post were destroyed. I remember explaining to my mother that the ‘noise’ destroyed the flower. That dream was absolutely terrifying to me. I never understood what it could’ve been until very recently.

To make sense of what those nightmares were all about, I have started to revisit what I remember about them. About a month before writing this, I lay in bed, half awake, and meditated on the dream. I saw the field, and the flower. My vantage point was at ground level. Suddenly, I saw my arm flop outward toward the flower. Then I had the revelation that the ‘field’ was a battlefield. The ‘noise’ was artillery and I probably died from being hit by the barrage of cannonballs or bullets. I don’t know if I was sick with typhoid or cholera at that time, but what I understand to be true was that I WAS a nurse on the battlefield in Crimea, possibly at Sebastipol. And it’s very possible that I was that nurse, under the leadership of Florence Nightingale, who cared for my great-grandfather.

And so begins my most recent journey.

“Dream Sequence” uses my series “The Red Door Allegory” as a starting point for this exploration. I’m not sure where it will take me, but I’ve begun my research into what my lifetime as a Crimean War nurse might have entailed. I fully expect that the journey will lead me elsewhere but for now, this is where I decided to start. More to come, at some point!

Nancy

For more information on this work, please contact the artist, Nancy White Cassidy at nwcassidyfineart@gmail.com
or by calling (603) 662-2074.