Last night, I had a strange dream that has stuck with me into the morning. I suspect that it is pulling in themes from various things going on in my life, but instead of attempting to analyze it, I want to write down as much of it as I can.

I was working at a hospital and received a large manilla envelope. It was full of various clippings and artifacts. One of the first things I found was a note. It was addressed to Aldon Hynes, so I felt quite clear I was the intended recipient. The exact address was unintelligible, but it was in Adarnton, KS. I don’t believe there is a city named Adarnton in Kansas. However, it struck me that Adarnton was the first initial and the last name of my first wife.

I haven’t had my ex-wife show up in a dream in a long long time, and that seemed really weird. Yet the whole thing seemed weirder still. It was an unexpected package and I wondered how it found its way to me. As I read some of the notes it became apparent that an elderly widow had given the package to a hospital administrator in Texas and asked that he get the package to me. Somehow, he managed to find the hospital I worked at and got it delivered through some sort of inter-hospital mail.

My job at the hospital was unclear. It wasn’t a medical job, nor was it an administrative job. It seemed to have some sort of therapeutical role related to helping people use social media.

I knew a little bit about the elderly widow. A few weeks ago, I had led a conference call on learning to use social media. The plan had been to do it as a webinar and to explore various aspects of social media. However, the group I ended up talking to was not especially experienced with technology and a webinar was too complicated, as was going beyond anything other than simple blogging.

The participants were long time friends and they took to the idea of using blogs to stay better in touch with one another during their final years. They would share stories of their present day lives, visits from grandchildren and great grandchildren, memories of their past; perhaps a little online scrapbooking or sharing other crafts they were working on.

The woman who sent me the package was, for lack of a better term, the queen bee in waiting of this small social group. Unfortunately, the queen bee herself was ill and could not join the discussion. A few weeks later, the queen bee died, and the package was various clipping and memories of the queen bee.

I started to look through the package. I knew that there was a lot in there, a lot of deep personal memories, and something of great value, if I could figure it out. There were pointers to the beginning of blogs of various members of the group, and I was pleased to see the progress they were making.

At this point, waking life intruded on my dream. It was time to start the day. Yet waiting for me in my dreams is a packet with an important secret.