Memorias

Yesterday, on the plane somewhere between Miami and Rio, not knowing what time it was or even if it was day or night outside the plastic window shade, I drifted into the dreamlike state just before actual sleep where my writer's mind runs wild. I composed every latent blog entry about the last three weeks, word for word, entire sentences and even paragraphs forming effortlessly, my tongue tracing soft syllables on the backsides of my teeth.

If I'd had a notebook in hand, perhaps I could have recorded those complete bursts of thought for later publication, but any writing implements were buried deep in the backpack on which my feed rested, wedged under the seat in front of me. I sighed, drifting closer to true sleep.

This happens to me often, this effortless writing stage just before my brain makes the switch to unconsciousness. In these quiet moments, free of the filters of waking life, I am able to find words, combinations of words, that express what I never quite seem able to capture on the blog screen, in the e-mail to an old friend, even in the blank pages of my neglected journal.

My dreamstate writing is flowing and alive while it lasts, then gone just as quickly once the amnesia of sleep takes over. In the morning, I am left with the blurred impressions of moments too perfect to have existed in waking life, much like one remembers an "I love you" whispered prior to surgery by a friend who has never before expressed such a sentiment, a sweet first kiss in the midst of too many glasses of wine, or the relief of a cool towel held by a caring hand that wipes away fever in the middle of the night.