Weird stuff

Okay, so last night I had a dream I woke up from. Nothing spectacular, but interesting enough I thought I’d record it. I was on the street in someplace that was supposedly the neighbourhood I live in, but it looked more like something closer to downtown. Crowded tree-lined streets that wandered just a bit. I was carrying a huge load of laundry in my arms. A young woman wanted to know how to get to Kennedy Road. I knew it was parallel to the street we were on, but I was disoriented and had to ask a passerby which way was south. Orienting myself, I could direct her to Sheppard Avenue, and then to Kennedy. I think she got the gist of it because she thanked me and started in that direction, but I followed after her, lugging my laundry, telling her more than she needed to know about getting there. She finally said good-bye and gave me a parting shot I couldn’t quite get, but took for “Nice puppy,” which was weird because I didn’t have a dog. But when I looked down, there was a bold, orangey-coloured chipmunk at my feet, striped, almost like some kind of jungle cat. And when it stood on its back feet and leaned on my knee, I was surprised by how large it was… the size of a cat. It let me pet it, though I had no food to give it. I had the vague sense it would be a pet for me from then on, and that’s when I woke up, needing to visit another room for a few moments. :)

Now here’s a waking one. I’ve been listening to an audio book about the turbulent romance of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Yesterday morning, the narrator said something about letters Burton wrote to her that she apparently never answered, but “she treasured for the rest of her life”. That sounded like the kind of remark you make about someone who’s already dead, but I was pretty sure she was still alive. So when I got into work, I checked on Wikipedia and, sure enough, they gave her death date. Then I noticed it was this month, this year. Then I noticed it was recent. Then I noticed, OMG, that’s today! She died yesterday, March 23. And there it was, already written up on Wikipedia. Now that, that was weird.

Meanwhile, back in the 1980s...

I just woke up from the strangest dream. I don't very often remember my dreams, but if I wake up during or just after them, I've got a better chance of doing so, so... Let me record the adventure!

I don't remember it all but I do remember wandering an old neighbourhood near where I used to live... it was once a little town surrounded by countryside till the city engulfed it in the 70s. In the dream, I was there with my friend Roc, the guy I mentioned yesterday, and we were going to these old used book stores I used to haunt years ago. The place didn't look the way I remember it, and eventually it morphed into some other place. Roc wanted to go to some different shop, so I followed him, babbling away to him. He wouldn't respond. I then realized I was following some woman I didn't know, and that's why "Roc" wasn't responding. I saw Roc walking a path off to my left, and knew I'd have to catch up with him. The woman and I crossed a foot bridge over some nice little creek, and on the other side, P-Doug and G were waiting for me. So much for Roc.

I don't remember what happened right after that, but I eventually wound up driving around on my own. I stopped into some fabric shop (hmmm... maybe G did have something to do with this!) and picked out something made of flax, or something, that someone there told me was just great for stuffing furniture. I took a bunch of it to this car dealership that somehow I had something to do with. I felt like I didn't belong there, though I knew the people (for some reason, they were all the guys I worked with in a warehouse one summer during university), and I put the material on a shelf where it would no doubt be noticed and used to comfortably stuff car seats! One of the guys I used to work with, a fellow I was friends with for a while, took me aside and told me confidentially that the stuff was in fact crappy for stuffing furniture. It was very itchy. I felt sad. I left.

Somehow, I wound up wandering around with Jeff, a guy I knew in high school, and haven't seen in about ten years. More used book stores. The sun was setting, and we were with a bunch of other people in this open-air tourist wagon being pulled by Clydesdales. He was going on about something, and I was relaxed and gazing off into the distance. We're on the crest of this hill, and we can see this whole city spread out below us, and just on the horizon, I can make out what seems to be a mushroom cloud... no, two of them. It's hard to be sure; in the setting sun, they're misty and nearly transparent, so far away they're barely moving... so I sit forward and yup, that's definitely what they are. Other people begin to notice, point, mutter. Suddenly another one bursts, closer. Then another, then another, closer each time. A nuclear attack... and I'm wondering, Russia? Terrorists? Too many to be terrorists... we must have pissed off someone substantial. I resign myself to the fact we're about to die, and I turn to Jeff and offer my hand, and he shakes it; 'nice knowin' yah' kind of thing like that 'Well, that about wraps it up for this life' scene between Ford and Zaphod in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. We didn't get a chance to sing any ancient Betelguese death anthems, though, because the ground shook and the shockwave hit us and that was that; I woke up.

I can't remember having dreamed of nuclear war since I was a kid. Maybe I have, but I don't remember it. It's funny because not all that long ago, I was remarking to a friend that the world seems so different now. When I was a teenager, nuclear war was just about a daily topic of conversation. Since the Soviet Union collapsed, it hardly gets mentioned. I guess it's still in the back of everyone's mind, though.