Make Mine Mike

Weird scary dream last night.

It started off with a new feature on Jay's site. He had photos of kids in a classroom, doing some kind of educational role-playing, like a model U.N., or a model Congress. But the pictures, out of context, looked kinda goofy and nerdy, and Jay was inviting his readers to come up with captions. Many of the entries, of course, were full of sexual innuendos, which were at times pretty funny. I was gonna submit some when the dream narrative changed.

[Note: In real life, I was finally was able to hear the audio posts on his blog, and had an idea for a prepared creative one. But he went on to post other stuff, and I got too busy to do it for now...maybe this weekend. I think that’s why this was on my conscious and unconscious mind.]

Then I was on Sunset Boulevard with my sister. We had left a video store -- which isn’t there in real life -- and were gonna go back to her place to watch them. At one point we were sorting through some stuff that looked like pills. She told me not to take the little ones -- those were her dramamine (which she takes whenever she travels). I didn’t want them anyway. I wanted to have all the marshmallows from the Lucky Charms -- pink hearts, yellow moons, orange stars, green clovers, etc.

The parking structure was configured so that the only way out -- on foot, which is bizarre considering, as the song goes, "Nobody walks in LA" -- was onto the busy street.

There on the edge of Sunset, sitting on a table, I saw props from a TV commercial. Not a real commercial -- it had been in the dream, I think advertising for some wireless service. A quirky woman was in her apartment, preparing for a date. She lifted up an old-fashioned large black dial phone, revealing it was a container for her old 45 records. Indicating land-lines weren't necessary, a thing of the past, I guess. She took a record out, put it on the turntable, and romantic music (Billie Holiday, or something like that) played as she continued to get ready for her date to arrive. I saw the old phone, found one of the albums and tried to put it on, but it was still in its protective paper covering as I put it on the turntable -- how do you work those old record players? I was about to remedy the situation, when my sister told me we had to get going.

She was right, and I started to go, then realized I forgot the bag containing the videos. When I looked back, the bag had gotten fused into the asphalt. I tried to peel it loose, but traffic was picking up, and I had to get out of the way.

Now here’s the scary part – I wound up boxed in between two buses. It’s hard to explain the physical layout of this. I was directly in front of the giant right front tire of the bus. Traffic was stopped, but as soon as it would start up again... I would be crushed. I tried to figure out how to get outta this. I was too low to be seen by the driver. I couldn’t go forward because another bus was right there. And I simply could not get out to the side either.

My only hope was to step to the middle of the bus, between the tires, lay flat on the ground and wait for the bus to drive over me, then pray traffic wasn’t so dense that I could jump up and dash out of the way of oncoming cars. It was a longshot, but it was my only hope, and somehow... I thought I could do it.

Just as I lay down flat, I started to wonder if the middle of the bus was high enough that I wouldn’t get snagged and dragged... and how will I know exactly when the bus had passed? I wanted to look up, but was afraid to raise my head...

I may have done just that, because I woke up, raising my head in the bed, relieved it was all just a dream.

I have a pretty good sense of what this all means. I’m feeling trapped and overwhelmed in by a lot of things, especially my family situation, and it’s keeping me from "smelling the roses", appreciating and embarking on the creative things that make me happy.

That, and traffic on Sunset Boulevard is a bitch.