I was very grateful a short time ago to wake up and realize that I was in Vanuatu and not back home.  I did it twice.  I was awaking from bad dreams.

In the first dream it just dawned upon me that I had forgotten to feed the calf that I had locked in the barn.  I had forgotten to feed it for days.  It had been so long that I would either find it emaciated or dead.  I felt terrible.  The poor thing was locked up, helpless, and depending upon me.  I had neglected my duty, and now it was starving to death.

Not only had I forgotten to feed the calf, I had forgotten to milk the cow, its mother.  She was surely suffering.

And not only that, I also had two pigs locked up in another pen in the barn, and they hadn’t been fed, either.

How could I have been so careless and neglectful!?  I was scared to death to learn what suffering my forgetfulness had caused.  I was just set to run out the door and over to the barn when I awoke.

“I am so glad to be here!” I shouted into the darkness.  My startled wife giggled, and asked, “What did you dream?”

As I settled down and prepared to go back to sleep, I heard a small voice in my mind.  It said, “Feed my sheep.”

Suddenly I understood.  We’re all surrounded by people who are as helpless and starving and as dependent upon us to feed them as my calf that was locked up in the barn.  If I don’t do my duty and feed them, I know how ashamed and awful my neglect will cause me to feel.

I went back to sleep.  I had another dream about forgetfulness.  I wonder if my dreams about forgetfulness were occasioned by my real-life experience yesterday.  Yesterday I went to pick up the lumber I’d ordered from my friend, Alistair.  Before leaving I had carefully put the checkbook by the door so that I could pay for the lumber.

“I’ve forgotten my checkbook,” I told Alistair.

“That’s all right,” he said.  “You have an honest face,” and he let me take the lumber.

The bad part about the story is that when I arrived back at the house it dawned upon me, without looking, that the checkbook was sitting on the seat behind me.  I had picked the checkbook up as I’d left the house after all.  I had forgotten that I’d remembered.  I had to go all the way back to Alistair’s place to give him the check that I’d had all along.

Is this a story about my age or about my neglectfulness?

My forgetfulness and oblivion reached new heights in my second dream.  My 66-year-old wife had previously informed me that she was pregnant.  I’d forgotten!!  She was patiently reminding me.  It was time for the baby to be delivered, and I’d done nothing to prepare.

Understandably both of these dreams put me into a panic.

Let it be known that I am grateful beyond words to find myself in Vanuatu this morning.