1 essay
Dreams
“Fred, is that you in this painting?”
I squinted at the canvas on the wall of my father’s Muddy Wheel Pottery Studio in Albuquerque. Clay dust and the smell of earth drifted through the air. In the painting, the figure of a Black man reclined on his back. Facing the viewer, the top of his bald, clay-splattered head rested on a potter’s wheel for a pillow. One clay-speckled hand embraced a blue pot. As he slept, his creations—anthropomorphic vases that morphed into faces—stood or laid on the floor around him. Above his head floated a dream cloud in which a new creation formed—the face of a woman whose hair rose into a bottleneck. From the cloud, she ogled the potter who would create her when he awoke.
My father looked up from his work bench, his arms covered in clay, a lump before him. His eyes glinted as if I had asked him, “Tell me a story.”
He answered with a tale he had told many people, but never his firstborn son. “Once, I was doing an art show in Lubbock, Texas, when this painter, a white dude and his wife, came up to my booth and looked at my pottery. He got this real confused look on his face because he was looking at all of my fantastic sculptures and forms, you know, and he asked, ‘Where do you get your ideas from?’
“And I told him, ‘Basically, my ideas and forms come from my dreams. Usually, I get up and draw immediately if it’s something that’s important, but if it’s bugging me, I get up and start making it.’
“This white guy was a bigot and real rude. He said, ‘A nigger with dreams? You got to be kidding me.’
“But his wife was right there. She was looking at my candelabras and crying, because they were so powerful. Big tears came down her face,” My father swiped a hand across his face to mimic her tears. “She had never seen anything like this before. She said, ‘Bob, you got to buy this for me.’
“So now this painter, this bigot, Bob, was embarrassed because he had insulted the artist and his wife wanted to buy his candelabra. She got to have it and kept going on about it.
“The guy and his wife went away, but before the show closed, he came back and gave me this painting, Asleep at the Wheel. He was a landscape artist but he painted a portrait of me. It shows me sleeping on a potter’s wheel and dreaming about my next creation, because I always tell people my ideas come to me from my dreams. He said, ‘Fred, I’m sorry I made an ass of myself, but will you accept this painting in trade for that candelabra? My wife keeps bugging me about it. You’re a great artist because you proved that your dreams can have a powerful impact on people.’ “So I accepted this painting in trade for the candelabra.” My father grinned at his prize.
I stood slack-jawed in front of the painting and examined it closer. “Wow.”
The face of the woman-vase in the dream—light-skinned and red lipped—resembled my mother. How did the painter know how my mother looked?
#
After my father died, I packed his slides, poems, and other documents into boxes for their long journey to California. The damp smell of mud had subsided in his pottery studio since work on the potter’s wheel ceased, but I dispersed more clay dust into the air when I grabbed art binders and ledgers, which had not been moved in years.
I studied the wall above his work desk, strewn with tools he will never use again. Asleep at the Wheel, my father’s portrait, hung unclaimed. I knew he left me instructions to get his papers when he died, but who will get his portrait?
I left the pottery studio and entered the main house. “Kristen, can I have Fred’s portrait?”
The widow’s eyes gazed at me with a question. “Which one?”
I had forgotten that several artists had given Fred portraits over the decades.
My hands trembled as they removed the painting from the wall, leaving behind a rectangular ghost. I never dreamed I would own this portrait. Most portraits showed a person’s face. This showed my father’s bald head—his most distinguishing feature. During the Black is Beautiful movement of the 1960s, an old newspaper clipping showed my father wearing a “Bald is Beautiful” button. I ran my fingers over my scalp. I wish I found that button, too.
At home, I unwrapped the painting and hung it above the entrance. My father’s bald head shunned the viewer. I imagined he ignored my comings and goings as he dreamed.
#
I awoke from a fading dream. My partner slept beside me. Our Chihuahua, Mina, nestled against the warmth of my body beneath the blankets. Before the dream vanished in my transitional state between sleep and awake, I closed my eyes to prevent myself from squinting in the dark, darted a hand from beneath my bald head, and grabbed a notebook on the nightstand. My fingers felt along the book’s edges until they found the last entry. I fumbled a pen, wrote a few ideas, and resumed sleep.
Thirty minutes later I woke again. My partner and dog slept. My ideas did not.
But if it’s bugging me, I get up and start making it.
I moved Mina aside, threw my legs off the bed, and grabbed my notepad and pen. I staggered from the bedroom, leaving behind warmth, companionship, and sleep. Adjacent Asleep at the Wheel at the entrance, I closed the bathroom door to write.
Andre Le Mont Wilson was born the son of poets in Los Angeles. His work has appeared in Rattle and The Sun Magazine. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He teaches storytelling and writing on Zoom to adults with disabilities in the San Francisco Bay Area.