Nightmare

Last night I found my dream ridiculously boring and terribly slow, like some made-for-TV movie in the late 80’s, Candace Cameron staring in the lead roll. This was a dream with high-waisted pants and men in polyester polo-type shirts; lots of beards and forced dialogue.

Was all the communication strained back then, when Reagan was President and I wore shoes called Buster Browns? In dreams, especially during one’s own, you’re supposed to walk away with some greater sense of self, or learn something about your fellow man, but I simply wanted it to end as quickly as possible.

This is what I remember: Riding in some large, metal, 80’s car (was is a station wagon?)

There was a dinner at some touristy restaurant where we (whoever "we" were) were seated beside a table of about thirty well-to-do types all young marrieds with bratty children who ran around the table and yelled while adults drank scotch on the rocks and martinis with olives floating in them. The women had feathered hair and big dramatic eyes beneath blue eye shadow.

I wanted out of the restaurant and long car ride and the dream all together. It was slow and without action and plot. I think it started running in a loop- the first twenty minutes repeating over and over and over without resolve or conclusion. Who where these terrible actors and why were they getting on my nerves at 4:40AM?

The dream was slow and terrible and I roused myself awake just so that I could get away. I woke tangled in my arms, both of which were asleep, drool (or was it sweat) covered my right cheek that had been pressed against my new blue, pillowcase.

I pushed myself awake. I forced the weight on my bladder heavy enough to need to go to the bathroom. Arms asleep, junk in my eyes. My XL t-shirt that reads "T.A.S.S. Middle School Tack Team, No Speed Limit" became a web that constricted me as I sat on the edge of the bed. Opening and closing my hands, trying to force the blood back in the right direction; it had pooled around my elbows. I just kept thinking, "What a dumb, pointless dream." And annoying.

The large yellow moon now shone in the opposite window from where I left him last night when I laid down. A big, golden serving platter. Big enough for a cow to jump over and men to walk on and me to find awfully intriguing. More intriguing than that pointless dream.