The Recurring Dream

The “Recurring Dream” is a supernatural story that particularly centers round a strange dream, which Kim was frequently haunted by. Kimberly Clark, the protagonist, has undergone a serious problem which she had the same sort of dream time and again. She is a young and beautiful woman of twenty-five who used to live in London and worked in a large company. She keeps a good position in the office however she has a problem. She sees a mysterious and frightening dream almost every night. In the dream, she finds herself walking on a village lane that is surrounded by white fences on both sides of it. At the end of the lane there is a little hill where on the top a beautiful cottage is located. She enters inside the house and finds in an old man with white hair and white beards fallen asleep. When she goes near him he wakes up and looks at her. But when she tries to speak with him she wakes up and finds herself in her bed in London.

The recurring dream troubles her badly. So, she shares her problem with her roommate Janet Wilson. One day Janet went to her parents’ farm for a few days with Kim to keep Kim free from her problem. On the way Kim falls asleep and has the same dream. She was surprised to see the same place in front of her that she usually sees in her dream. She asks Janet to stop the car and she gets out of it. She sees the same lane, hill and cottage of her dream. As in the dream, she goes towards the house. There she sees assign of “FOR SALE” in front of the door.

As in the dream she knocks at the door and the same old man with white hair and white beard opens the door but he is afraid to see her. So, he immediately closes the door. Kim again requests him to open the door and when he opens it she asks him if the house is on sale. The man replied positively and says that a ghost has haunted the house every night. Then Kim asks him who the ghost is? The old man replies “It is you” then he closes the door.

The Lost Doll

Carmen was the only child of Roberto and Rosa Soto. She was beautiful, bright and loving child. However she was sick from the day of her birth. When she was four, she fell sick seriously and died. A few days after the funeral ceremony, Rosa gave away Carmen’s playthings and clothes to a priest of another village so that she couldn’t see them time and again. She thought that she wouldn’t have another child as she was told at the time of Carmen’s birth. When Roberto knew about it, he became very unhappy because he was hopeful that they would have another child. He asked about her the little dolly which Carmen always carried with her. Rosa said that she didn’t give it away. Then they searched everywhere in the house as well asked the villagers too but they couldn’t find it.

However they soon forgot about the lost doll because Rosa became pregnant. On the first anniversary of the death of Carmen, Rosa gave birth to another child. Roberto and Rosa became very happy. She was named Evangelina, which meant “good news”. When Evangelina grew she looked very much similar to her sister Carmen. But she was healthy girl. When she was about four, she told her mother that she had been sick a long time ago. She also told her aunt that she had a little, beautiful doll with blue eyes and red dress. She had buried it under a tree in the yard. She requested her mother to dig up the doll. When Rosa dug up the ground, she found the lost doll. She looked surprised, shocked and sick because it was difficult for her to believe. Evangelina also said that when she was sick, the nice man came and helped her to bury that doll under the tree.

The story accounts the supernatural significance regarding its particular focus on the concept of reincarnation. When Evangelina was born and grown up, she looked very much similar to that of Carmen’s actions, characters, behaviors and other many things were very much similar. The priest said that God healed Carmen and sent her back in the form of healthy Evangelina. Though Rosa did not believe that her newly born child as the reincarnation of Carmen but she could not reject the mysterious fact towards the end of the story. When Evangelina reported everything about past and about her doll, Rosa could say nothing anymore.

The House Call

“The House Call” is a story from Germany that basically concentrates upon the mysterious arrival of the spirit of a young girl to make a call to the doctor for the treatment of her mother who was suffering from pneumonia for several days. Dr. Brawn, the protagonist of this story, is identified as the famous surgeon in his locality. The day after the Christmas of 1903, he was sitting alone in his dining room in about 9:30 p.m. he was quite tired even unable to take his evening meal due to hard surgery, which he performed on his particular day. He was preparing report about his surgical works and putting his head down the table and dozing. He suddenly woke up when he heard the doorbell. After sometime, he came to know that he had a patient to see. In fact it was a young girl who had come to call the doctor for her mother. Despite his exertion, Braun decided to follow her up to her home and see her mother. The doctor tried to catch her up on the way so that he could have asked many questions related to her mother and about herself. The doctor was old enough to walk on the speed as the girl was making a rush towards her home. Anyway the doctor managed to follow her till he reached at her old apartment where a woman seemed to be lying on the bed.

The doctor checked her up and found that she was suffering from pneumonia. He provided her some medicine that comforted the woman because she was the same woman who once worked in the same hospital as the maintenance staff. The doctor knew that Elda had gone to stay at her brother’s house in the village. The woman further added that she came back just three months ago after her only child Adelheid died. Dr. Braun was very surprised because the very child had been to the doctor to make a call. The woman further showed some of her belongings to revive her memory in her old and least furnished apartment. The ragged shawl and tattered shoes shown to doctor by her mother made him more confused and serious because he had seen the girl in the same dress. When he looked at Elda he found her asleep and returned with his black bag on his hand.

Fear

Armando Gonzalez was a very hard-working man. After he and his wife worked for twenty years, they were able to save 50,000 pesos in a large bank of Mexico City. With a dream of buying a new house Armando went to the bank to withdraw the money as per the suggestion of the agent who wanted the payment in cash. The cashier, in the bank counted the money in a loud voice. Armando thought that everyone knows how much money he had.

The people in the bank began to look at Armando because he had won his hat on backward. But he thought that they were looking at him for his money. A fat man persistently stared at him on account of the way he had worn the hat. When Armando came to the street to wait for the bus, he saw the fat man next to him. He suspected that the fat man was going to rob him, consequently his body began to shake and his heart started beating faster. Armando was waiting for the bus. When the fat man looked at his pocket, Armando thought that he was checking his pistol. In this way the situation made him quite nervous.

When the bus came, Armando got on the bus and sat on the seat behind the driver he found the same man sitting behind him. Armando’s whole dream of buying the new house was in his pocket. He was not happy because he thought that someone would easily cease his dream. Moreover, he saw three boys talking to the fat man that made him truly skeptic, whether they were the helpers of the fat man. Armando got up the bus at the next station from the front door but after sometime the boys also got off from the back door. Armando was sure that they were going to rob him. So, he cried begging help from the bystanders. Then he ran as fast as he could. The boys simply thought that he might have undergone some serious problem so they ran after him for his help. Armando fell in the ground many ground many times. Eventually, the boys meet him, who was weeping like a child and requested not to rob him. He said that he was honest and he had earned that money in fair way through hard work. However when he knew that they were not robbers, he felt shamed. He returned to the bus stop with the boys feeling easy and happy.

The Loving Mother

‘The Loving Mother’ is a story that reveals the everlasting love of a mother to her baby even after her death. It particularly gives central focus round the mysterious arrival of a woman at a pharmacist’s usually at midnight. Shoji Sakota, the protagonist of this story undergoes an unseen fear when he received the frequent visit in the same time almost every night. Sakota was a Japanese pharmacist who lived a lonely life since his wife had died many years before. One stormy winter night, when he was preparing the annual business report, someone knocked at the door. At first he didn’t pay much attention towards the knock thinking that whoever came there would see the drugstore closed and return back. Second time also he heard the knock at the door and thought that the wind was making the sound. The frequency of knock grew that compelled him to think whether he might have some urgent house call. He looked outside from the window quietly and saw there a woman standing and speaking in a trembling voice. He suspected her and thought whether it might be her trick to rob him. But her continuous pleads made him open the door. The woman looked not like a normal woman. She was wearing a torn out gown and her hair was not arranged. She asked Sakota for an ame on a stick stick. Sakota was surprised when he knew about her request because he thought that she would ask for the medicine.

The woman came to the shop in the following nights regularly with same request at the same time. With a view to have detail study about a woman, he called his friend who was a photographer by profession. They managed to take photos of that woman secretly. But, when the film was developed, there was no sign of the woman except the things in the drugstore. The mystery remained so intense that ultimately forced them to follow her up to her bedroom. They followed on her way back to her home and they became able to find the same woman lying beside her child who was enjoying the ame on a stick, which she brought from Shoji Sakota. When Mr. Sakota saw her sleeping instantly, he thought it was merely a kind of pretension. The moment he touched her with his fingers he became sure that she had been dead for many days.

In this story, the spirit of a loving mother visited Mr. Sakota’s pharmacy in order to buy ame on a stick mostly preferred by her child. Though the mother is dead, her spirit shows an infinite love to her child who is reported to have been sick for many days. Her death was quite unknown to others. Moreover, there was nobody to look after her.

My Heart Leaps Up When I Behold (by William Wordsworth)

‘My Heart Leaps Up When I Behold’ is a beautiful poem composed by a famous English romantic poet William Wordsworth. The poet is a great lover of nature as well as true worshiper of God and nature. In this poem, the poet recollects (remembers) the experiences of his childhood days and gives his emotion and feeling a meaning that the poet wants continuity of life and nature. For him, nature is both God and religion. In this poem, he not only presents the reality of human life but also shows a deep respect to God and religion wishing his days to be bound each to each by natural piety.

The poet says that he becomes very happy to see the nature going on in the same way. So, he says that his heart leaps up with great happiness or joy when he sees a beautiful rainbow in the sky. The colourful rainbow symbolizes the continuity of the nature and colourful human life. The rainbow was there in the sky when the poet was born and he has now become a matured man. He also wants the rainbow to be in the sky when he has become a matured man. He also wants the rainbow to be the same in future. He says that present is the result of the past and future will be the result of the present. In this way the poet shows that time and nature are ongoing phenomena of universe. If there is any break in this continuation the poet wants to die. The poet also says that both are inevitable.

The poet presents his main idea of the poem through the paradoxical line “The Child (past) is the father (present) of the future.” The poet means to say that human life begins from childhood. A man can’t be a father without being a child. According to the poet, father means from whom the creation of new generation takes place. It is the child from whom the manhood begins. Thus the child is really the father of man. Yesterday’s child is today’s man (father) and today’s child is tomorrow’s father. The poet also says that nature is God, religion and source of life and inspiration. He worships, loves and respects the nature. He also wishes the continuation of time (past, present and future) in the nature in the same way.

Speaking Of Children (by Barbara Holland)

‘Speaking of Children’ is an essay by Barbara Holland in which she delightfully and critically examines the idea of having more than one child and the consequent expenses of parents. The entire essay centers round the issue of having a single child is far better than to have money. The essayist goes on arguing the possible difficulties and disasters which the parents have it bear if a house is filled with many children. She has raised the most burning issue of overpopulation that has further generated series of challenges and risks to the living beings of the present world.

She begins this essay with a humble statement ‘one child is an appendage and more than one is a way of life’. The statement genuinely implies that single child like our body and we can attach him or her in our body and we can carry wherever we go or whatever our circumstances may be. But having many children in the house is certainly a matter of burden. It is obvious that it is quite hard for the parents to provide proper care and affection equally for their all children. Consequently the children are abided from good education, proper health care and other facilities, which are the key components for the overall development of children’s personality. Moreover they disturb the privacy between husband and wife without letting them chances of private talk related to their job, income, business and their experiences of their duty and so on. In a sense they need to be worried all the time for their future prospects as well as to satisfy their unsuitable demands of hunger and enjoyment. The essayist minutely examines some other dark sides in this regard like they make their house dirty, create unnecessary noise, and make wounds in their body, which ultimately goes in the hands of parents.

Eventually, the essayist makes an appeal to the readers so as to make us aware of in time from committing such blunder. She strongly suggests us to have a single child for the happiness and prosperity of family life. Every details and illustrations are quite prescriptive in nature that intends us to be aware of such mistakes. The essay is quite funny, humorous, informative in quality and filled with various fragments.