Dream
Archeology with New England Ancestors
By Rev. Amy E. Brucker
For
me, dream archeology is the waking-life investigation of images that surface
while we sleep, or that unfold as we make our way through a dream (shamanic)
journey. Dream archeology can help us validate our dreams and reveal the
depths of our connection to Spirit, our Self, the past, and the present—and
maybe even the future.
Years
ago, I questioned a colleague about his commitment to recording all of his
dreams and waking life experiences. My dream life was prolific, resulting in
four or five dreams a night. The amount of time required to record so many
dreams was too much, I argued. Besides, I wasn’t sure that it was worth the
effort.
My
colleague wisely assured me that I was being delivered bricks of gold on a
nightly basis, and I was in effect saying, “No thanks!” How true this proved
to be. I rediscovered the importance of my journals after returning from a
week-long program called “Reclaiming the Ancient Dreamways,” led by Robert
Moss. While at this workshop I entered fully into a web of dreams and
coincidences that had been leading me, over a period of 15 years, to connect
with my colonial ancestors and their American Indian counterparts.
During
Robert’s program I made a shamanic journey to the land of the departed,
where I was greeted by my ancestor Jonathan Padelford (1628-1669) and an
Indian identified as Meeshkawa, who seemed to be either Mohawk or Wampanoag.
The two men anxiously pleaded for my assistance. They asked me to help heal
their people by reclaiming the ancient ways and honoring my ancestral
lineage. Their plea and desperation brought me to tears, and I vowed to do
my best to honor their request.
When I
returned home from the workshop, I started to research my ancestors and
their connection to the American Indians in the early 1600s. As I followed
the threads of every lead I could imagine, an old dream memory surfaced. The
title of the dream was “Thanksgiving Day Massacre.”
I had
no recollection of when I started keeping a dream journal, so I thought
perhaps the dream might have slipped into one of the years when I was not as
intent on recording my dreams. The dream, as it turns out, was recorded on
September 6, 1991 in my first journal devoted exclusively to dreams. This
was the second dream I recorded:
Thanksgiving Day Massacre
I am on a boat with a
swing stage. White men are shooting Indians who wear red face and body
paint. Dead Indians bodies are lying everywhere on shore. From the boat
I yell in distress, “What are you doing? Indians are people just like
you!”
In the next scene it is
Thanksgiving. The Indians are now dressed like the white people, but
when it comes time to eat, they are sent to a basement that is dank and
gloomy. I go to the basement with them. We share a meal together while
the rest of the white people remain upstairs.
In
the last scene, it is a year later and Thanksgiving again. The Indians
are sent to the basement, but this time it is re-finished and warm with
carpeting and furniture. I stay with them again and try to reassure them
that it will get progressively better. “Next year we will have a table,”
I say.
I
have a future vision that has not come to pass. I see everyone eating
together at the same table. I hold the vision and know that I am
instrumental in helping it come true.
This
dream entry helped anchor the “dream archeology” I was conducting. My
journals provided enough information to help me discover that, like the
Indians in my dream, the Wampanoag were known to early settlers as the “red
men” because they painted their faces and bodies with a red pigment. The
Wampanoag lived near my colonial ancestors in Massachusetts. Further
research established that the two communities came into contact with one
another during the devastating King Philip’s war that nearly wiped out all
Wampanoag Native Peoples.
The
dream image of a boat with a swing stage is highly significant to me because
my grandfather, a direct descendant of Jonathan Padelford, created a
paddlewheel boat business in 1969. His first boat, complete with swing
stage, was named Jonathan Padelford.
A more
literal interpretation of my dream tells me that the people of Jonathan
Padelford were fighting with the Native Peoples who painted their bodies
red, and that Thanksgiving was an integral part of the relationship between
the two people. The Wampanoag are known historically, not only for their
role in the King Philip’s War, but also for their generosity in helping the
Pilgrims survive the harsh New England winters. Together, the Pilgrims and
Wampanoag shared the harvest festival, a festival that eventually turned
into the American Thanksgiving tradition.
My
dream also tells me that I may have a role in acting as bridge between the
two peoples and their ideologies. Coincidentally, my last name, Brucker,
means bridge-tender.
In
1991, I didn’t know what to think of my Thanksgiving dream. Although it took
me fifteen years to understand the significance, it planted a seed in me
that sprouted and has been growing ever since.
This
wasn’t the only seed planted in 1991. In December, I recorded an experience
in a different journal. My trip to the Kahnawake Mohawk Indian Reserve just
south of Montreal was an impromptu decision. On the reserve, I discovered
that the Mohawks are part of the greater Iroquois Confederacy. I met an
Iroquois woman who singled me out of a large group, looked deep into my eyes
and said with conviction, “I know you.” I felt her power and was stunned.
I’d never met this woman before. She seemed to be alluding to an ancient
relationship that went beyond my understanding. At the time I did not know
that dreams were a significant part of the Iroquois legacy.
Thoughts of “Thanksgiving Day Massacre” lingered through my mind as I made
my way through the reserve. There was no waking life connection between the
Iroquois and the Indians in my dream, but the dream images haunted me
nonetheless, begging for attention.
In
retrospect, 1991 was a big year for me. All of these experiences were
swirling around in my daily life, but I had no conscious notion of the
significance. Today, as I page through my dream journals, I realize that
they are archeological gems. They hold keys to unfolding stories of my
ancestors and their American Indian counterparts.
Visit
Amy Brucker’s website
www.amybrucker.com
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