mr. clooney makes a reappearance

I've been lax lately about recording the dreams that I've remembered (which haven't been many), but I couldn't neglect this one, since I find repeats amusing [although, note to subconscious: group trips/group living arrangement repeats are no longer amusing!].

Anyway, my situation alternated in the dream between being an 8th-grader (??), being an older student (as in, I was my age or maybe even older and returning to college), and being on a trip with my husband. I switched back and forth between these situations as they seemed to make more or less sense within the context*. There was a lot of rather tiresome back-and-forths involving being in a younger classroom (a first-day-of-school atmosphere), finding my college classes, and making travel plans with my husband. I should add that at times I was in Paris and at times I was in New York.

Anyway, there was a lot of low-level stress and interaction with peers of various ages, but the noteworthy part of it was another conversation with George Clooney, in which he proved just as agreeable a conversationalist as my first [dream] encounter with him**. It started in the 8th-grade classroom, although I have absolutely no idea what he was doing there. He seemed slightly bemused, and I made a little small talk with him before asking, "Honestly, what is it like to be constantly assaulted everywhere you go by eager females? Doesn't it start to get annoying?" He seemed slightly amused but very deftly answered in a way that wouldn't get him in trouble with his female fan base. Then the situation shifted and I was in college. I turned around to talk to him again, but he was gone.

Other recent snippets that I remember:

1. I had gotten myself roped into knitting a rather complicated light blue lace scarf for a coworker. I had gotten about 8 inches of it done and was showing it to her when she said that she might really rather prefer a cowl. I was proposing various ways in which what I'd already done could be converted to a cowl format, trying to be nice while at the same time annoyed at her presumption since I didn't really want to knit something for her in the first place.
2. [I was living in a group situation when] while walking home one day, I was accosted by a developmentally disabled man. I couldn't find a way of avoiding him, although I didn't want to talk to him because I was afraid he would ask me for something. He did, although not what I expected: he wanted me to look over a book on jewelry making and do a (positive) review of it online. I tried to be noncommittal, but he wouldn't take no for an answer.
3. I had been on a semi-long visit somewhere (living in a group, of course), and was ready to go back, or maybe go on to another destination. I was traveling with my sister, and there was some miscommunication all around as to the time/place of departure. When one bit of confusion was cleared up, another one cropped up, and when we finally cleared up where and when we were supposed to be leaving, it was almost too late and our luggage was still with our hostess. She finally came running up with it, in a weird, construction-tunnel-like part of the airport, and we made it on the plane. Once on, though, we were informed that because of our lateness we had been relegated to "the upper deck". This turned out to be a small balcony in the back of the plane, overlooking the rest of the seated passengers. There were no seats on this balcony, and not even any railing to prevent us from falling on the heads of the passengers below during turbulence. I was really worried and annoyed that the airline*** would think this was acceptable, but finally discovered a few seatbelts coming out of the back wall. I figured that we could strap ourselves in with those and lounge on our luggage (which had stayed with us), and thus be reasonably safe. The other "upper deck" passengers didn't seem worried, and spread themselves out near the edge, looking very comfortable.
   

*I'm not sure this situation-switching has happened to me before, although surely it has.
**Although I can't deny his attractiveness, I feel I should specify that I am not, nor have I ever been, obsessed with Mr. Clooney.
***The airline was African, a detail I'm sure was due to my recent thrift-store purchase of a blanket from Kenya Airways.

Mascara

I was supposed to go somewhere--breakfast, I think--with a cute boy, but I wasn't quite ready, so we came back to my place so that I could freshen up. I was just going to put on some mascara, but for some reason it ended up taking me forever. I felt awful, because not only was I making us late, I has lost my sort of fresh-faced charm, both by appearing to be super high-maintenance by spending so long on my makeup, and for actually putting on too much. I knew I had disappointed him and felt like a total failure.

Unrelatedly, in the dream I had straight, dark brown hair that reached to my shoulders, and longish bangs. In real life, my hair is much shorter, curlier, and multicolored.

crocodiles and mobsters

I know I say this fairly often, but I really had the most exhausting dream just before waking up this morning. [This is Part 1 and Part 2, since blogger won't let me put in all the necessary labels. Part 3 is below.]

Part 1:

I had a plane ticket to go and visit a friend of mine. There was one connection, and for some reason I thought the hour or so was a huge amount of time. I left the airport and ended up in a national park near Houston (apocryphal as far as I know) known for its crocodiles. I had no car and no camping gear, but I had completely forgotten about my flight and was walking around the campground choosing a site. I felt slightly liberated by the idea of camping all alone, like I was doing something very brave and adult. I guess it was rather brave, since the campground was surrounded by a bayou (of very clear water, weirdly). The water came right up to the campsites, and the bottom sloped down very slowly, giving the impression that you were actually in the water while you were still on land. I didn't see any crocodiles, somewhat disappointingly.

Part 2:

Before I could settle on a campsite, I remembered that I was supposed to be making my connection flight and was now about three hours late for it. I was extremely unhappy with myself, and stressed out about what to do. I hemmed and hawed for a while, and then finally realized that I was actually at my friend's house, having somehow magically arrived there. For a while I was very confused and kept thinking that I still needed to arrange transportation to get there.

She lived in a weird building with a labyrinth of rooms and an assortment of people. At one point I found myself squeezed onto a couch with her (somewhat portly) father and some random young bearded and hatted musicians, all singing and boisterously celebrating their newly-released cd, the product of a collaboration with a lot of high-profile people (including Charlotte Gainsbourg). Her father was getting very excited about the music and the cd, and kept encroaching further into my personal space. It was all completely innocent, but I was getting very physically uncomfortable being squashed, and couldn't think of a way to extricate myself without making a scene. I think he was also shirtless, which added to the discomfort.

[continued below]

george clooney

I had one of those annoying late-for-work dreams last night. I had run a bunch of errands and badly miscalculated the time that would take (as usual in real and dream life). I was supposed to be going to work at 10 or 11 a.m., but still needed to take a shower. In the dream, I was living (temporarily?) in some group setting* with common bathrooms. There were about 4 shower stalls in the bathroom, and I had just peeked in and seen that they were all empty with no one in line for them. By the time I gathered up my stuff and got there to shower, though, they were all occupied and there was a line of about 6 people waiting, including a girl I had found annoying in high school.

That was the boring, unpleasant part of the dream. After that, I was at an airport with both indoor and outdoor waiting areas, and I was supposed to get on a flight to somewhere for some kind of work-related trip. There was a giant snowstorm/cold front over pretty much the whole northern hemisphere, and all flights were canceled until further notice**. I was waiting outside on a high concrete balcony with an assortment of past real-life acquaintances, random dream people, a Norwegian girl whose design blog I sometimes read, and George Clooney (?). We were all leaning against or sitting on the balcony railing, and talking about random things. Incidentally, I was dressed in a very ratty pajama ensemble, possibly having given up earlier on getting a shower.

It turned out that George Clooney was extremely personable and funny, capable of a wide-ranging conversation. He had the sort of dry, punny, double-meaning humor that I particularly enjoy, but at one point he got serious and launched into a rather long, Steinbeckian soliloquy on the salt-of-the-earth working man and the dangers and hardships he faced (I think he was referring specifically to truck drivers, in the context of the big winter storm).

George stayed there for quite a while just chewing the fat with us, and I kept thinking, "he's a great waiting companion, but doesn't he have bigger fish to fry?" At one point he abruptly buried his face in my stomach to warm up his nose, which I thought a bit odd (although I realized that it must be an effective strategy, and that he probably found lots of willing stomachs to warm his cold nose, being who he was).

At one point in the dream, toward the beginning of the George Clooney episode, I was very concerned because I had noticed that several of my teeth seemed loose***. I was very worried, and asking everyone if they knew anything about it and if I should be worried or if it was normal****. No one had anything too reassuring or useful to say about my problem (I think the girls were all too focused on our distinguished companion). Only George had something somewhat helpful to say, and he also reminded me that [in this alternate dream universe] people's teeth were generally spaced far apart (??).

Anyway, if you're ever stranded at an airport in an open-ended, weather-related travel complication, look for George Clooney. I highly recommend him as a temporary waiting companion.



*I'd really like to someday get to the bottom of this group trip/group living thing.
**A relatively rare intrusion of current events into my dream life.
***I've experienced this loose-teeth thing a lot in dreams before, although not for a while.
****What a charming thing to bring up with a very attractive celebrity: "Nice to meet you. I think my teeth are getting ready to fall out."

packing and work stress

Right before I woke up I dreamed that I was on a trip with my husband and sister (maybe some other family members, but if so, not many). We were nearing the end of the trip and had to get our stuff packed up to go back home. We were in some kind of corporate conference-room-like place (middlebrow, not high-end) attached to a huge supermarket that was in turn in a mall. I guess we had been sleeping there, although there weren't any beds to be seen. My clothes had multiplied, and I had bought some things on the trip; there was no way I was going to get everything back in the suitcase, and I was stressed about it.

To further stress me, someone from my actual job came up and started telling me about the things she wanted me to buy at the supermarket. They were not necessary things at all, just things she happened to want, and I was irritated that she was asking for this when I was clearly busy (well, I was somewhat irritated that she was asking at all). I said, a bit too forcefully, "Yeah, yeah, yeah! I'll get it!" Then, alarmed by having shown my irritation so obviously, I tried to backpedal by adding, "I'm going to get one of those magnetic pads to put on the refrigerator too, so you guys can write down what you want on there."

Ugh.

colorful dresses and makeup mishaps

I had yet another dream where I was picking out clothes and trying to get ready. I was at my parents' house, and I was supposed to be participating somehow with my sister in the church service at my parents' church*. I guess I hadn't packed any appropriate clothing, because I was looking through the closet in my sister's old room. There was a huge selection of dresses, so huge that they were stored on one of those rotating racks like at a drycleaner's. I could tell that most of the clothes had been found at thrift stores. They were all really interesting, with a lot of prints and unusual color combinations. Some of them were overtly "ethnic" and others not, but they all managed to be unusual while still being very wearable and not too weird or cutesy. I was really impressed that she had amassed such a huge collection of interesting clothes, and ended up spending too much time browsing. I finally settled on a black dress** and realized I hadn't left much time for the rest of my preparations.

At that point I looked in the mirror and realized that I looked better than I would have thought given my lack of cosmetics, and also that I was a very young-looking Asian girl with bangs. Apparently my sister was also Asian, and she looked much older and more sophisticated. I worried that, especially if I didn't have time for much cosmetic work, people would think we were mother and daughter.

I guess I had time to start on the cosmetic work, because the last thing I remember was putting a mascara wand back into a bottle of makeup because I was in a hurry and being frustrated that I had probably messed up both products.

I think it's weird that I have these clothing/preparation dreams so often. I love the clothing parts and wish I could remember the details when I wake up; the preparation parts I could do without, though. I wish I could come up with an interpretation for them that doesn't point to unhealthy appearance anxiety.

*That reminds me that I periodically have dreams where I'm supposed to play the piano for their church (something that happened a lot growing up) but haven't prepared anything and am trying to figure out how to muddle through. These dreams feature a weird combination of performance anxiety and hubristic overconfidence that I'll just be able to improvise something baroque-y.
**Why did I choose something black, with all the beautiful colored and printed options?

Parking, Calling home, Dialing the wrong number

I was somewhere killing time. I drive in and out of the parking garage of this building two or three times and then would go to a cafe. The last time I went into the garage, I hit the garage door opener, but the rolling steel door did not go up all the way. I thought my SUV could fit, and it barely got through the opening. I went to park, but stopped so I could decide which parking stall to choose. There were a few spaces open in front of me, but I didn't want to other people to park in front of me because I thought I would need to move for them to get out. But when I pulled closer to the space, I could see there was another way to get out. I saw cars come down a ramp from higher floors, drive around the corner to exit on another street. So I parked, got out and went into the cafe.

I saw a clock - the time was 6:47. Suddenly I remembered my writing group was meeting at 6:30. I was already late. I started to call the workshop leader on my cellphone, but then I got a call from home. I answered the phone and heard my brother say, "Where is it?" I didn't know what he was talking about. I was frantic about getting to the workshop since I was already late and asked if I could call him back. I called the workshop leader's number. It took three or four rings to her answer. I feared she might not because the group was probably working on the first prompt. When she did answer, I apologized for being late. I didn't introduce myself and wasn't sure she recognized my voice, but she said in a low voice, "Hello PT". She said I could come for the second part.

I tried to call my brother back on the cell phone, but I didn't get through. When I looked at the phone, I realized I had dialed the wrong number. I tried dialing on a land line and still kept dialing the wrong number. The key pad was sticky - so I would press a number once and the same digit would appear on the screen two or three times. My friend came to help me, but the numbers still came out wrong or transposed - too many 7s or 8s. I finally decided to use the voice command on my cell phone.

Lateness

Once again, I was running late to catch a flight and hadn't packed.

I was playing chess in the kitchen (I remember the board and it was completely improbable...) when I looked at the clock and saw that it was nearly 9:15. I realized that we should probably already be on our way to the airport, and I wasn't even dressed, let alone packed.

In the bathroom, my contacts were in what looked like a small, shallow, petri dish--and there were probably 10 of them. I knew that only two were my correct lenses, but figured that the others were old lenses that could work in a pinch. I got my right one in, but then couldn't find the left one. I tried on a couple that turned out to be soft lenses instead of hard ones; one was a gigantic blue lens that was way larger than my iris. At one point when I looked down at the petri dish, the contacts were all folding over on themselves, and some looked like they were made out of red rubber.

When I went to the bedroom, my suitcase was open but basically empty, and the closet was full of stuff that needed to be packed. I wasn't dressed, though, and I couldn't figure out what to wear on the plane. I tried on my new pair of striped gray slacks, but they looked funny. Then I realized I'd put them on over jeans. I took them off and decided to wear the jeans. I found an awesome sweater, a slim little scoop-neck, with wide horizontal stripes of navy and lime and narrow emerald ones, and half-length sleeves, which I thought would go perfectly with my new green trench coat.

The whole time I'd been dressing, I'd been trying frantically to do the math in my head on exactly how late we were. My flight was supposed to leave at 10:24, which meant I should be there not much later than 9:24. Then my sister said it would take 29 minutes to get to the airport! Dream math is not my forte, but I finally realized we should have left at 9:04. That's about when I woke up.

I'm halfway through my exams; apparently lateness to catch a flight is my subconscious' most accessible anxiety theme!

Meta

I was packing my suitcase at the last minute, and my mom was helping me cram things in. I was still going to leave some things at my parents', until I could pick them up at Christmas, including a pretty cool pair of running shoes.

As we were hurriedly trying to get everything in, I remember thinking, "No wonder I have dreams where I'm running late on my way to the airport, and packing at the last minute--this is the way my life is!"

No Pets Please!

So I had this dream that I was living in an apartment somewhere with one of my coworkers. (In real life, she and I are acquaintances, but know each other from work). In the dream she loved pets. I agreed, since I have never lived with pets or owned a pet (this is true in real life as well), but I was willing to try it. I ordered the pets from this telephone service, and suddenly, I had a ferret, a snake, and 1 mouse. As the dream progressed, I was doing my weekly activities, which I was rushing to and realized I was late to because I was trying to find the pets. Suddenly, the ferret grew up and became large, the snake became 3 snakes, and the mice became 8. It was also weird because 3 of the mice were still attached to each other. To make it even more interesting, they had found themselves out of their cages, and I could feel them running by me around my feet, but when I attempted to catch them, they would disappear. After a day of trying to chase them around, I finally called the hot-line and asked them to take the pets back after finding them in my apartment. I was left with a feeling of knowing that my roommate would be disappointed and or angry that we got rid of the pets. I didn't wake up from the dream feeling scared of any pet as I would have thought of normally, which was a connundrum in itself for me. I guess I have the rest of the day to ponder this thought.

Creepy

Wooo, crazy dreams last night.

Many of them revolved around the theme of my family taking a trip in our old Corolla, and me being late (probably because I rode to work with my mom yesterday, and was running late). In the creepiest one, my siblings kept switching between being children, adults, and other people). The little boy (I don't know if he was supposed to be my brother at this point) had a heavy, suspicious-looking plastic grocery bag. I never got to look inside it, but the suspicion was that it contained body parts (is this what I get for reading about Deleuze and Guattari's Body without Organs?). My sister/the girl had one, too. They looked guilty, and seemed to be intending to dispose of a body at our final destination--though whether human on animal, and where it came from, I never found out. Then I remembered (ah, retroactive dream "memory"!) that they had made some reddish mouse that we had eaten, and felt very disturbed about its potential origin; if it had been what I was afraid I was, did that make me no longer a vegan?

I was all packed and ready to go, but I ran downstairs so that I could use the restroom one more time. When I tried to flush, the water pressure was really low and didn't do much. When I tried again, a jet of air shot out of the toilet at me! It finally flushed, and looked like it was going to overflow, but then it didn't. I ran back upstairs, and everyone was in the car waiting for me, except for my brother (now his adult self), who was leaning against the back bumper, looking disgusted at how late I was.

In another of the family-trip dreams--or maybe just another part of the trip?--we were in a big, multi-story parking garage, and my uncle was there. I think his car was a pale, minty-green Honda. I got out of the car for something, and my family drove away! I ran down several flights of stairs and met them at the bottom.

There were more dreams--about touring a beautifully finished attic apartment and cleaning the room of one of the senior girls in my dorm when I deaned (who in real life was beautiful, deaf, and kept her room immaculate), but I don't really remember much.

Unprepared

Apparently it's nightmare season? Oh, or maybe it's that my PhD exams are coming up at the end of the summer. Bring on the anxiety dreams!

I was driving through snow. It wasn't very much snow, and it didn't look too slippery, until oncoming cars started slipping elaborately, all across the road in front of me. Then I started sliding, too. I'm pretty sure I ran over a fallen bicycle wheel on the shoulder. And that there was a cop behind me when I did so. I figured if he pulled me over I'd say I hadn't noticed.

I got to the freeway and realized I was taking the wrong way to get to the place I needed to be, and to which I was probably already going to be late. Then (far too late to turn around), I realized that I was headed to my summer teaching job, and that I didn't have any of my supplies with me.

In the building, I put down what I did have with me (my purse?) and saw that the clock said 1:40. That meant I was either 10 minutes late for the start of a 1:30 class, or maybe just shy of the requisite half hour early for a 2:00 class (although we were supposed to be there an hour early on the first day of class, and this was the first day). I went looking for a schedule of events happening at the building, and saw that my reading class was indeed scheduled for that day, from 2:00-4:00. As I was looking at the schedule, I saw one of my parents from last summer, who I really liked. She gave me a hug and told me what a great experience it had been, and that she'd brought her kids back for more. I looked around and saw several parents with small children. I smiled uneasily, terrified about what I could possibly put together in the next 20 minutes without my lesson plan, let alone any books for the kids to read, or even their materials packets. To make matters worse, I realized that that first class was to be a Level 2, the only level I hadn't taught last summer. I was feeling horrified at the thought that I would just have to tell everyone we couldn't have class today on this first day when I woke myself up. What a relief.

Teaching

I was supposed to be teaching, and I was running late. (I think I also had long hair and was wearing a skirt--maybe fuschia.) On my way into the classroom, I saw someone important--an administrator type--who then knew I was late. I was a little embarrassed, but it didn't seem to be a big deal.

I wasn't prepared as I started teaching, but my students seemed to really love me--they smiled and nodded enthusiastically at pretty much everything I said. I realized I was kind of a spaz as a teacher, though, but couldn't really convince myself to care much. I wondered briefly whether I could just drop out, since I didn't care.

roller skates and russia

i was on a day-long date. he carried me around on roller skates. it took forever for us to get to this show that he was very excited to take me to see. we climbed up the bleachers and sat at the very top. it was here that i realized that the show would not start for another three hours and that i had forgotten all about my 11pm flight to russia. i apologized profusely as i told him he needed to take me back to my parents house immediately because i had not yet packed. he was irritated though he was trying to hide it. i began to worry about finding a warm enough coat to take with me and became frustrated with myself that i hadn't packed earlier. i also got nervous because i would be going to russia on a space shuttle and i really wanted to spend time with my family before i left. my date used a combination of roller skates and a car to get me back home. i felt bad that our date had not turned out as he had hoped and i rushed out of the car so as to avoid an awkward kiss.

Back in Minneapolis

It was next Tuesday, at 7:30 a.m. I was back in my apartment in Minneapolis, once again afraid that I was going to be late for all the day's appointments and generally having feelings of anxiety (and terror). For some reason I wasn't going to ride my bike (maybe because it was cold?) and was trying to figure out both how to get a U-Pass and how to catch the bus to school. I went to my neighbor's for help with this (she was, impressively, up and about at 7:30 a.m.; I think the reason I was up may have been that I hadn't slept that night). I don't remember whether she helped me with the bus thing, but she did make me feel a little better.

When I got back to my apartment from hers, I was in the kitchen, where I had a GIGANTIC refrigerator (my mom suggested when I related this to her that it may have been symbolic of the state of Minnesota). Also, there was food everywhere, on cooling racks. In the dream, I "remembered" this having been left the last time I was in my apartment. I'm not sure where the strange round yellow pancakes (?) came from, but the cookies (also yellow and round) were from Jeni. They were coconut, sort of chewy, especially in the center, and not too sweet.

When I went into my bathroom, my sink was one of those fancy flat ones with straight edges. It was also composed of small slate tiles, which, even in my dream I realized, must be a nightmare to clean. It was pretty, though, with dark brown, gray, and terra cotta colors, plus the odd, inexplicable, dash of patinated-copper-green.

As I was standing there, I somehow broke my retainer (which I haven't worn for years) and dropped it down the drain. I was able to fish out the two wire pieces (ewwww), but there was something else in the drain. I thought it was part of my retainer, but it turned out to be just the pincer part of a rather rusted pair of pliers.

Then I woke up.

The vividnes of this dream--including full color, taste, and touch--got me thinking about my sense perception in dreams. I know I see, taste, touch, and smell in dreams (almost all of which are in full color, though I don't always taste or smell), but I'm not nearly as convinced that I hear in them. Conversations, for example, have a distinctly more telepathic flavor than an auditory one.

But what about the rest of you? Do you hear in your dreams?

Running late

There was something to do with elevators.

I think I was traveling with a group, and took a different elevator from the rest of them. We were very close to, or in, the airport, but I was lost pretty much as soon as I got off the elevator. There was a sign that directed to another elevator, and then down a hallway that seemed vaguely familiar, and then the signs stopped. The people who had been in the elevator with me were a friendly lot and we tried to figure it out together, but with no luck.

Finally I asked directions of a fellow who said I should get to the first floor, at which point I'd have to exit the building and do a sort of U-turn in order to reenter in the right place. For some reason, this seemed perfectly correct to me; in fact, I could picture having had to do the same thing once before. "Ha ha! That's Sea-Tac Airport for you!" I said.

However, once I finally got to the ground floor, exited, and reentered, I saw that although there were counters for checking in, there was a large sign that said "NO STUDENTS." The students, apparently, had to check in elsewhere. Increasingly frantic, I found myself downstairs, trying to get to the correct place to check in for my flight. Although I thought I had budgeted plenty of time, all this wandering was costing me. It didn't help that one of the people I asked for directions (apparently I had wandered into a hospital or research wing; I wondered despairingly whether I was even still in the airport complex) said she always arrived four hours early for her flight. I only had 37 minutes left before take-off, and I hadn't even checked in.

I woke up with my heart pounding. "Like a drum" sounds clicheed, but that's what it sounded like to me as I lay there, relieved, in the dark.

Wet

I was driving in downtown Portland--I think I was trying to get to my grandma's old house--and I was lost. I had just gotten off the freeway, but traffic was crawling. When I finally reached the front of the line, I realized that it was a pedestrian area and cars weren't allowed through. There was also some sort of demonstration or celebration; one of the people allowed me to go around, which involved squeezing the car (my parents' blue Toyota) through an area that was too narrow. But I realized I could just float it up and over. Then I was pulling the car through waist deep water (I haven't had one in several years, but pulling/driving cars through water used to be a recurring theme in my dreams). I realized I didn't want to "flood" the engine (yeah), so I lifted it higher.

But then the car was my laptop, which was worrisome, as it had then been dragged through the water. Still, it turned on, although the graphics seemed a bit... watery. I thought I'd go online and figure out how to get to my destination. I was also going to change my clothes. I don't remember what happened next, but at some point the dream shifted and I was in one of those group-training retreat weekend deals. To get to the bathroom, one had to walk through multiple rooms furnished with comfortable chairs and one bedroom. When I got there, I realized I was wearing light blue denim overalls over a really large graphic T-shirt, which later turned into a red and white striped bustier of sorts. Part of the bathroom also included a sort of maintenance shed, where tools were spread out on a brick counter with a view out the large window.

For some reason, I'd only had two minutes for my bathroom trip, but realized, predictably, that I was running later and later, due to the long trip there and then fussing with my costume. On the way out, there was a woman unpacking on the bed in the bedroom, and I apologized for trespassing, but she assured me it was the only way to and from the restroom.

Chased and late

So I was in the car with my parents, and we were driving along one of the semi-familiar composited freeways that populate my dreams. It was under construction of some sort. I don't remember if I saw a sign or heard a tour guide of some sort say it, but I became aware that there was something special about the robots on the side of the road. Robots?! I looked to one side of the car, and all I saw were these concrete pillar-things that looked vaguely humanoid. I looked to the other side, and there were some robots that looked like overgrown Lego men. One in a yellow hat started running up to the car, but my dad was able to speed up and get away from him. But then another of the robot guys started chasing us. This one looked like a human, with long dark hair and a goatee. I was reading a magazine and realized that the guy who was going to play a robot in a movie was a famous actor, who I think was named Collin Tokannon. Sure enough, that was the guy chasing us. I still felt alarmed by him, though, especially when he managed to catch us and then jump onto the bumper and cling to the car. We were in my car, the Bruise, and I was in the backseat, so I reached back and locked the back, just in case. I suppose if a guy can catch up to a speeding vehicle, jump onto the back, and manage to hold on, he shouldn't have any trouble opening the hatch and getting in (if it's unlocked).

Earlier, I had one of those awful dreams where I'm running late and about to disappoint everyone because I just can't get it together. It was my second day at a new job, and I was trying to decide what to wear. The outfit morphed a bit throughout the course of the dream, but throughout it was striking. I had on some sort of stripey green and pink long sleeved shirt, under a fuchsia button-down tunic with a beaded black bow-tie/brooch (I eventually removed the latter as being too over-the-top). Over that, I had on a sparkly black crocheted vest of sorts with a very open weave that showed the other two layers. On top of everything, I was wearing a soft, loose, long black sweater with a very deep V-neck, which made the whole thing very classy. The bottoms morphed from a knee-length fuchsia skirt that matched the tunic to capris of the same color. The thing that really pulled it all together, though, was my wide fuchsia bracelet. The problem was the shoes. Closed-toe shoes looked funny with such a spring-like costume, but it was winter and I had to wear them, even though the gap between my socks and the skirt/capris, exposing my very white legs, looked silly. I think I ended up settling on rather demure black sneakers with a couple inches of gray socks showing.

Even in the dream, I was concerned about such an odd get-up, but running as late as I was (45 minutes, I think, by the time the dream finally shifted), it didn't even occur to me to just start over. I think I thought if I could just get the right footwear ensemble, everything would be okay.

As if the stress in my waking life isn't enough. Instead it has to plague me in my sleep...

Troubled waters

I was in my car when I started up the bridge, because I remember one of the workers holding out his hand for me to stop as I approached, and then motioning that I could continue. It looked like it was under construction, or perhaps just being built, like the new bike bridge on my commute to school.

By the time I got near the end of the bridge, though, things were definitely not finished, and I was on my own; I was now on my hands and knees crossing the widely-spaced rungs of a swinging bridge. As I was struggling with it, a guy passed me, and then he got the single-passenger circular orange transport-thing that would take him to the other side of the river. It was meant to travel on water, which seems odd given that we'd just crossed a bridge, but the logistical aspect that most concerned me at the time was how I would get across if he was taking the only transporter. He assured me that there was another on the other side, which satisfied me at the time (dream logic!).

When I crossed the bridge, I realized I needed to pack my suitcase before I got on the transporter. I knew I didn't have much to pack, but found myself packing and packing. Suddenly I realized I had two suitcases, both with clothes in them, that I needed to consolidate into one. About that time I became aware that I had been spending waaaaay too long on this, that I was at my aunt and uncle's house, and that I was about to be late for my flight. Thankfully my aunt agreed to drive me to the airport if I could cross the street and meet her on the other side--whatever that means.

I keep having these packing dreams; this is at least the third this week. First, I dreamed I was repacking my suitcase on a bus trip and missed the bus. Then a few days ago, I dreamed my family and I were going on a trip and that I was trying to grab things at the last minute, because I hadn't packed at all. There's the general anxiety of being late and about to miss my ride, but there's also the guilt about my tardiness and inability to get it together. I want some pleasant travel dreams!