Blue_Opossum

Morning of June 25, 2015. Thursday.



I am once again at the King Street boarding house in La Crosse, Wisconsin where I have not lived since the late 1980s, though this is also an atypical in-dream location in the backyard near the southwest corner. I find a yellow plastic bucket (probably about a three-gallon size) full of paper scraps, about three-quarters full. All of the paper scraps have either one of two shapes. Either they are square and have some writing on them in typed print or they are shaped like corner-to-corner adjacent longer rectangles and without writing (similar to one of the Tetris shapes, and indeed, this dream may actually be based on my interest in the so-called Tetris effect, though not relevant to the Tetris game itself as I do not play it). I find the rectangular pieces (about four inches in length) quite intriguing in shape for some reason and first consider that they might be worth more than the other scraps even though the square pieces have a written claim that they can be reimbursed for a certain amount of cash, possibly around five or more dollars though I am not certain of the amount.

Still, I begin to sort them out, and eventually realize that the curious connected rectangle shapes (many of which are slightly curled) may not be worth anything after all as they do not have writing on them. This makes me a bit annoyed as there seem to be slightly more linked rectangular scraps than the square ones, which I realize are probably some sort of mail-order coupon and perhaps worth three dollars each at this point. Thus I become more interested in holding onto the “coupons” to mail them in for cash. I am not even sure who the bucket belongs to, or of any in-dream back story to the scene.

Eventually, my pinhead friend from years ago (who also lived at King Street), Leonard S, comes out and informs me that none of the paper scraps are worth anything and that the square “coupons” are related to some sort of mail-order scam. Somehow, in the back of my mind, I already knew this and ponder why I even bothered sorting them in the first place.

This dream seems to be an odd composite of two fairly clear associations from over twenty years apart. The paper scraps remind me of a science activity I taught recently (grades six to eight and of a McGraw-Hill manual) whereby you “classify” different shapes of small paper cutouts into different groups to learn about how scientific classification works - even though the activity did not include the rather peculiar joined rectangles shape (which I still find a bit intriguing to appear as such so consistently in a dream, especially a fair number of the exact same size). The other aspect reminds me of years ago when Leonard kept sending money to the same company each time he supposedly won a “prize” which always turned out to be a tiny black stone glued to a piece of cardboard, which he apparently enjoyed getting (although his mood was quite erratic at times - he looked like a more developed version of the more well-known Schlitzie, and was also more intelligent and mentally competent in most ways though his mother did not want him and he grew up in St. Michael’s Orphanage in La Crosse).