Well. After yesterday's extremely mundane dream, last night I had a pretty wild one. Following a bit of conversation about the Balkans yesterday, I dreamed that I was in Albania. Not only was I in Albania, but I was--wait for it--dealing drugs.
I'm not sure how I came to be in Albania, but I had our (real-life) old Jaguar with me (this will come up again later). Despite having transportation, though, I was stuck because I didn't have enough money to leave the country. So, logically, I turned to dealing drugs to make a quick buck (or lek, as the case may be).
I don't know how I made the acquaintance of the local underworld figures, but I had ended up as sort of a freelancer, only dealing with them in an off-hand way. I think I was obligated to turn over some kind of "tax" to ensure that they wouldn't meddle in my affairs. I also got my drugs from them. Of course they fit the exact mental image you'd have of a small-time Albanian Bad Guy: greasy hair, gold necklaces, track suits, unfortunate choice of headwear.
At one point I was in the lair of my drug provider to get re-supplied. There were several young women/girls in various states of intoxication and undress--it was obvious that they were working in a state of semi slavery, serving both as prostitutes, sex slaves, and drug customers. One of the gangsters was beating one of them up*, and I was trying to think of a way to get these girls out of the situation, while realizing that most of them were too addicted to participate in any way in their extrication.
During this same visit, while the guy I was dealing with was otherwise occupied, I started idly examining some of the wares on the table. I wasn't sure what it all was, not having any experience in that area myself. There was a pink package with some pink plastic objects resembling short pens (the labeling and packaging style was very Feminine Hygiene Product**). They had a little hole near one end, which I deduced was supposed to be sucked on or inhaled to get a hit. I tried it once, and got enough of an indefinable sensation to remind myself that rule number one was always that a successful dealer didn't consume the goods.
One of the most noticeable things about the dream was the feeling of being in a dangerous situation but of being tough and "bad-ass" enough to not be worried about the gangsters trying to mess with me (where this came from, I don't know, since I'm not exactly a toughie in real life). The scariest moments were two encounters, while in or near my car, with a group of young knife-wielding Roma boys intent on carjacking my car (I put that down to a stereotype about them favoring Mercedes and Jaguars). They were significantly scarier than the grown-up gangsters, but I managed to evade them both times.
In the end, the dream wound down in a fairly tiresome way. I had met up with some random young-ish American(-ish?) dream acquaintances, and we were all hanging around waiting for something undefined. I think we were waiting to be able to leave the country, although I don't know what specific event was going to allow us to leave. I finally got tired of them and their uninteresting and stupid conversation and went off by myself.
So there's another one to add to my collection of dreams dealing with unsavory themes. In my defense, I don't actually remember selling any drugs to anyone, and I remember having a philosophy of not introducing new users to drugs.
*In an interesting twist, I'm positive that this brutalization was inspired by that recent video of the guy stomping on the moveon.org protester's head. He used the exact same foot action.
**I was surprised to note a manufacturer's name and address in China; I hadn't thought that a manufacturer of illegal drugs (in my mind, this was some new exotic form of crack) would label their products as if they were, say, something you'd buy at Wal-Mart.
Showing posts with label gypsies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gypsies. Show all posts
Friday, November 12, 2010
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
cinderella strikes again
I find it a little embarrassing to admit to my recurring dream themes, but I had another one this morning in which I was the household Cinderella. Anyway, I was living with my parents, and my sister was there, although I think she was more of a long-term visitor than a full-time household member. I think my husband also lived there, but he was absent for some legitimate reason--I think he may have been working extremely long hours at a demanding job, or maybe he was on a trip.
What I can remember started with me coming to the realization that for quite some time I had been doing everything for all the other members of the household. My wrath was directed primarily at my mother, and I started yelling at her: "Don't you think it's grotesque?! I cook EVERY MEAL, I clean up the dishes, I do the laundry, I clean the house--how can you live with yourself?!" I was really steamed up. When I realized how mad I was, I started to analyze how I felt about each member of the household. My dad was more or less exempt from my anger because he was working outside all day on some building project; my grandmother was exempt because she's 89 years old; my husband was exempt because he was always working and never there. I was a little mad at my sister, but she was somewhat exempt because of her guest status--and anyway, she was staying well away and completely ignoring the discussion, puttering around with a stack of art supplies in the corner. My mom refused to acknowledge my tirade in any real way, which made me even more mad.
I should add that the house we were living in was interesting, some kind of 60s-70s split-level thing with a main living area in a sunny half-basement, where the kitchen was. There were quite a lot of tchotchkes to be dealt with in cleaning, too, including macrame plant hangers.
After the outburst I went off in a huff and was rather proud of myself for taking a firm stand and not feeling guilty about it. I felt like I had made a psychological breakthrough. Then I started to think about the fact that my mother was busy taking care of my grandma, and I wondered if maybe I hadn't been a tiny bit hard on her.
That semi-guilty feeling morphed into some sort of depression whose cause I can't remember. I was still in the same house, with my sister and a friend of hers (random dream person). The friend was visiting and they were going to go to some social function scarily reminiscent of a church-high-school "banquet". The friend had showed us a very expensive couture gown that she was planning on wearing. Although I was depressed, I realized that I should make an effort at sociability, so I said, "that sure is a snazzy dress!"
Shortly thereafter I escaped into a bathroom with a laptop computer. I thought I'd distract myself by looking at ravelry (knitting website, for the uninitiated). I started reading a non-knitting-related forum there, and the avatar of one of the posters drew my attention. Instead of being just a photo, it was a video, showing several women frolicking around at an outdoor house party. There was some kind of "party"/dance music, and some of the women were dancing to it on a trampoline while others were dancing around a pool or jumping into the pool (this was more of an interpretational modern dance than a generic party dance). Someone in the discussion said that they wished they were attending the party, and I kind of agreed, which was a little out of character for me since I'm not much of a party person. The setting was certainly attractive, though, a stone house with nice landscaping looking like it should be in Provence.
I guess I clicked on her avatar or something, because suddenly it filled the whole screen. The view was now inside the house, though, and the women were in really elaborate and colorful eastern European costumes, with equally elaborate hairstyles (the one I can remember was a halo of tiny buns all around her head, supplemented with some kind of flowery decoration). They looked like they were warming up when an announcer came on and announced, in French, that they were such-and-such gypsy group and they were going to be doing a show; he also made it clear somehow that this was in Quebec.
The show started when some very animated gypsy music came on. The most interesting thing was that when they moved, their costumes moved with them. The dancer most visible had a couple of huge chrysanthemum-like flowers on the front of her dress, and they opened and closed and revealed different layers of petals, each with its own color and shape, kind of like a kaleidoscope. I thought vaguely that instead of dwelling on the injustices of my Cinderella-hood, maybe I should have just distracted myself with this first instead, because I suddenly felt a lot better.
What I can remember started with me coming to the realization that for quite some time I had been doing everything for all the other members of the household. My wrath was directed primarily at my mother, and I started yelling at her: "Don't you think it's grotesque?! I cook EVERY MEAL, I clean up the dishes, I do the laundry, I clean the house--how can you live with yourself?!" I was really steamed up. When I realized how mad I was, I started to analyze how I felt about each member of the household. My dad was more or less exempt from my anger because he was working outside all day on some building project; my grandmother was exempt because she's 89 years old; my husband was exempt because he was always working and never there. I was a little mad at my sister, but she was somewhat exempt because of her guest status--and anyway, she was staying well away and completely ignoring the discussion, puttering around with a stack of art supplies in the corner. My mom refused to acknowledge my tirade in any real way, which made me even more mad.
I should add that the house we were living in was interesting, some kind of 60s-70s split-level thing with a main living area in a sunny half-basement, where the kitchen was. There were quite a lot of tchotchkes to be dealt with in cleaning, too, including macrame plant hangers.
After the outburst I went off in a huff and was rather proud of myself for taking a firm stand and not feeling guilty about it. I felt like I had made a psychological breakthrough. Then I started to think about the fact that my mother was busy taking care of my grandma, and I wondered if maybe I hadn't been a tiny bit hard on her.
That semi-guilty feeling morphed into some sort of depression whose cause I can't remember. I was still in the same house, with my sister and a friend of hers (random dream person). The friend was visiting and they were going to go to some social function scarily reminiscent of a church-high-school "banquet". The friend had showed us a very expensive couture gown that she was planning on wearing. Although I was depressed, I realized that I should make an effort at sociability, so I said, "that sure is a snazzy dress!"
Shortly thereafter I escaped into a bathroom with a laptop computer. I thought I'd distract myself by looking at ravelry (knitting website, for the uninitiated). I started reading a non-knitting-related forum there, and the avatar of one of the posters drew my attention. Instead of being just a photo, it was a video, showing several women frolicking around at an outdoor house party. There was some kind of "party"/dance music, and some of the women were dancing to it on a trampoline while others were dancing around a pool or jumping into the pool (this was more of an interpretational modern dance than a generic party dance). Someone in the discussion said that they wished they were attending the party, and I kind of agreed, which was a little out of character for me since I'm not much of a party person. The setting was certainly attractive, though, a stone house with nice landscaping looking like it should be in Provence.
I guess I clicked on her avatar or something, because suddenly it filled the whole screen. The view was now inside the house, though, and the women were in really elaborate and colorful eastern European costumes, with equally elaborate hairstyles (the one I can remember was a halo of tiny buns all around her head, supplemented with some kind of flowery decoration). They looked like they were warming up when an announcer came on and announced, in French, that they were such-and-such gypsy group and they were going to be doing a show; he also made it clear somehow that this was in Quebec.
The show started when some very animated gypsy music came on. The most interesting thing was that when they moved, their costumes moved with them. The dancer most visible had a couple of huge chrysanthemum-like flowers on the front of her dress, and they opened and closed and revealed different layers of petals, each with its own color and shape, kind of like a kaleidoscope. I thought vaguely that instead of dwelling on the injustices of my Cinderella-hood, maybe I should have just distracted myself with this first instead, because I suddenly felt a lot better.
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