DoubleHelix

April 13, 2014: I am at a block party or outdoor gathering following some sort of contest or sporting event like a baseball game. I am happy with the outcome of the game, not so much because we won, but because of the poor performance of someone on the opposing team as his mistake(s) caused them to lose.

I leave the gathering to take a break from the party crowd and find myself negotiating/pushing my way down a crowded urban sidewalk, like 7th Avenue in NYC. I pass a movie theater. When I left the party, I did so without any money, phone or wallet, which, in my dream, I normally keep in some kind of wooden box on my person, as I did not expect to want to leave the party as I had done, nor did I expect to be gone for long.

I decide to go for a jog and end up on far eastern Long Island - Montauk Point. I run to a place on the edge of a body of water which is murky and crowded with reed grasses and bog-like plants typical of the edge of a wetland. As I stand there gazing into the water, what appears to be a large fish, perhaps 6 - 8 feet long, swims towards me, then, reaching a too-shallow spot, turns to its left and returns out of sight to deeper water. Before it is lost to view I can make out its large, plate-like scales and the mud-brown color of the fish. As it swims away I realize it is too big for a fish, and from the way it swims I realize it is an alligator. Although I see only the one, I know the water has many more of them in it.

In order to leave where I am standing, I must cross a decrepit, poorly maintained dock/bridge made out of pilings and planks, many of which are missing. The alligators appear to be aware of this and in my mind I strongly suspect that they are lurking beneath the dock waiting patiently and unseen in case I stumble and fall into the water. I run/jump competently and safely across the decrepit dock even though I am afraid and now I can continue my journey/quest which I now realize was to re-trace the final steps of a friend who had recently died.

I am far from home with no car, no money and no phone, so my only option is to continue jogging west towards home. I run through a series of ground-floor patios at what appears to be a cheap beach-side hotel/motel, passing underneath the balconies of the rooms on the second floor. The balconies are supported on their outer edges by what looks like raw, unpainted 6" X 6" wood studs. I jog leisurely past **** (name deleted-old girlfriend), who is talking with, and in the company of a man who is kind of young for her. I say something to him (which she can also hear) about her being unable to give love to him to discourage the relationship, because it seemed to me to be the truth. Neither of them seems particularly upset by my statement.

I keep jogging and encounter two women, one of which has a car. I ask her where she is going three separate times and she responds the same each time but I do not know/am not familiar with the town she specifies. I say “One more time?” and she says the name of the town one last time. This time I hear the name of the town but it does me no good because I do not recognize it or where it is in relation to ***(my home town), which is where I want to go. Since we are so far east, I conclude it is a virtual certainty that wherever she is headed has got to be generally west and will bring me closer to home no matter what, so I get in her car. In order to get in the car, I need to remove three sacks of what appear to be bags of concrete, which we leave on the side of the parking lot.

It is at this point that I realize that I have been jogging and visiting places trying to uncover the last movements of my friend before he died. When I exit the car, I meet with a man who was a mutual friend of the deceased who is also my friend as well. I begin to tell him about my efforts and journey and all that I learned about our mutual friend. He puts his arm across my shoulder as we walk and talk. I wake.