Dear Stress, Let's Break Up

I think this was a stress dream.  I'm a college senior and things have been a little overwhelming lately.  On the last day of the semester before the holidays, I got sick.  I had a fever for 2 days, a cold for 2 days, and then felt very woozy on the fifth day.  The next week was fine, and I got to enjoy the lack of responsibility.  The third and final week before school - my heat went out, I lost a tooth, and had to have a locksmith come out to fix my doorknobs.  The following week I went back to school and was immediately overwhelmed with the massive amount of work I'll have to do this semester.  It's all been very stressful.

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I was at home trying to get some homework done when there was a knock at the front door.  It was a handyman, and he got right to work.  Whatever he was doing was noisy, and I couldn't focus on my homework.  I'd gone grocery shopping earlier in the day and had a few things I hadn't gotten around to putting away yet sitting on the table.  I'm not sure what the handyman was fixing, but he wasn't working in the kitchen.  For some reason, I asked him if the groceries were in his way.  He came in to look at them and said no, but that I really needed to put the cleaning solution away so that my children wouldn't get into it.  I told him that I didn't have any children, but that I would put it away anyway.  I opened the cupboard door under the kitchen sink and discovered a puddle of water.  I stared at it for several seconds, then decided I needed to contact a plumber.  I sat down on a chair in the living room with a cell phone and phone book.  After making a few phone calls, I looked down at the cell in my hands.  It was an older version flip phone.  I thought to myself, "I am clearly not one of the cool kids with a cell phone like this!"  

*******

And that was that!

Math homework, stranger with dog

At my mother's house, getting ready to take a shower. My mother is getting ready to leave for work. She's wearing a black trench coat, over grey pants with black slingbacks. Her hair is up in a French roll. She is trying to look nice today and asks me how she looks. I tell her she looks good. I walk her to the front door. She opens it and it is still dark outside The glass in the storm door is fogged up. We wipe it clean - it is foggy outside too. In the darkness I see a shadowy figure of a man walking his dog on the other side of the fence. I open the storm door and my mother goes out. I tell her to watch out for the man walking the dog. He appears to walk in the opposite direction, then walks straight to the house and allows his dog to defecate in the shrubs in our front yard. I tell him to stop letting his dog defecate in our yard. At first he doesn't seem to hear me, so I say it louder. He finally leaves. I close the door and head back down the hall.

My sister and brother are awake now, laughing at the exchange between me and the man outside. I walk toward the bedroom, sit down on a mattress on the floor and start doing math homework - algebra - trying to solve for x. I finish homework and get up to leave. I go room to room saying goodbye. My sister is not feeling well, so I help her get back into bed. I lay her down on the mattress on the floor, swing her legs in the bed, and put the covers over her. I go to say goodbye to my brother. He is sitting in a brightly lit room, doing homework. He asks me to help him with an algebra problem - bought 10 things for 14.95 and have to figure out how much he has to pay if they raise the price by a certain amount. I was getting ready to leave so I was a little miffed he waited until the last minute to ask for my help. At first I tried to explain the solution really fast, but he wasn't following me. So I went into another room and started writing the problem on a whiteboard. I was writing on the mahogany doors of the whiteboard. I realized I needed to open it. I started writing the problem out - a(x) = b(x) - also divided by 10 on both sides.