Echoes of Dreams or Past Lives?

When gathering trash from the tide lines, it echoes a distant memory...

As a child, I used to get annoyed when taking walks on the beach with my grandmother. She was a dear woman, but she was concientious to a fault. She could leave no butt, cup, can, or chip bag on the beach if she passed within sight of it. That meant we'd walk from the water to the dunes to the water, in an endless zigzag, gathering all the flotsam and jetsam. As an impatient child and a impudent teen, I just wanted to get where we were going -- I admired her ethic, but didn't get why she couldn't just take a vacation!

I had a recurring dream when I was a child. In my dream, I was at the beach. The sea was very rough, and waves were crashing against a set of very steep, stone steps. The steps were almost too high for me to climb and stretched as far into the distance along the coast as I could see, though there were only a few dozen leading to the wild waves. In the waves, toys, furniture, people, the objects of everyday life, bobbed and sank. For some reason, it was my job to save everything. I maniacally swam into the sea, tossing everything a could back up the steps, back to dry ground. And now, in my adult life, I clean this refuse from the beach, as my grandmother before me.

In another frequent and terrifying dream, the sea was contained in a wood-sided house on a vast grass prarie. My sister was in the house, upstairs, watching helplessly as the water threatened to engulf and drown her. Entering the house was like walking into a coral reef -- the sight was beautiful, but my lungs are not adapted for water breathing. As the water rose higher and higher in the house, I panicked, trying desperately to find my sister before she drowned -- not a happy night's rest!

I have to wonder - what are these dreams? My friend tells me I died in Atlantis when I was hit by something when I was underwater. She tells me I have a strong connection to the sea that grows throughout the ages, that I am fulfilling my destiny with my current work and the projects that are growing from it. She says to soldier on. I'm not sure what she means, or what to believe, but I do know I have a connection to the sea. Is it metaphysical, or just intellectual? We all rely on the sea for 70% of our oxygen (from plankton), for food, for rain, for global weather patterns and the benefits of ocean currents, for so much. A healthy sea is vital for human survival, but my friend thinks there's more to it. I guess time will tell...