lucyoncolorado

nothing for two nights but this:

In which A makes a Facebook post that I find hilarious...

I check Facebook and see that A has posted a picture of the Silly Wabbit from Trix cereal. She has typed, "Trix your child into replacing his brain with sugar!" In the dream, I think this is the funniest thing I've ever read.

Fragments again, but more sleep.

In which I suddenly have a baby...

I'm sitting in the living room of my childhood home with my mother and with K. I have a blond, light-skinned newborn on my shoulder. I'm trying to hold the baby girl in a way that supports her little neck, but her head keeps slumping over. I express my surprise at having the baby. My mom is trying to convince me that it is my child. I tell her that I have no memory of giving birth. She says that is because I was heavily drugged. I respond that I have no memory of the pregnancy either. K says, "Don't you remember when your water broke?" And I do.

I'd been sitting on my couch in my current adult home. K and H were in the living room with me. My belly was swollen with pregnancy. Out of nowhere, my water broke and flooded the living room. K and H put on waders and carried me out to the car.

"I remember," I tell them and accept that this child is mine. I'm still confused about who the father is since the child has such a light complexion. I start to ask about this when I hear the kettle whistle.

I walk back into the kitchen (still exactly like the kitchen in my childhood home) and prepare a bottle of baby formula. K lectures me that I should be breastfeeding. I admit that it would be best for the baby, but I tell her there is no way I'm going to do such a thing. She says I'm being selfish and I concede that I am.

Then the baby says, "mama I'm hungry." K and I are amazed that a newborn is speaking so well.

In which R has a camera that shows the user's perception of objects and people...

I'm back in my current home. R and I are sitting in the dining room. I still have the baby but she is older now and sitting on the floor next to the snake plant in the corner of my dining room. R shows me a new camera that he bought. The user takes a picture of something and then looks at the screen to see an image of what the user really thinks about the subject of the photo. He demonstrates by taking a picture of our backyard. We look at the viewer and see a beautiful and wild jungle, green with life and full of birds. I take a picture of the baby. We look at the viewer and see a monkey. I know this is true. I don't really care about the baby. She seems like an alien creature and I have no feelings of attachment to her. I don't know where she came from and I'm still confused about how I ended up with a baby. But at the same time, I feel really guilty about being such a bad mother. I'm embarassed that the camera exposes my lack of feeling for the child so I try to argue with R that it is not working properly.

He suggests that I test it out by taking a picture of Lucy, our dog. I point the camera at her and click a picture. Then I look at the viewer to see a happy, cheerful dog with little digital hearts rising out of her. I love my dog more than the surprise baby. I shrug my shoulders and admit it's true.

In which I purchase a coffee table from the local antique store and discover a treasure trove...

R and I walk Lucy down to the local antique store to pick up the coffee table. The owner has a dog too, and we all step out to the garden behind the store to let the dogs run around and play. She shows me a back room where she has stored the coffee table. Then she returns to the front desk and leaves R and me outside.

While we are examining the coffee table, I notice a secret door in the floor. I look inside and see a treasure trove of gold coins and jewels. We marvel at it and then shut the door.

We go to the checkout counter to pay and I hand the lady 75 dollars in cash which is the deal we'd made for the table. She charges me 100. I ask why she is charging so much, and she says that she has added on a 20 dollar fee to support local businesses. I tell her that I just want to pay the 75 that we'd agreed upon. She rings me up again with the correct amount, but now she looks sullen. She makes me feel guilty for not supporting local businesses.

I know the math doesn't add up, but it did in the dream.

Mostly a bunch of fragments, just random images, with one short remembered dream. Ever since my false awakening lucid dream a few days ago, I've been so excited about it that my sleep is being disrupted. Last night, I woke up six or seven times because I realized I was dreaming and it woke me up. I can't remember the dreams and all it did was disrupt my sleep. I don't know if this is a common phase, but today I'm tired.

In which KH and I pose for a picture with swapped heads

KH posted a link to a list of creepy science experiments which I read just before going to bed.

I'm with KH at her garden. My friend E, a photographer, is making us pose in front of her garden plot like the couple in American Gothic. I argue that this parody is lame and over-done. He snatches the pitchfork from KH, decapitates both of us, and swaps our heads.


EDIT: I just read a news headline that made me remember another dream. I guess I did get some sleep.

In which J got out of prison and I ate all his candy...

I'm working as a substitute teacher. I report to the AISD office to collect my assignment, and the woman at the front desk tells me that something has come up on my background check that has caused my name to be removed from the sub list. I call the police department for details, and they give me the details of J's conviction. I explain that they have me mixed up with him, and they tell me that I'll have to go to the prison to get confirmation of the mistake.

I get to the prison and give them my information and J's. The guard looks it up on the computer and he says, "What a coincidence. J is going to be released in five hours." I'm shocked. I call M and C and tell them about it, and they rush over to the prison. J comes out and he is nearly seven feet tall. He is carrying a bag of candy.

We all drive to G's house, and he is having a Welcome Home party for J. His entire family is there. I sit down beside the pool and notice the little bag of candy beside me. I eat a tootsie roll, a piece of butterscotch and come licorice. There are a few lollipops and peppermints left in the bag.

I go back inside the house to get some beer, and when I come outside, J, M, C and G are all standing around, looking at the bag of candy.

"Did you eat all of J's candy?" they ask me.

"No- I didn't touch it," I lie.

They don't believe me. I try to blame it on A's little kids. I tell them that maybe the kids ate the candy. They tell me that they have a video camera installed on the side of the house and they will review it to see if it is true. Finally I admit to eating three of the pieces of candy, but I maintain that I did not eat the rest.

Two fragments, poor recall. The interesting thing about these partially remembered dreams is that they all include some sort of awareness that I was dreaming without me ever becoming lucid. I've never tried to do reality checks, but if I was in that habit, I'd probably have become lucid. Maybe I should start doing them.

In which my non-lucid dreaming-self tries to have a lucid dream...

I'm resting in the branches of a low-limbed oak tree in a green field. There is a lot of activity all around me. There are characters running around who appear to be harmless but annoying teenagers. One is wearing a top hat. There is also a lawn-mower running around the field by itself.

I lay back in the tree and decide that I'm going to attempt to reproduce the false awakening WILD (if I'm using the terminology correctly) that I had a few days ago. I focus on all my limbs and try to repeat to myself, I am dreaming, but the teenagers keep distracting me.

In which I run into SR, she is eight months pregnant, and her mom lives in a house I've dreamt about before...

I'm teaching a class at MMS. I see SR walk into the computer lab and she is eight months pregnant. I run over to congratulate her and talk to her a bit about the pregnancy. She tells me she is expecting a boy and we talk about the ultra-sound, etc. I feign excitement and keep the conversation really positive, but actually I'm really upset that she had not mentioned it to me at all these eight months. We've emailed several times and she never told me about it. It makes me feel really insignificant in her life.

Later, I'm at SR's mom's house and I'm congratulating her on becoming a grandmother again when I realize that this isn't really her usual house but rather a house that I dream about a lot. For example, a few months back, I dreamt about P and H in this house. I've never seen this house in real life. It has a long patio in the front with three separate front doors and windows on either side so that the front of the house is a row of five windows and three doors. If you enter into the far right door, you will step into a sunken foyer that then lifts up into a long open living room. The middle door opens to this living room though it is also a fireplace. The far left door opens to a linoleum hallway. I can't remember the rest of the house after this.

I explain all this to SR's mom and even tell her about the dream I had here in this same house about P and H. But somehow I do not realize that I'm still dreaming, even though we are talking about dream houses.

In which I introduce my mom to MA and she tells her of a funny dream she had about Jesus...

My mom, Grandma, Aunt B and I are sitting at the sports bar in downtown. We see MA and two other people crossing the street. I ask my mom to come outside with me to say hello.

We are standing on the corner of Main and Chestnut in front of the office supply store. MA and my mom chat, and the two people with MA stand there politely, waiting. One of them is a young man who is wearing a shirt that has a picture of Jesus with the Sacred Heart. My mom points at the guy's shirt and giggles a little bit because she says it reminds her of a dream she just had. I get a little nervous because I know that MA and her friends are extremely religious. My mom is not religious at all and I'm afraid one of them will say something that might offend the other. But my mom is a nice person who would never intentionally insult anyone and MA is a fun person who has a sense of humor, so I decide it will probably be OK and I don't try to prevent my mom from telling the dream.

I can't remember my mom's dream but it had a punchline that had something to do with meeting a person whose name is Jesus. Because this person was Hispanic, my mom assumed his name would be pronounced in the Spanish way, with the J sounding like an English H. But instead, the person pronounced his name Jesus- just like the English name for the Christian son of god. For some reason, we all thought this was hilarious.

Oh and I really wish that I could remember more of this dream because my Aunt B was in it in the beginning and we had a long conversation that I can't remember. My Aunt B is dead, and in the dream we talked about being dead. Too bad I can't remember it.

In which I meet a woman who claims to be my husband's first wife...

I'm walking around Berkley and I meet a pretty 40ish Indian woman named Sangeeta. Her hair is pulled back casually and she wears a burgundy and gold shawl. She carries herself elegantly. We get to chatting and she tells me that she knows who I am. She says that she was married to my husband when he was straight out of high school. This really shocks me and I tell her I don't believe her. She just laughs, and says it was a long time ago. She says he cheated on her with another woman and left her to marry this other lady. Wait a minute- that makes me his [I]third[I] wife!

I leave Sangeeta and go to a cafe to call my mother-in-law. I plead with her to tell me honestly whether or not this is true. She weeps and apologizes for lying to me all these years and admits that it is true. Now I wouldn't have minded so much if I'd always known that my husband had two marriages before he met me, but finding out now after I've been married for ten years is shocking! It completely changes everything I thought I knew about my husband's life. The entire timeline of his life that I thought I knew well must've been fabricated just to cover up these former marriages. And worse still- every one of his early friends and all of his family have been lying too and going along with this for years!

I feel like a fool, but the worst part is that I feel broken-hearted. I'm so miserable that I dread calling him up and confronting him. What could he possibly say that would make up for this level of betrayal? I think that I'll just leave my life and disappear without telling anyone anything. I start to think about how difficult it would've been to pull this off. This deceit would've required hundreds of people to flawlessly lie to me for over a decade. All of the photo albums I've casually thumbed through at friends and family houses would have been carefully presented just to cover up his previous marriages. This seems like too large a conspiracy- and it would've been absolutely pointless. Why would they do that?

There is no reason, I think to myself. It doesn't make any sense. I look around in the cafe and realize that there is also no reason for me to be in Berkley. I'm dreaming. It's as simple as that. Relief rushes over me. Though I'm lucid, I'm not excited about it. I'm just relieved that my life is still normal. I put my head on the table and fall, peacefully, into another dream.

In which cousin S gets a job at SUNY and I encourage her...

S sends me an email describing her job offer. I respond with encouragement and questions. The dream is pretty boring so I won't talk about it in detail. The only thing that makes it interesting is that the whole conversation took place via email. I think this is the first time I've emailed in a dream.

Too much to drink on New Years Eve to dream much. Restless sleep, bad recall, but two vivid images.

In which I see a winter landscape...

There are rolling hills that gently ascend to bluffs, high above a river. There are two bare limbed trees at the end of one bluff but the rest of the hills are only pastures of grass that has yellowed in the winter. The dream zooms in on the bluff with the trees, and I see a small cottage sits nearby. Smoke comes from the chimney and a light is on inside. The snow starts to fall and soon the landscape is blanketed with fresh snow. It piles up on the roof and tree branches. Two blue birds fly from the tree and land on the house.

In which I see a dead horse...

I see a horse that has fallen dead. Blood pours from his eyeballs and his nose. It disturbs me so much that I wake up.

First off, I'm really sorry that this is SO long. It took me half an hour just to type it all up- and I type fast! But it was really one of the strangest dream experiences that I've had. This is the first time I've ever played around with any of the dream techniques that I've read on this site, so I'm excited about it. The first part of the dream, I was non-lucid and it's really long. Then I became lucid for a while. Then I woke up briefly and attempted a WILD.

In which a chance encounter with Julian Assange causes me to get mixed up in his trial…

I’m riding in the back of a chauffeured car with my husband. We see Julian Assange hitchhiking on the side of the road. He is wearing a black suit with black shades and he has a Blue Tooth in his ear. He looks like a Secret Serviceman.

We pull over and offer him a ride. He climbs in the front of the car and asks us to take him to the Austin capitol. He says that he expects there to be a huge crowd of curious people lined up along the way to see him, and that we will probably have to fight our way past people at the capitol too. Then he spends the remainder of the ride alternately texting on his Blackberry and talking on his Blue Tooth. Meanwhile, my husband and I roll up the divider between the front and back seats and we have sex.

We arrive at the capitol. There are no members of the general public waiting at all, but the place is swarming with media. The capitol building is also a courthouse, and Julian Assange presents himself to the judge. My husband also drops me off at the capitol as my workplace and my school are just a few blocks away, and he takes the car and continues on to his own job. I’m walking with my backpack when a crowd of reporters surround me and usher me into the rotunda. They are all asking me questions about having sex with Julian Assange. Apparently someone snapped a blurry picture of me having sex with my husband in the car, then they saw Julian Assange and me get out and assumed I’d been with him. I try to clear up the confusion, but everyone is shouting at once and I can’t get a word in.

One of the reporters puts a television camera in my face and a microphone. Everyone else goes silent because this guy is with the BBC. He asks me very loudly, “Did you have consensual sex with Julian Assange?” I know this is live television and I’m flustered and embarrassed. I look into the camera and say, “No.” The crowd of reporters erupt into gasps and howls. I’d meant “no- I didn’t have sex with him” but they interpreted it to mean “no- it wasn’t consensual”. I heard them screaming accusations at Julian Assange and they were asking me if I planned to press rape charges. I tried to leave the crowd, but they blocked my way.

Finally I become disgusted with the whole thing, and I want to put an end to it as quickly and easily as possible. I announce in a loud, clear voice that we had consensual sex, that he did not rape me and that there was no story to be had here. Just two adults having consensual sex! I ask them to leave me alone. They lose interest and allow me to leave.

Off in one of the side wings of the rotunda is a short, plump friendly looking lady dressed in gypsy clothes. She is leading a mule by its reins. A young gypsy girl stands next to her, dressed in a colorful shirt and a black lace shawl. The woman calls me over to her. She explains that Julian Assange is the father of the young girl but that he refuses to pay child support and she asks me for help. I tell her that I hope things work out for her but that I have no connection to either Wikileaks or Assange’s sexual assault case. We shake hands and I turn around to leave.

I exit the rotunda and the grounds outside are covered in sand. The area is completely empty, but as I start to walk to the street, I see my brother sit down in the sand with a plastic shovel and some pails.

“Are you really going to build sand castles?” I ask him in disbelief. My brother is in his 30s so this seemed very strange to me. He looks embarrassed at first, then adamantly maintains that there is nothing wrong with an adult building sand castles. We laugh about it. I ask him why he is here.

“I heard that Julian Assange was going to appear in court today and I figured there’d be a big crowd here to see him so I came to witness the public circus. But when I got here, there was no one here but reporters,” he explains.

“Yeah, I was surprised too. Last year, when the pope came to visit, there was a huge crowd,” I answer.

“Well that makes sense,” my brother says, “since the pope is really famous. But I saw an even bigger crowd here a few years back when ABBA came.”

Then for a little while we discuss ABBA and how they have some really great songs despite their reputation of being a cheesy disco group. Then I tell my brother that I have to rush home to call my mother-in-law as she was sure to watch BBC and get upset when she hears me saying that I had consensual sex with Julian Assange. I need to go home and call her to explain. We say goodbye and I walk home.

In which I fly around the mountains and become lucid…

This is a continuation of the long dream above.

My house is a one-room cabin with large windows. I look out the windows and see beautiful and imposing mountains lining the landscape. I think for a second that it is odd to see such majestic mountains in Austin and I wonder if I’m back in the Himalayas. I stare at the mountains carefully though and realize that the peaks are too low and smooth to be Himalayan peaks. They appear to be snow-capped, but when I look more closely I realize that the snow is actually the color of caramel and it is spread along each softly rounded peak like icing on a cinnamon bun. This is such a beautiful sight that I lean far out the window so that I can look up and see the top of the mountains.

From this vantage point, I’m able to see that actually there are three ranges of mountains with valleys between them. The second is taller than the first and the third’s jagged and steep peaks reach high up into the clouds. Mountains this tall don’t exist outside the Himalayas, I think to myself.

For a moment, I consider how I went so quickly from Austin to Nepal, but then I’m too rapt with the sight to wonder about this. I step out the window and start to fly to the mountains. I am daunted by the steep face of the third range. I realize I don’t have the skills to climb it and that if I tried, I’d fail embarrassingly, but I’m pretty sure I could conquer the second. Looking for a good path, I fly along the ridge that connects the first low range to the second. It seems like an easy hike up the first and then it is just a matter of walking along the ridge until I get to the final climb up the peak of the second. I fly around this peak looking for the best climbing path. I decide that it might be easier to see it all if I go up higher than the third peak, and I soar up above the clouds and look down. Suddenly I see an amazing sight.

There is a ridge connecting the tallest of the first, second and third ranges, and on each peak is a hexagonal landing pad of some sort. They look like helicopter landing pads only they are much larger. Each pad is connected with a runway. This is impossible to see from the ground. You must be up in the sky above the mountains to see it. I marvel at this for a little while and keep flying higher and higher.

Then from behind the third range, I see a gigantic house towering over all the tallest peak. At first, the house is beautiful. It is made of brightly colored panes of glass. But when I glance away from it for a second, it changes. Now it is made of pieces of scrap metal, old tin roofs and garbage. It looks like millions of shanties from the Dharvi slum stacked on top of each other up into the clouds.

I stare at it for a while and ponder all of it. It is absolutely impossible, I realize, for any of this to be happening. At that moment, I become lucid.

I fly down into the valley in front of the tower and see all sorts of huge mobile statues made of scrap metal. Most of them are beautiful, and they all move in the wind. Most of them contain spinning flowers and pinwheels. They are fun, colorful and creative. I’m absolutely delighted to be dreaming these things. I fly back over the lowest mountain range, the one with the soft, rounded peaks covered in icing. They are gorgeous. Even though I know I’m dreaming, I really feel how beautiful nature is and I’m very happy.

Then I see another mobile statue. This one is metal pole on which many shelves have been welded. The shelves are connected to the pole with gears that look like clockworks and they all spin around. At the end of the shelves are giant but dainty multi-colored tea cups. I fly up and down this mobile statue and realize that I’ve dreamt about this before. I try really hard to remember when I’ve seen it before, but thinking about this causes the dream to disintegrate and I wake up in my bed.

In which I attempt to WILD and possibly succeed…

I have just woken up from the dream above. I have an atomic clock in my bedroom that projects the time on my ceiling. It is almost 5AM. I’m laying on my back, and I can see the window by my bed and feel my husband’s body next to me. I think about what a cool dream that was and also how my body still feels heavy with sleep. I have not moved at all. I know the alarm clock will go off in a few minutes since we have it set for 5. I close my eyes again and think about what I read on this website about WILD. I’ve never tried WILD before, but since I’m so relaxed and heavy with sleep, I figure this would be a good time to try.

I let my body relax some more but I keep thinking to myself “I’m dreaming, I’m dreaming, I’m dreaming”. This goes on for a little while and then my body feels like it is jerking awake- the way you feel when you fall in a dream and it jerks you awake. Then for a little while the room feels like it’s quaking and I hear a really loud sound. It is similar to what is sounds like when as a child I used to stand underneath the trestles and watching a train pass by above me. This went on for a very short period of time and then it stopped. I could feel myself still in my bed with my eyes closed. I wasn’t sure if I was asleep or not.

I opened my eyes and I was still in my bed beside my window, but I was in a different room. Strangely enough, I was very calm at first. I just lay there and looked around. Then I got up. From then on, I had this strange compulsion in my body- I could not slow down or be still. I felt like my body was in a constant state of movement and all I could do was steer its direction. It was like I was hovering above the ground.

I went over to the door and decided to see if I could pass through it without opening it. I did, and it was easy. Then I was standing on a banister of a spiraling staircase in a three story house. I went down the first flight of stairs and heard someone moving around below. I shouted “hello” to whoever it was, but no one answered. My voice sounded really loud and it echoed. I could feel my vocal chords vibrating in my throat, and I wondered if I really said hello in my real body laying in bed. It took a lot of energy to shout and I was afraid that I’d wake myself up if I did it again so I decided not to talk anymore.

I was still standing on the second floor and I looked out the window. I decided to try to fly, and I leapt from the banister out the window and flew out of the house. Then I was standing in the yard. It was dark, the stars were bright and there was a pine tree beside me. I looked up at the sky and decided to fly towards the stars. They were big and beautiful and shining. I flew and flew as high as I could, but after a while I got tired. They were just too far away so I started to sink back down.

It was lovely falling slowly through the sky back towards the earth. I passed a satellite along the way and it had a microphone on it. I leaned over and shouted “hello!” again. It sounded strange again and it took a lot of energy.

At this point, I became a little giddy and silly. I don’t know what happened, but I started to feel like I was losing control. Part of the problem was this constant state of compulsion that my body felt. I had to keep moving and I didn’t know how to slow it down so that I could think. My mind started racing and I got really crazy. I started doing loops in the air and just laughing hysterically.

I was falling in standing position with my feet towards the ground. When I was eye level with the roof of the house where I started, I saw a giant purple and pink plush rabbit sitting on the roof. It had to be 15 feet tall. It was an Easter Bunny stuffed animal but it had a menacing face. It was wearing a top hat. I hovered in the air around it for a while and wondered where it came from. I was pretty sure I did not dream up this rabbit- but here it was, as real and detailed as can be. I was also surprised that it did not scare me. I knew I was dreaming so I wasn’t afraid of it despite its menacing face.

I flew back down to the ground and entered the house through the backdoor on the first floor. There was someone in the shower and I decided to go see who it was. I ran in a crazy way towards the shower, pulled the curtains back and shouted “Boo!” but before I could see who it was, the alarm clock went off and I woke up.

This whole dream took just a few minutes though it felt like an hour. After I woke up, I started to question the whole thing. To be honest, I don’t know if I really had a WILD experience or if I just dreamed that I did.

Two uninteresting stress dreams about going back to school. I've had a few dreams lately related to my career change. It's a big move for me and so naturally I'm going to dream about it and be stressed, but these two dreams are really uncreative and disappointing. Oh well. Not every night can be an adventure.

In which I fail Psychology...

I realize that I've skipped three or my four Psychology classes. The entire course is only four classes long. I pull out the syllabus and see that I still have a chance of passing the course. The final is worth 75% of the final grade, so if I can ace the final, I can pass even though I didn't do the three daily assignments. I spend the weekend procrastinating, thinking about how I should be studying. Then I sleep late the morning of the final. I wake up at 10:15 and my final starts at 10:30. I rush out the door and sit in traffic. Finally I arrive at 10:45 but the professor lets me in anyway. I look at the final and realize I don't know any of the answers as I have not even opened the book or attended a single class. I feel like a loser.

In which R acts like a jerk...

I'm on campus before the semester starts with R. We walk into a gazebo where we set our books down. The bookstore is nearby and I need to go over there and buy my books. R says he wants a cup of coffee and he exits the gazebo and starts walking to the coffee shop across the street. I holler at him because I want to tell him to bring me a cup a coffee too and explain that I will be in the bookstore. He hears me trying to tell him something, but he waves me off in an angry way and continues walking away. I chase after him, but he crosses the street before I get there. The bookstore is closing soon, but I'm afraid that if I go there without telling R first, he will not know where I am and I will not be able to find him again. I don't have a cell phone or money with me, so I sit back down alone under the gazebo and wait. I'm nervously watching the managers lock up the bookstore and I realize that I will not be able to buy my books.

These are the two dreams I remember from Sunday night during my Christmas vacation. Notice that they both feature public baths. When I woke up, I really needed to pee.

In which I am a king who takes part in a revolt to overthrow myself and am attacked by a fellow conspirator's decapitated head…

I’m a young, handsome king with long blonde locks but I’m disguised in Harlequin‘s broad hat and mask. There is a mob of people dressed in 17th century French clothes running through the streets of an old city hunting down four conspirators who are suspected of planning a revolt to overthrow me. Inexplicably, I am one of the four conspirators even though I am also the king. I’m standing in the shadows made by a gas fired lamp that shines down on a café, whispering with my fellow conspirator, a young man who is dressed like Baptiste the mime from Children of Paradise. When we hear the mob coming, we realize that we are soon to be discovered so we decide that the best thing to do is to blend in with the crowd.

We join the angry mob and begin shouting slogans of support for the king mixed with threats for those four who plan his overthrow. In the crowd, I find another conspirator, an older bearded man who is disguised as a peasant. I realize then that our entire plot has been interrupted by this mob and now there is nothing to do but get away safely. The “peasant” has my royal clothes under his coat and he hands them to me. When the crowd passes the public bath, I dart off into the building alone with my clothes and hide in a stall to change clothes.

I leave the stall dressed like a king once again with a large feathered cap like D‘Artagnan. People are standing in front of wide sinks of warm and soapy water washing their hands and hair. They recognize me and bow down. I look over their hunched backs and see a royal soldier standing at a bath, saluting. I walk over to him and ask him for a full report. Standing next to him is a short red-haired noble woman who is wearing a tiara and a burgundy velvet dress with puffy shoulder sleeves. She has shining green eyes and a blushed face. She is the fourth conspirator, but I pretend not to know who she is.

The royal soldier responds cryptically. He is asking me a series of questions that only the true king can answer to make sure that I’m not an imposter. When he is satisfied that I’m the king, he still looks at me suspiciously. He asks how I came to be in this public bath. I stomp my foot, straighten my back, and remind him of his place. I’m the king. I’ll ask the questions.

The soldier apologizes but it is apparent that he is suspicious that I, the king, am involved in my own attempted overthrow. Also I’m worried about the red-haired woman at his side. Has she been caught? I glance into her eyes briefly and see that she has not given me up. She’s told him nothing. I repeat my demand for a full report.

At this point, the soldier asks me a tricky question. He is sly and brave. If I answer in a way that will confirm that I am innocent of plotting my own overthrow, it will somehow also confirm that the woman at his side is one of the conspirators. But if I answer in a way that could save her life, it will reveal that I am, in fact, a traitor. All of my subjects at the bath are silent, listening for my response. The guard has his hand on his gun.

I do not hesitate. I answer with authority and indignation. The soldier cowers, apologizes for his suspicion and begs my forgiveness, all the while raising his gun to the red-haired woman’s head. She does not cry; she expected nothing less. The soldier shoots her in the neck. Her body tumbles over but her head flies off her shoulders.

To my horror, arms grow out of her ears and they start to crawl towards me with the decapitated head between them. Her green eyes are fierce and wild, and she howls with her teeth and tongue showing. I scream and fall over. As the head crawls towards me, I kick it in the face with my buckle toed boots but it keeps coming.

In which I attempt to organize a public bath after successfully organizing a public market…

I’m standing with my mother in front of a series of cabinets and drawers at a public bath. There are many rows of cups on the shelves, and the drawers are full of common bathroom items. The contents of the drawers are in disarray. As patrons walk into the public bath, they first stop at the drawers and rummage through them, looking for a particular item.

I’m organizing them by object, gathering all the razors in one place and all the shampoo in another. Then I put them into the cups on the shelves. I fill the drawers up with towels and toilet paper. My mom feels overwhelmed by these tasks and asks if I think there is any hope of bringing order or efficiency to this chaos.

I take her into the locker room and show her the contents of my locker. There I have arranged all of my supplies neatly and efficiently. She looks at this and is impressed. I tell her that one day, every locker and all the cabinets and drawers will look like this. She says that she wonders if I’ve bitten off more than I can chew.

I then take her outside and across the street. Now we are in India in a crowded produce market. Indians push and shout around the stalls and vendors manage the crowds. I ask my mom if she thinks it looks chaotic, and she tells me it does. Then I explain that before I came to this market, all the different vegetables and fruits were simply piled up in one big box without any organization by produce. I explained that it took me a really long time to sort it all out, but after I’d done it the people appreciated how much easier it was to shop. I admitted that I’d had less luck getting them to queue up.

As we walked around the vegetable market, I found lots of strange and new fruits that I’d never seen before. One was a red fruit with shiny skin and the texture of an apple but it was shaped like an acorn squash. I was eager to try it, and the vendor sliced one up for me. It tasted like a custard apple. I told the vendor how much I missed some of the fruit in India.

Here are two dreams I had on Saturday night over the Christmas vacation. Notice that they both feature giant birds. Also yet another appearance by a famous person.

In which my dog and I befriend a strange, red-eyed bird-horse…

I’m standing in my study looking out the backdoor and over the fence at a strange bird perched on the high limbs of one of my nextdoor neighbor’s pine trees. The bird is black and shaped like a peacock, but it is the size of a small mule. His head is red on top and his eyes are a series of in-laid geometric shapes with bright red beads in the middle. First there is a large black circle on top of which is a white triangle on top of which is a black square and so forth until we come to the beady red pupil that shines in the darkness. He has a small sharp orange beak and he squawks. It was the sound that made me step outside in the first place.

My dog Lucy comes to the door also, curious to know what has alerted me. When she sees the strange giant bird, she instantly jumps up into the pine tree as well. This frightens the bird, who then spreads his wings and flies to the second pine tree. His wingspan is easily eight feet across, and I notice that the wings have the black and white striped pattern of a common pileated woodpecker.

Lucy and the giant woodpecker sit perched up in the high limbs of the twin pine trees like birds on a wire. It’s a funny sight, and I’m surprised by it all. I walk back into my study and locate my Field Guide to the Birds of North America and flip through the pages to the section on woodpeckers. There, I read about the variations of pileated woodpeckers and notice some small print at the bottom which describes the strange geometric pattern around the eyes. It mentions nothing about the unusually large size of this bird, but it does say that this variation is friendly with dogs.

I go back outside and call Lucy to me. She leaps down out of the tree as if she’s done it her entire life, and it seems normal to me that she knows how to do this. She lands gracefully in my backyard and I give her a doggie treat. The bird sees this and swoops down off the limb and lands beside Lucy. I offer the bird a doggie treat too, but he does not want this. I pet him on the head and marvel at how big he is. Thinking that since he is as big as a horse that he might be as hungry as one too, I go into my kitchen and pull out a few stalks of celery and an apple that I keep for the horse that lives in the pasture behind my house. I offer these to the giant bird who eats them hurriedly.


In which Johnny Cash tries to avenge his friend’s murder but winds up drowning in an underwater crevasse…

I’m an important person in a Zacatecas, and people are gathered in a room outside my office waiting to meet with me. I know that Johnny Cash is among them and that he is looking to avenge the murder of his Sicilian friend. I ask my servant to show him in.

The man in black is in his early 50s and a little heavy around the middle. I stand up to shake his hand and thank him for coming. He responds politely and sets a pecan pie on my desk. He says he brought it as a gift, but I notice that there is a miniature scythe underneath the pie tin. I thank him for the pie and ask him to take a seat, then I sit across from him, behind my desk. In a dignified but down-to-business and booming voice, he calmly tells me that he has come for revenge because I’ve murdered his friend, the Sicilian. I do not deny the murder or betray any fear. Instead, I smile and casually explain why I killed his friend. We discuss the matter civilly, without any drama or insults.

In the end, we can’t come to an agreement and Johnny Cash challenges me to a duel. He lifts up the pecan pie that he’d set on my desk and exposes the scythe. He explains that he’d originally planned to cut my throat with it, but now that he sees that I’m a reasonable and honorable person, he wants to challenge me in an open and respectful manner. I tell him that I’d noticed the scythe as soon as he walked in, and I thank him for not slitting my throat.

We exit my office by the backdoor where I have a rollercoaster car waiting. We climb inside the roller coaster and head out into the jungle which is somehow very near my office even though we are in Zacatecas. The jungle is dense with banyan trees with intricate networks of roots and vines. We shake hands and then begin to fist fight. I immediately run towards a chasm. I know the jungle well and am able to navigate the terrain without a map or light. Johnny Cash doesn’t do as well, and he is soon lost in the woods. I hide down into the chasm until I see him running up to the edge. He is out of breath and I start to feel sorry for him. But I carry out my plan anyway and throw a bunch of vines towards his wrists and ankles, lassoing him like a cowboy catching a bull at a rodeo. I pull him down.

Johnny Cash lay on the ground hogtied. I climb up to him and speak to him respectfully. I don’t want to kill him, but I also know that if I don’t give him the opportunity to save face that he will just attack me once he is free. I pull out a hunting knife and cut the vines that bind his wrists but I leave his ankles tied. Now he can sit up and move about with some dignity. I explain again why I killed his Sicilian friend and how it was not personal and how I hope that he will stay out of the matter. He tells me again that he must avenge his friend’s death. I tell him that I will not kill him, but in that case must leave him bound by the ankles in the jungle overnight. I leave, knowing that he will eventually untie his ankles though it might take a while.

Meanwhile, I climb up a tree and out of the jungle. It turns out that the jungle is located within a giant warehouse in the colonial part of Zacatecas. I sit at a table in the warehouse and watch Johnny Cash untie his ankles down in the jungle. When he is finally free, he walks over to a pond to wash the mud off his face and clothes. Eventually he jumps in for a swim which I know is a dangerous idea. I jump off the table and run back into the jungle to warn him, but it is too late.

At the bottom of the pond is a deep crevasse, similar to what one might find high up in glacial regions of mountains. Johnny Cash has fallen through the pond and into the crevasse. I think about him slowly slipping deeper and deeper into the crevasse and wouldn’t wish the horror on my worst enemy. But there is no way for me to rescue him without falling into the crevasse myself.

The jungle is shrinking at this point so that it takes up only a small room in the warehouse. I run to a telephone and dial 911. I explain the emergency but the ambulance driver needs an exact location. I tell him that I’m at the warehouse with the jungle inside, but this is not precise enough. He needs a street address. I put him on hold and run out the main door of the warehouse to read the address.

The door slams behind me and I’m standing in a narrow alley with cobblestone roads between colonial style buildings that have been constructed together to share walls and flat roofs. I realize that there is no way that an ambulance will be able to fit down these alley roads. I turn around, dejected, but find that the door has locked behind me. I walk out back to the alley road and look both right and left but see nothing but a labyrinth of alleyways. I’m afraid to leave my spot because I don’t want to get lost. Suddenly I notice that there is a sculpture of a giant red chicken directly in front of the warehouse doors. I climb on the back of the bird, up its neck and then sit on top of its crested head. From there I look over the tops of the rows of buildings and alleyways spread out up and down hills as far as I can see. I realize that I’ll never be able to find my way out of the city and that the only way I’ll ever get back home is to jump back into the jungle before it disappears.

I try to climb back down the chicken, but it is very difficult to find places to put my feet. I concentrate carefully on making sure that I have a foothold before I move my other foot or hand. I slowly work my way back down the chicken. The climb down is so difficult and so dangerous that at one point I briefly realize I’m dreaming. I reflect on how frequently I have a dream in which I must scale great heights without the aid of climbing equipment and I remember that I almost never fall. This brings a little comfort and confidence, and I eventually make it back to the ground. I try the warehouse doors again, and this time I’m happy to find them unlocked.

Now the warehouse is the site of a conference of American and Mexican teachers, all of whom sit at the type of folding tables that seat students in public school cafeterias. The teachers each have a colorful plastic basket in front of them in which there are several cheap and cutesy items including a fake feather, a rubber squeeze ball and several pencils decorated with cartoon characters. I rush in front of the crowd and explain that Johnny Cash is struggling in a crevasse at the bottom of the pond in the shrinking jungle and that if we don’t get to him soon, he will die. I need their assistance in saving him. They just carry on with their conference, discussing how the useless items in the plastic trays will revolutionize public school education and save the future of both their countries. I roll my eyes in disgust and run back to the jungle.

By now, the jungle has been reduced to a small aquarium. When I look down into it, I see that the trees and terrain are all made of plastic. They are pushed into ice like beer bottles set in an ice chest. I simply pull all the jungle items out of the ice and toss them from the aquarium. At the bottom I find the pond which is now only a mass of wrinkled tin foil. I take it out and find Johnny Cash in its folds. He is the size of a GI Joe action figure, and he is dead.

In which I explain the difficulties with getting PIO status in India to my brother-in-law...

My brother-in-law and I are sitting in his living room. I'm telling him how the Indian government has changed their tourist visa laws. Used to be, you got a long-term tourist visa that allowed you to stay in the country for 180 days at a time. After that, you had to cross over to Nepal or some place for a day and then come back into India to continue another 180 days. Now, that option is no longer available and a tourist must stay out of the country for a longer period of time between 180 day spurts.

He argues that the government has created this rule because so many people were living in the country on tourist visas by taking advantage of this system. "Lots of burnt out hippies are just hopping the border twice a year and living here indefinitely." I acknowledge that this is true, but I argue that if the bureaucracy were not so corrupt then such a thing wouldn't be necessary for many people. For example, I'm fully eligible for residency PIO status, have all the appropriate paperwork and paid all the necessary fees and yet my application was caught up in the inefficient system. I spent days running between FRRO and immigration offices only to deal with one "stone-walling babu" after another. Eventually it just became easier to remain on a tourist visa and take a biannual trip to Singapore or Nepal than to deal with the bureaucracy or pay the bribes.

My brother-in-law tells me to calm down that I'm working myself up over nothing important, especially since I don't even live in India anymore. He says every country has its problems, and at least the Indian government is not trying to run the world with a massive and corrupt war machine.

OK... about this dream- it is pretty boring but what is astounding to me is the detail of the conversation. There was no action in this dream, just conversation, but it was so precise and detailed. In the dream, my brother-in-law really used the words "burnt out hippies" and "hopping the border" and "massive and corrupt war machine" and in the dream I used the words "stone-walling babu". Also, all the details of the change in immigration, including the number of days a tourist is allowed to stay in India and the recent change in policy, are true. I'm just really surprised at my dream's ability to sustain such a detailed and accurate conversation, especially since this is an issue that has not concerned me for over a year!

In which I attempt to make four children sleep in bunk beds...

I'm in my bedroom but there is a bunk bed where my own bed normally is. Four toddlers, two boys and two girls, are running about the room. They have worked themselves up into a hyper frenzy that I find very annoying. I'm trying to regain control of the children and I'm telling them that it is bedtime. They are all blondes. The two girls have curly blonde locks and little red skirts and the boys have short blonde crew cuts and wear overalls.

After a lot of shouting and threatening punishment, I herd the children into bed. The boys are on the top bunk and the girls are on the bottom. Just as I'm turning out the lights, one of the boys suddenly leaps off the bed with his pillow and starts screaming at the top of his lungs. He randomly hits things with his pillow. One of the girls starts to cry but the other two children also jump up and start a pillow fight. Feathers are flying everywhere.

I'm livid at this point and I lose my temper. I yell at the kids that they are being brats. I yank the boy who started the pillow fight up off the ground by his arm and throw him onto the top bunk. I do not intend to hurt him- I'm throwing him onto a soft matress. But his head hits the wall and he rolls over backwards, twisting his neck.

I panic. I think that I've injured the child. I rush to him where he is laying with a twisted neck and start to cry, but he looks up at me and sticks out his tongue. He is not in any pain and he gets up and starts running around in circles, playing with the pillow feathers. I make him calm down and stand in front of me where I inspect his vital signs to make sure he really is OK. His neck is red, but he is not harmed.

Then I explain to the children that they are crayons and that the bunk bed is a crayon box and that it is time to stop coloring. They all lay down on the floor straight, stiff as logs with their hands by their side. I pick them up one by one and slide all four of them into the top bunk as if I were sliding crayons into a box. I put them in alternately head to foot. They are inanimate objects now and do not move or make a sound.

In which R and I discuss Chilean goldfish...

R shows me a picture of a man holding a giant goldfish. The fish is the size of a small car. I ask him if it is real, and he says that it is a Chilean goldfish. We go to the Facebook page of the man in the photo.

The website explains that Chilean goldfish grow up to be 25 feet long, though the average size is only 2 feet. R says that Chilean goldfish are not really goldfish. They just call themselves that to fool people. He says this is sort of like how Chilean seabass is not really a bass.

In which I'm really sorry about something...

I'm outside a beach house under a full moon looking at the house stilts. R is up in the house, and I'm downstairs in the sand crying. I'm full of regret about something but all I can remember is the feeling.

In which I have two phone mishaps...

I'm recording phone numbers from my caller ID to my little address book because I'm always losing phone numbers and having to call around to get ahold of people. The first number on my caller ID is K's number, but to see it, I have to press a button. When I press the button, it calls K's phone. I hang up instantly because it is the middle of the night and I don't want to disturb her. But it doesn't hang up, and when I turn on the phone again, the line is still connected. I assume it is her voice mail, so I just hang up again. Then when I pick it up again, the line is still connected and I can hear K talking. I say hello and she responds by saying, "It's the middle of the night, why are you calling me and hanging up?" I explain what I'm trying to do and apologize. She is a little irritated, but we disconnected.

Then my phone rings. I pick it up, expecting it to be K again, but it is a man's voice.
"What are you wearing?" he asks.
"Shorts and a tank top," I answer.
"Wha- really?" he asks, surprised.
"Yeah. Who is this?"
"Wait a minute. It's December right?" he asks.
"Yes. But it's in the 80s today," I answer.
"Damn. I need to stop prank calling you and move down there. It's cold here."

A bunch of fragments...

In which a man in a top hat is conducting Christmas carols...

A man wearing a tattered burgundy top hat is conducting a choir as they sing Christmas carols. He holds the conductor's stick in his hands, and ruffled cuffs stick out of his coat sleeves.

In which Bob Dylan is cooking pasta...

I really don't know what is up with Bob Dylan popping up in my dreams all the time lately. It's weird. The only thing I can figure is that it happened once, I wrote about it here and told people about it, so it was on my mind enough that it happened again, so I wrote about it again, it's on my mind more, etc...

Bob Dylan is in my kitchen making pasta. I ask him what he's doing, and he ignores me and keeps cooking. He has a pasta maker that looks like the plastic toy meat grinders that kids use with their Play Dough. I ask him how he got into the house, and he tells me to stop asking questions and learn something. "You never know, you may have to cook for 20 guys someday," he tells me.

In which I'm teaching a college class...

I'm teaching a college class, but the room is the same as where I used to teach 8th grade. The students are all sitting in desks arranged just like they were then. I'm calling roll, and I realize that one of the young women is my former student MG. She's looking very healthy and pretty, and I'm actually happy to see her. I ask her if she remembers me and she sasses at me and sucks her lips. I laugh and tell her that I'm glad to see that she has graduated high school and gone on to college and that it looks like she hasn't lost any of her attitude. She responds sarcastically and says that she's happy to see that I still haven't learned to fix my hair.

I walk over to her desk and tell her that I was at a carnival last week and thought I saw her. I called "Patricia!" but as that is not her name, she did not turn around. We laughed hysterically at this. Somehow, this was a very funny joke. I told her that I'm going to call her "Patricia" all semester. She got serious and sassy again and said, "OK, Ms. B- it was funny the first time, but now you're just beating a dead horse."

(I have no idea what the carnival or the Patricia thing is about. Dream nonsense.)

Then I started to teach the class, but the students kept throwing paper balls across the room at each other. I was really annoyed because they were adults and I couldn't understand why they were acting like children. I started to feel really stressed about the fact that I'd started the semester off on the wrong foot. Why did I try to jump right into a lesson? I should've spent the day going over classroom routines and my discipline system. I told them that we were going to start over and that I'd explain about detention and time out, etc. The students responded that this was college and they were adults and that I couldn't punish them. I said that if they were adults and this is college, that I'd simply throw them out if they kept disrupting the class. They laughed, and I kept thinking how strange it was that college kids were acting like this.

Then I realized that I was dreaming and that I'd already quit teaching and that I didn't have to worry about any obnoxious students ever again. I simply walked out the room and into another dream but I don't remember it.

In which I'm planning for a dinner party...

R and I are planning to cook an Indian meal for a dinner party. H, E, S, C and K are all present. We decide to make it vegetarian but also rich since many people who aren't used to eating Indian food prefer to get the saucy curry type dishes. I go to the Asian foods store in town and pick up some paneer and then I search for Indian green peas. American peas aren't as good and S explains that this is because Americans don't snap their fingers while growing them.

In which the horse in the pasture behind my house breaks his leg...

The sweet horse that lives in the pasture behind my house learned to leap over the fence and knock on my door with his nose when he wanted a carrot or an apple. I happily fed him and brushed him. We became good friends. He hung out in the yard in with my dog all day, and then in the evening I told him he had to jump back over the fence to go home or else his owners would be angry.

He tried to hop back over the fence, but his front hoof got hung on the wire and he fell, breaking his leg. He rolled over on his back and whimpered in pain. It was really upsetting. I bandaged up his leg and then walked around the block to his owner's house. They were having a costume party, so I let myself inside and looked for them. I explained what had happened and that their horse was in my backyard with a bandaged leg. They told me that he'd have to stay there for now to be safe. Most of them were dressed in drag. Several of the men were wearing the sort of outfit that saloon girls wear in old Western movies, and the women all had handlebar mustaches painted on their faces. Before they let me leave to go back home, they put a wig on my head and gave me a cigar.