12/05/04
A Little Piece Of The Island

This dream was small and kind of sad.

I had somehow acquired an antique "stamp." Perhaps I'd won it at eBay or something. Ma had something to do with this; maybe she was in my room with me when I was looking at it. I was sitting on my bed admiring my "stamp," which was more like a teabag or little packet of some kind, kind of see-through, like tissue paper and sealed at all four ends. It was perhaps a couple of inches long, taller than it was wide. At first it contained some tiny plant item, like a piece of greenery or a flower, of course dried. But then I think it may have contained both that and a bit of soil, and then it seemed to be only soil but that might be because the soil was what I was focused on primarily. This soil was from Mackinac Island.

At first I think the soil was like little grains you might put in a fishtank--gravel. But then it was like dark moist potting soil. There might have been some association with the Round Island Lighthouse, which is right near Mackinac Island, and highly visible in the area, but I don't remember what that association was. I sat on my bed looking at my "stamp" with pride. I noticed that the bottom edge of it was kind of "missing" and torn, and wondered with some anxiety how much of my stamp was missing? Was it a big section--meaning I was missing a lot--or just a tiny bit of the edge, which was acceptable so long as the main part was still visible? After examining it a bit I determined that the damage was minimal and the important part of my stamp still remained. This relieved me and I continued looking at it, handling it carefully. (I might have pulled it out of an envelope when I first got it.) I knew that since it was damaged, it would not be worth so much to a collector or anything, but the mere fact that it was old, it was a piece of something I loved, and *I* had it, was enough to make me happy. (I would always buy a battered copy of a book I want, for an affordable price, rather than a pricey new copy, because it's the content that counts!)

I noticed now--I think I had noticed it earlier but it hadn't bothered me--that there was also a small tear in the side of the stamp. For some reason this had not bothered me since it hadn't really altered the stamp's appearance, but as I handled it a lot, some of the little bit of soil began to spill out into my hands and onto my bed. (It may have been nighttime as my light was on.) At first I didn't seem to notice or care about this so much, but then I realized that this was my little piece of Mackinac Island which was spilling away! Horrified, I tilted the stamp back up and tried to pour the bit of soil back in with the rest. But of course it was difficult and not all of it went back in; some scattered over my other hand. And as soon as I did that, I accidentally tilted the stamp back the wrong way and MORE soil spilled out! (It's almost like there was more soil in there than there could have been, volumewise.)

I told myself I would HAVE to be more careful, and tried once more to pour the spilled soil back inside. I think my eyes welled up with tears. I felt so sad that it was so damaged--I think the tear had grown--and that I was just making it worse, and losing what little thing I had to keep me happy. It seemed like such a trivial thing, but it made me very depressed. Ma might have been watching me and wondering why I was so upset. I just sat on my bed with the stamp in my left hand and a bit of soil in my right, trying to think of how I could fix this without making it worse, and hating that the thing I loved could so easily slip away from me. :(

Lots of possible real-life associations here. In real life I HAVE been bidding more than I should ^_^ on some antiquated items at eBay, which mostly have to do with Mackinac Island. I prefer pre-war items since they might have information about the landmarks which no longer exist there--for example, the Fairy Arch, which I puzzled about for quite a while. (See "In Search Of The Fairy Arch"--the real truth of the matter?--it was blown up to help fortify the shore road from erosion, during WWII. This information really distressed me in real life. -_- ) So every day I search eBay for interesting Mackinac Island items, and some I've bid on lately are an old book, an old (but post-war) booklet, and an old map from a magazine (pre-war). My most recent acquisition, the map, I actually bought at a higher price rather than bid on it for a lower price, because I did not want anyone else to get it. I snatched it up barely seven hours after it was put up for auction. But I was and am worried that I will not be able to properly read it, and that it will not have all the sites I'm seeking. It's almost exactly like the map of a woman online, which I've been waiting for her to get back to me about, since it's impossible to read some of the words on it; but there are some visible differences. I've been feeling some distress about this situation too, lately.

The fact that the stamp was damaged along the bottom yet that didn't bother me, since the "important" part, the soil, was intact, is kind of like how a while back I saw a copy of an antique book about the island at eBay and agonized over whether I should bid on it--would it even have any information I'd want? On a whim I did a search for the map present in the book at Google and came up with the entire scanned text of the book itself! I saved the page images and didn't bother bidding on the antique book because it was the content which I really wanted--I couldn't care less that the book was an antique.

My sadness over losing my little part of the island might have been related to the fact that, in real life, a few months back I located two online webcams of Mackinac Island, which I dutifully checked every single day, and I loved to see the people passing by on the street when I could not be there. I was hoping I could continue to watch through the winter, but one cam shut down unannounced in late October...and the other, better, cam shut down in November. -_- This depressed me greatly, that I cannot see the place I love so much in the winter (I've only seen it in photos that way), and that I will not be able to see it probably until MAY. Going all winter without a regular glimpse at the daily life there makes me feel sad, like I've been separated from it yet again. :(

I actually kind of like the thought of a little portable packet of soil from the island, now that I think of it (I have a rock or two from there but no soil); perhaps that's something I should keep in mind for a project, like a necklace or something, to keep the island with me always? :)



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