I had two romantic dreams this morning, the first of which was more so than the second. I remember very little of the first, except that I was walking through a park, and I saw two young guys practicing a form of acrobatic dance. I slowed down to watch them for a while as I passed by. I walked a bit further and saw a girl who was doing the same sort of dance. What a coincidence, I thought, they should all be friends. There was a long scene that I don’t remember, but I was back to the park later, walking in the direction from which I came. As I walked closer, I saw that that the guys and the girl had joined forces and were now acrobatically dancing together. I gave the group a smile as I passed, and the girl grabbed me and pulled me into an embrace that was surprisingly intimate, yet still looked like part of the dance. “I just had to meet you,” she told me, “I don’t know why yet, but I felt that I needed to know you.” We sort of danced around each other for a little while, in that intimate way, while we talked a bit and got to know each other. It was very beautiful. Then the dream changed to another scene, the rest of which eludes me. This is unfortunate, because I do remember that it was also pretty romantic.
* * * * *
Dream #2
I was lying in bed with a girl, T, and our relationship wasn’t particularly close yet. We hadn’t been seeing each other long, maybe a few days, and for some reason we were both wearing pajamas while we were in bed. She resisted and got annoyed when I tried to cuddle with her, so we had an incredibly long, uncomfortable conversation before we ended up just cuddling anyway.
When we finally got up, we decided to call one of our female friends and go hiking. We stopped in at a convenience store on our way up to the hills, and after we’d bought some supplies, the three of us hit the trail. T led the way, then me, then our friend. T got a long way ahead very quickly, and the other two of us weren’t able to keep up with her. We walked and talked with each other instead, and said things like, “Man, she sets a grueling pace,” and “I sure hope everything’s okay up there,” and “I was hoping we’d all get to have some time together; I wish she’d stayed with us.”
After hiking for a while, we arrived at a turn-of-the-century inn that was nestled in a little valley between the hills, and since the front doors were wide open, we walked inside. There was a lot of activity, and the place seemed to be a sort of retreat. As we walked from room to room, we saw different things happening. One room was the quiet room, where people were reading books or admiring the scenery out the windows. Most people were single, but there was a married couple standing by the window. In the next room was a dancing class, which appealed to both T and our friend, so they immediately took off their hiking boots and jackets and spontaneously joined the group, which the group seemed to encourage. I gave them a little wave, and continued walking through the building. I came to a large kitchen, in which a cooking class was in session, where they were making omelettes in the old-fashioned French way, over a fire in the huge oven.
As I passed one of the young women in the class, she was pulling a long-handled omelette pan out of the oven, rather awkwardly, and it looked as if she was having some difficulty, so I reached over and helped her maneuver it onto the prep table. We made a few jokes back and forth, and had a really short but great conversation, and I thought to myself that already this girl and I probably had a better relationship than T and I had. I bid her adieu, and walked out of the kitchen into a library room, where I saw a writer I’d met a few times standing next to one of the bookshelves with a guy friend of his. I walked over to join them, and Writer asked me how it was going with the new girl I’d been seeing. By the way he worded the question, I could tell that he knew we weren’t particularly close.
“I don’t know yet, we’re still figuring things out.”
He smirked. “Do I know my audience, or what? You been together long? You f**k her?”
“We’re not quite there yet,” I replied. “Like I said–”
He cut me off. “Man, I could never do that. If we don’t have sex, I’m outta there.”
“Hey, most of my friends are girls. T and I are taking it slow, that’s all. Seeing where it goes.”
He gave me a dude-I-just-feel-sorry-for-you look, and we changed the subject and talked about other things for a minute, then I took my leave to find my companions. I saw them in a large dance performance room, which had bleachers on one end that were packed with people. I found a seat before they did, so I motioned for them to join me. They were on their way when a girl plopped down on my right, and dropped a huge duffel bag and overcoat next to me. I told her that my girlfriend’s sitting there, and asked her to please move them underneath the seat. She grumbled but finally agreed. T and our friend weren’t able to make it through the milling crowd, however, so they decided to sit on the floor in front of the bleachers. That figures, I thought, T and I are kept apart once again. The group of dancers walked out to the middle of the floor, and the show began.
At this point, the dream changed and I found myself in my home, which was an old farmhouse. It was comfortable but needed a few repairs here and there. I was walking across the gravel driveway, from the house to the shed, when a dog ran by me. He was running from Cletus, my crazy neighbor with long black hair who was wearing a black suit, top hat, and John Lennon sunglasses. He was chasing the dog with one of his homemade guns that had a short, flared barrel. As he ran by, the dog yelled back to him (yes, the dog was yelling), “Don’t shoot me, Cletus, you hillbilly!”
Cletus lived in the next house down the road. There was a large orchard between our houses, so we didn’t interact very much. He was about five years older than I, and his two adult male cousins lived with him at his house. A few seconds after Cletus and the dog ran past me, his two cousins came running by with two guns of similar design. I said to them, “Okay, guys, that’s enough; just let him go,” and one of them turned and ran toward my shed, where I was leaning in the doorway. He was either high or drunk, but I knew he was harmless, so I was unfazed and stood with my arms folded across my chest while he pulled out a switchblade and started to wave it around.
“I don’t recommend you do that,” I said, pausing at one point to lean away from one of his pathetic lunges. “We’re neighbors, and at some point we may need to. . .help each other out.”
By way of an answer, he lit something on fire and stuck it onto the door jamb next to me, then laughed and ran off to join his brother. I expected it to explode or something, so I shut the door and waited. Nothing happened, so after about ten seconds I opened the door, grabbed a small hand towel, and snuffed the little fire out. I’m gonna need to talk to Cletus about this one, I thought to myself, and that’s when I woke up.
