lucyoncolorado

This felt like four completely different dreams because the emotional tone and color of each was very different. But the dreams included several of the same people, and seemed tied together by the same narrative. I woke up feeling that I did not dream at all, and then suddenly I remembered everything at once.

In which I return to high school and think of a previous dream in which I returned to high school…

I’m walking through the halls of my old high school following directions that are printed on a small notecard. I enter a science room that is set up for a lab, and I realize that I’ve been there before. Years ago, after I’d completed college, I’d received a call from my high school to tell me that I didn’t really graduate. They insisted that I come back and complete a science and math class. I’d driven all the way to my home town to visit the administration and argue my case, and they’d allowed me to test out of the classes. I took the test in this room.

No wait, I thought to myself. That doesn’t make any sense. That must’ve been a dream. I must’ve dreamt that I’d returned to high school. I sat down in the science class and thought about this for a minute. Was that a dream or had I really been forced to test out of high school math and science even though I’d already completed college? I thought about this for some time without ever realizing that I was having a similar dream just again!


In which I introduce old friends to new friends in a freshman comp class, and they decide to throw ice cream at everyone…

I felt that a full day at school had passed, and the last period of the day I had English. It was a freshman comp class, and the schedule on my notecard said it would be taught by my 5th grade language arts teacher, Mrs. Mitchell. I entered the classroom, and it was full of undergraduate freshmen. I chuckled to myself that I would have to take this class despite having a BA already. The classroom was decorated like an elementary room with cute cartoon posters and stuffed animals on the wall. We sat facing a chalk board, and behind us was the retractable wall that Mrs. Mitchell shared with her friend, the social studies teacher. Mrs. Mitchell was in the class nextdoor talking to her friend, and all the students sat quietly and waited for her to return.

My seat was a pink hammock. I set my books underneath, climbed in and started to swing back and forth. I rocked myself to sleep and only woke up again when I realized I was snoring. Some of the kids around me were laughing. I noticed that B and JB were among them. I was excited to see them and eager to laugh and talk with them the way we did when we really were in high school. But I held myself back, coyly. I didn’t want to appear desperate, and I wasn’t sure if they remembered me as fondly as I remembered them. Besides, among the books beneath my hammock was my pocket-sized copy of Thoreau’s Walden that B had given me just before I’d gone backpacking after college. I had just recently taken it off the shelf at the request of a German backpacker who’d been staying with my neighbor, but I feared that B would think that I’d been carrying the book around for 10 years. I glanced at the book, stashed away under my hammock, and was relieved to see that the cover was facing down. I looked up and made eye-contact, and we all smiled.

B, JB and I walked to the front of the classroom and leaned against the chalkboard to talk. Meanwhile, I glanced about the room. I saw that R, E and JG were all present. I called E over to introduce her to B. They are both artists, so I thought they’d enjoy each other’s company. E and I had just recently talked about the inscription in my copy of Walden and I’d told her about B, so the introduction was easy.

E is a delightful person and I enjoy watching her talk with other people. She has more social skills than I do, so I stepped back and let her talk to B for a while. It was exciting to me to see two people I really like enjoy one another. They became very animated, and then E opened up a giant tub of vanilla icecream with rainbow sprinkles. She explained that she was going to throw a scoop of icecream on everyone’s face. B thought this was a brilliant idea.

E demonstrated by throwing the first scoop of icecream at B’s face. The icecream stuck to his forehead and then melted down his face in colorful streams. He stood there with it pouring over him, laughing. Then E danced through the classroom, throwing icecream on everyone. She carried the tub of icecream as if it were a basket, and she thrust her hand inside and tossed the scoops out like she were a flower girl at a wedding, sprinkling petals on the ground. The icecream came out of the tub the color of vanilla, but it streamed down people’s faces in different colors, depending on the color of the rainbow sprinkle.

JB and I declined the icecream face splat, and we sat in the back of the room watching B and E make everyone else happy. As we looked at all the students in the class, I realized that they were all kids I’d known in elementary school, including KV, AK and ST. I hadn’t seen, heard from, or thought about any of them in over 15 years. JB was trying to argue with me that it couldn’t really be those kids but I didn’t listen to him.

Then we looked at the clock and realized that it was time to go home. Mrs. Mitchell had never returned, and we supposed that class was cancelled that day. JB then argued with me about the clock and told me that I couldn’t tell time properly. I looked at the clock again and saw that the minute hand was in a different place from where it had been. Even still, it was time to leave school, I told JB. He argued with me some more about the clock but I decided to ignore him.


In which I carpool home with R and my neighbors, stopping at a factory along the way…

R, E, JG and I car-pooled back home through a country landscape of oaks and horse ranches. The sun started to set, and R explained that we needed to stop in a factory to pick up something for his job. We pulled into what appeared to be a farm with a giant barn on the property, and pulled back a heavy tin door to reveal an empty warehouse storage room with high, rafted ceilings and dirt floors. It was completely dark but for the light from outside coming shining in through the door. I worried aloud that if the sun set while we were in there, we wouldn’t be able to find our way out. R insisted that we wouldn’t be that long, and he headed confidently to the back wall of the room. The three of us followed.

R placed both hands on a giant vault wheel in the wall and struggled to turn it. It noisily turned some gears in the ceiling which caused a series of heavy chains to grind and crank about. At the right moment, R said that we must run over to a particular place in the warehouse where a trap door opened up from the ceiling and many articles fell to the ground. It looked like a pile of junk to me: a hat, a sock, an empty duffle bag, some tin cans, and a few pieces of paper. R ran over and started to pick up the items, one by one, and then set them down again.

“What are you looking for?” I asked him.

“Her mail,” R answered.

“Whose mail?” But as soon as I asked I realized he was looking for something that belonged to the yellow haired smoking woman from a dream I’d had a few nights ago. She was extremely important in our lives, but I couldn’t quite remember why. I picked out two large envelopes from the pile of junk and held them out to R.

“This seems like a really elaborate and inefficient way to get the mail,” I told R. He looked irritated that I was questioning his job. He kept looking at the other items intently. JG and E were seemingly patient, but I could tell they were just being polite. Did R ask them if it was OK if we ran an errand? It seemed like a rude thing to do to carpoolers. I was about to complain again when R took the two envelopes, picked up a stocking cap out of the pile, and we all left for home.


In which my friends have a live-in eccentric guest, and we try to help him get over the loss of a lover…

R, JG, E and I arrive at M and K’s old home in the woods, just as it was before the fire. I walk into the kitchen with M and he tells me that K is feeling better now that they have exactly rebuilt the house and put all the trees back where they used to be. Then he tells me how much he loves K and explains that he hasn’t felt this way about anyone since his previous partner of 15 years died of a long illness. His eyes are sincere and sad, and I’m overcome with emotion for him. I’d been irritated with R, but suddenly I realized how much I loved him and I wanted to run to him immediately and tell him never to die.

I walk out of the kitchen and into what should have been M and K’s living room, but instead I’m standing in a cluttered mansion’s main hall that has been decorated by someone with expensive but tacky taste. The walls are painted to look like a tapestry while the archways above the doors and the columns that buttress the ceilings and corners are bright gold. Large, fine vases and heavy velvet curtains cover the walls and Persian rugs cover the floors. Instead of furniture, there are giant, fluffy white cushions laying all about the room. Old wine glasses, full ashtrays and dirty plates are scattered about. I think of Quilty’s house at the end of Lolita.

K meets me in the room, and he can see by the look on my face that I’m shocked at the transformation of their living room. K explains that someone else lives in that room and they can’t get him to leave. He walks me over to a balding man with gray stubble who sits in a silk robe upon a cloud of white duvets and pillows. He has a lap top in front of him, and there is an ashtray at his side.

K explains that this old man has been recently jolted by his lover, and he hasn’t been able to get on with his life since. He sits at the computer and checks his email constantly, looking for messages from the man who broke his heart. When he does receive a message, it is always something hurtful that makes him rage and throw his wine glasses.

K and I sit down, one of us on either side of the man, and try to encourage him to leave the house and put the heartbreak behind him. The man pulls out a crystal monocle which has a small telescope lens attached to the end of it. He places one end of it against the computer screen and holds the other end up to his eye, then he announces with glee that he’s received an email from the estranged lover. He laughs, sings, then types out a response.

I lean over and look at the screen. The first email says, “You are stupid.” The response reads, “No, you are.”

I realize K is right. This man is crazy, and they’ll never get him out of their house.