Wiccan Whirlpool

This was the night of 10/18, Wednesday.

The dream starts in a classroom filled with people from different times in my life.  I was talking with a former classmate about how well I did in math as I was trying to get up from a student desk.  My satchel got caught up on the edge of the desk and I couldn’t get it untangled.  Just outside of the classroom there was another room that vaguely resembled the bridge from “Event Horizon.” It was sort of roundish with a sloping ceiling with dim lights and some wood trim, so it wasn’t quite all metalic.  In that room a bunch of people were waiting for a bus with a nice man who had short grey hair.  He had some sort of control box that looked a little like a dark grey or black Etch-a-Sketch only a little more round.  It had a black screen with a monochrome green readout.  He was trying to set a force field of some kind, and we all had to gather on one side of the room for him to set the far side.  When it came time for him to set the half we were standing in we had to all crowd into the bathroom.  The readout showed one-inch-high vertical bars with numbers underneath.  He showed me the last series to set the field, 2111.

This bathroom was smallish and dimly lit.  It was in shades of grey and there was a mirror above the toilet.  Everything was very simple and modern-looking like something from IKEA.  It was spotlessly clean, and as we crowded into it there was just enough room for every person to stand with all of us scrunched together, like the space was expanding to let us in and the shrinking to fit.

When the bus finally arrived I realized that the seat numbers were different on different buses.  For some reason this was frustrating and important.

Apparently the busses took us to the mall.  Once inside I was walking up the stairs–the mall must’ve been five stories high.  On each floor there was something different, but it was all “mom clothes.”  One floor had bermuda shorts and matching patterned/sequined t-shirts.  There was a floor where I could see wind suits, and then finally something different, but it was all twiggy juniors clothing that was too skimpy or simply way too small.  The visuals people must have been doing a floor move because around one corner there were manaquin busts all over the floor, probably twenty or so, all of them dressed in different colored blouses in different fabrics.  All of these were business to evening blouses but small enough to fit a 6 year old girl.

I woke up disgusted that I couldn’t find anything to fit me.

another wild ride…

Last night when I “came to” I was in another crowded place, possibly another shopping mall or some kind of convention center.  I realized I had to pee so I began looking for the bathroom.  When I located the bathroom I found it to be a huge open room dimly lit with bare flourescent light fixtures and tiled in “institution green.”  It looked ancient and it was in very bad shape.  It was dirty, tiles were broken, divider doors were broken and their paint was chipped.  Many toilets had no paper, did not function at all and were rusty, were full of standing ick, and/or were missing some part or all of the divider.  People were lined up next to each other sitting down to go and I couldn’t locate an acceptable receptacle.  All of the people were old and depressed-looking.  Eventually I settled on one in a corner where the lights were dim. 

After escaping the bathroom I entered another door close by.  There were heavy old curtains drawn over the windows, blocking all of the outside light.  Dirty, dank, old mattresses covered in tattered bedclothes were scattered about on the floor.  I was instantly sleepy and couldn’t help by lay down even though I was repulsed.  As more people entered the room I managed to rouse myself enough to notice two sets of my elderly bank customers being led in by a man I knew was in charge.  I tried to yell out to tell them not to lie down but I couldn’t make any noise.  Somehow I fought off the covers and got up, and I began to struggle with the heavy curtains.  The rings were rusty and didn’t want to move along the rods and the curtains were fighting me back, but I was able to let a little light in.  I managed to get one set of customers up and out but the others just waved goodbye as I left.

Next was a room where the floor was covered in puzzles.  Everyone who walked in had to help put one together in order to leave.  Two people were alreay working on my puzzle before I started.  It was all in shades of brown and tan and the pieces were small.  We were under a time limit, and the man appeared again.  Something bad was going to happen if we didn’t finish the puzzle but the two men working on mine wouldn’t listen to me and kept messing it up. 

I had an extreme sense of dread throughout the entire dream.

I woke up as I was yelling at them for screwing up again. 

Comments?

Let me just start by saying this: when I dream it’s a fantastical experience.  Some people only remember vague impressions from their dreams.  Some people see disconnected images.  Some only see things in black and white.  My dreams are a cinematic showcase of sight, smell, sound, and sensation.  The color is clear, everything is realistic.  It’s as though I’m transported into another world to live another set of experiences.  My body tends to react this way to what goes on in my head as well.  I can awake with my heart racing, sweating, laughing, crying, furrowing my brow, and even talking.

So, on to last night’s bizarreness.

As I became aware of my surroundings I found myself walking through part of a new shopping plaza that is getting ready to open near my home.  I had just dropped my son off at daycare.  I was on the hunt for a gift to give my husband for Yule.  There weren’t too many people around as I entered a high-end men’s clothing store.  I could smell the new clothes that were hanging on the racks that were crowded all around the store.  The carpet was green and the walls were tiled in oak, and there were crystal chandeliers with dim yellow lights hanging from the ceiling.  The tall, thin, dark-haired man standing behind the wrap stand was telling customers close to him that there was a “free gift” with every purchase, which was a small toiletry kit that contained a bright red shaver.  I was looking at the khaki slacks hanging on the wall and trying to find the right size when I noticed the price tag.  While I have no recall of the exact price I suddenly realized that there was no way I would be able to afford anything there and I left the store.  As I was leaving a man was looking at the red shaver and runing it down a square length of wood that was set up for display in the middle of the store.

I left the shopping plaza to go to work, which was at my former high school as a helper in the library.  The whole building was crowded with people, and as I was walking I met a fellow bank employee who works in another branch.  Her role here was as librarian.  This is someone who is my peer but whom I consider less competent than myself, so it seemed odd to find that she was now my boss.  She helped me find the computer terminal I needed to begin my work.  Later that evening I had spent so much time working at this terminal that I somehow fell asleep and when I awoke I was looking out of the screen–from inside the computer.  This woman came over to shut off the computer, looked around the stacks of the library, didn’t see me, and left the computer running.  After she walked away I crawled out from under the desk and headed for the checkout desk.  Someone asked why I got to leave already and her reply was to lay off, because she has two small kids and she needs the time.  I told her thanks and headed toward the parking lot.

It was very dark outside when I was leaving.  Because it had been so crowded I had to park on the street, and as I was walking alone to my car I saw a man standing right by my car.  I tried to hit the panic button to scare him off but it wouldn’t work.  It’s difficult to describe him because he wasn’t clear, even though my impression of him was.  He wasn’t too tall but he seemed lanky, he was probably slouching.  His eyes were blue and wild, his skin was pale, and his greyish-white hair was a mess.  He looked like Gandalf or Odin might look, and he was hopping around leering at me.  His voice had an awful, sickening hissy quality, and I knew he wanted to scare me.  Somehow I managed to get around him and lock the doors as he was playing at reaching for me.

There were several accidents on the roads of downtown Terre Haute (where I grew up) as I drove home in the rain.  At one intersection there were police, fire, and ambulances.  At another blocked intersection I got out of the car and heard shots fired.  No one could tell me what was happening, but people were screaming and some building was on fire.  I hid with some unknown people behind an old mattress that was leaning against a wall in an alley just off of the road.  I don’t remember leaving there but shortly I found myself at home.

Once I got home I knew I needed to go upstairs, so I did.  There was a song I needed to play on the trumpet which was up in the attic (I don’t play the trumpet or any other wind instrument).  I could hear the song in my head, but I couldn’t get the instrument to do more than squawk a bit, and laughably I was trying to mute this horrible noise with a piece of cardboard so the members of the audience in the front row outside my windows didn’t think it was too loud.  The trumpet was very cold, and it began to snow.  The windows were open, and the white sheers were billowing in with the cold breeze.  I rested for a minute in one of the windows on the side while looking up at the brown shingled, steeply inclined roof to the side of it.  Eventually my (big, beautiful, black, and now dead) cat Onyx came in through the window.  His fur was stark white and when I held him I noticed that he was covered in huge brown fleas that scurried away from my fingers where I touched his fur.  At this point it occurred to me that I was dreaming, because Onyx wasn’t white he was black.  I put him down and then I woke up.

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