Visions [The Evil House]

January of this year, I began journaling my dreams. The experience has been enlightening. I have discovered numerous patterns and correlations. Some of my dreams are hard to forget.

Approximately 30 years ago, while I was engaged to be married to my first wife, I had a terrible dream. I woke up swinging, and nearly socked my fiancee right there in bed. Back then, bad dreams were common.

I can still remember that dream. I was walking up a stone path towards the front door of a small [evil] house. It was dark, snowing, and freezing. Someone had shoveled the path. On each side of the path, several frozen bodies could be seen beneath the deep snow.

As I stepped on to the porch, a hulking figure opened the front door. The man was holding a large knife in his right hand, partially hidden behind his right hip. I remember knowing that he was going to stab me to death. I could not escape unless I woke myself up from the dream. So, that’s precisely what I did; I opened my eyes and stopped the dream.

Not long after that dream, I married my fiancee. I was married to my first wife for seven years, and we had two children. Three years after our divorce, I began dating a woman that I met at my job. Within a short time, I moved out of my place and in with her. She was renting a small one-bedroom house.

I can’t remember how long it took me to realize that her house was the house from my bad dream. It’s been twenty years since we were together. She was the same woman from another piece that I recently posted here on my blog. The stripper that I lived with for more than one year. That piece was titled [One Word Stands Out].

Those were dark times. I spent that year surrounded by evil. Not my first nor my last time I tested my resilience. I will not test it again with an unhealthy relationship.

Joseph Shanklin

July 27, 2020