December 22, 2012
Four dreams from last night...
1st
My wife and I saw a small white dog--a cute thing with curly cotton fur--
wandering the neighborhood,
"Is that Chips?"
I wonder the same thing--Chips was a dog owned by neighbors who moved
about six months ago,
"I think it is!"
We go to him.
I hold him firmly
so he cannot get away.
"This can't be Chips," and then I add,
"I just can't believe they would leave him here."
"Check his tags. See if it says his name."
He has three tags--two green, square tags that
list the vaccinations he's had and when.
The third tag is a large, red heart.
His name is not Chips.
2nd
I am driving with my mother in the Pine Barrens of South Jersey.
I want to take her to see the family land in Atco.
(This is something we used to do occasionally when the family
still owned this bit of forest.)
We're driving on a dirt road through a thick pine forest.
We pass tracts of land and homes every two hundred
feet or so; the homes are ordinary--they're nestled in the trees.
Ahead appears an industrial complex. It's about three stories tall,
square, and rusted. Mom insists that the family land is there,
next to the complex.
"No, that's a sewage treatment plant, mom. Our land is nowhere
near that place." The smell is overwhelming. Raw, brown sewage
pours out of pipes and flows in a stream in front of the plant.
I turn left.
The road is flooded, but cars drive through the deep water.
We watch as a small black sedan turns in front of us
down a road on the right. It drives through water
that seems too deep for the car to pass. I expect
the engine to fail. But the car makes it,
and so we follow it.
3rd
A few friends of mine and I are living in a forest hideout
with a violent mafia...or perhaps it was more like a militia--
they're a disheveled bunch: dirty and unshaven.
My friends and I are undercover, trying to help expose the militia.
We're asked by someone I believe is the boss or leader to go
on a "hunt" to find traitors to assassinate. I remember
feeling hopeful that this would be the moment we would
arrest the group--before they can do more harm.
The "hunt" takes us over vast distances, through towns
and cities across the globe. We spend a lot of time
traversing Japan. The leader, Joe, walks ahead of us with
Rob. One man in our group tells me, "Joe is glad
that Rob dropped his quest for Enlightenment."
I am not convinced that Rob dropped his quest.
We're lead to a Zen Buddhist temple. As we enter the temple,
I see a couple of people sitting cross-legged on the other side
of a screen. The screen is about a foot above the ground, which
is why I can see them. I look in through the foot-high gap
and fake disinterest, "Nothing there."
We continue to another temple. We enter the meditation hall and see
that it is filled with monks who are in the midst of a retreat.
The teacher sits on cushions on the center of the wall to my left;
he has an enormous head, a thin beard, and wears a
navy blue teacher robe. He looks at me as though he's
perplexed as to why I'm there, but he does not get up or
say a word. I walk to the back of the meditation hall and
sit cross-legged on a square cushion. I am directly
opposite the teacher. The head monk gets up and shows various objects
to the group. A few monks try to respond to the head monk,
but he rejects each of their statements.
He holds up a medium-sized bronze bell.
I say, "Ring it without striking it."
He nods and then sits down.
I'm clearly interested in staying with the monks,
but I fake disinterest so that I don't blow my cover
with the mafia/militia. I get up and return to the group,
which is standing near the entrance way.
Suddenly, I see a floor board that is much lighter in color
than the other floor boards. I remove the light-colored board
and reach my hand down. I reach deeply under the floor
searching for something--I have no idea what.
I feel a dirt floor and begin digging.
The mafia/militia are hopeful,
but I find nothing and we continue on.
We're back in the U.S.--we're in a forest again.
My friends and I secretly communicate with the FBI
and help set up a sting operation--our task
is to lead the mafia/militia to a specific location
where we'll arrest them.
We rejoin the group and take a walk with Joe and Rob.
Joe has gray stubble on his face.
His clothes are old and dirty.
He tells us he'll shoot anyone in the face, and I shudder.
4th
I'm living in a post-apocalyptic world:
once majestic cities are reduced to rubble
and twisted steel beams.
Thick, gray clouds block out the sun.
It's impossible to avoid dirt.
I'm traveling with three others--one man and two women.
One woman tells us she had a dream that she betrayed a friend.
We travel far and wide over this blasted landscape--
mainly just trying to survive.
We come to an enormous dome that collapsed, but
still maintained it's basic shape.
It's made of enormous steel beams that once
held large panes of glass.
The woman who had had the dream of betrayal
slices the other woman across the belly with her sword,
blood pours from the woman's belly and she looks
at her attacker with a confused expression.
The man with whom we're traveling encourages
the attacker--"Do it!" he shouts.
The attacker then lifts part of the dome
like it's the trunk of an enormous car,
and kicks the woman she cut down into a deep pit
that is the footprint of the dome.
I continue on with the group,
but suddenly my POV changes. I'm now
seeing the betrayed woman in the pit under the fallen dome--
I'm not with her, I'm just seeing her as though through a camera.
She's standing, holding her belly, but otherwise physically fine.
Then she says, "Above or below the earth, you cannot escape my wrath."
