the eye of Nova's mind

I went to Fahrenheit 9/11 Thursday night. (Good movie, btw.) After it let out, I went to the parking garage, got into the line for the exit, and proceeded to not budge for 25 minutes. I've never seen anything like it. The line was just not moving. By the time I backed up and got in a line I noticed was moving, it was around 2:40 a.m. I didn't get to bed until 3:30, which meant the earliest I went to sleep was around 4:00.

I was pretty much dragging ass all the next day. In fact, I went to bed at 8:00.

I woke up this morning and went out to meet this man at an insurance company who had placed an ad in the paper this week. Apparently there were computers to be had for $90. So I bought one. There was a better one (i.e., had more RAM) for $60 more, but I'm rather broke. I brought the box home, hooked it up, then took it back down when I realized that I didn't know exactly what I needed to do to get it hooked up to the Internet. I believe it has a modem, but I'm so hardware illiterate, I really can't tell. (There were areas where the phone jacks go in, so that's a good sign. But I still can't get it to work.) Plus, I installed Rollercoaster Tycoon and, to my dismay, found that there were small hesitations when it ran. So, back to the box with the whistling power supply.

I had thoughts about DXM, so I took a nap (classic mental avoidance technique). In my dream, I repeatedly had the sensation of waking up in my bed, getting up and walking--I could feel the carpet underneath my feet--but later I'd look down and find I was still in bed. The first time this happened, it was novel enough to be intriguing; the latter instances just agitated me. Later, I ran into Blade, who was commenting that he was wanting to spend time with a mutual friend of ours, but he was resisting because of other people who were there. I told him that if seeing that person is what he wants to do, he should do it. He said, "Really?" and I said, "If that's what you want to do, and it's in your power to make it so, you should do so." He and I ended up on a couch, sleeping feet to face; I had my arm around his calf. I thought, "I really hope I don't 'wake up' like I have with the carpet under my feet feeling." And soon after, Blade's leg disappeared from my arms, and I fell to my knees weeping.

I don't nap well on Saturdays.

I don't remember much of my dream last night (I've been having trouble recalling dreams for the last two or three months). I remember traveling with a group of friends through a place that looked a lot like Iowa City. We were going somewhere where we had to look nice, and I was agitated because I'd forgotten my makeup (which makes sense, really, since I haven't regularly worn makeup in more than a decade).

I was much relieved, though, when I found out that duncang had a small makeup kit that had lipstick and blush. There was also a small vial of translucent liquid; I don't know what that was, but I think I thought it was perfume.

As I was checking out this makeup bag, another group of people came in, whereupon one of the guys took out a gun and pointed it at people, mostly me. I don't know why I often dream about people threatening me with a firearm. Eventually he asked the group who would be willing to make up a new dance move, and I volunteered so I wouldn't be shot. The guy giggled, he was so happy.

I'm still temping at the leasing office of a local apartment community. The days are getting longer, so I suspect I'm getting tired of my assignment. But I'll keep going; I don't have anything better to do.

I don't have much time to write anymore. I got a few poems out last week, while on a DXM trip. But in general, I'm just too tired in the evenings to devote much time to creative writing. This makes me unhappy.

Last night, I had a strange dream, one that featured sexual activity. This is always odd for me, because my dreams rarely focus on that (especially since I declared myself celibate). Blade was one of the people I cuddled with. It was nice to remember what that was like.

I rarely if ever write down descriptions of my dreams. I'll puzzle over them for awhile, then let them fade as they will. But a couple of days ago, I awoke from such a freaky dream (three dreams, really) that I had to commit the memory to paper. I'm in the process of converting it into a poem, if that's even possible.

Here's what I wrote upon waking:

3-D leprechaun standing (upside down) on the ceiling, looking at me as I backed out of the room. Squeezed itself from underneath the door as I tried to convince my parents of the existence of this impossible creature. Had to put my hands to either side of my father's face and literally turn his attention to the fantastical man about to leap at us. My father and it struggled a bit, and it bit my father on the finger. "Don't let it bite you," I said. I stomped on it with the heavy boots I was wearing. I looked again and it was gone.

Later in the dream, stuffed animals ambulated toward me, as if possessed of some ill-fitting life. One even passed through a shut window, as if the glass were made of air.

Then I, in a group of four, made my way up an inclined gray ultramodern hallway to a corporate cafeteria. On the way to an impossibly long buffet, our group passed two men who looked like they were in line but were not advancing. Apparently (according to them), they were gay. There were two salad sections, separated by entrees. I was glad to see the second section, because I'd neglected to get any dressing my first time around. All they had was ranch in a small triangular reservoir, about the size of a half-piece of toast.


There were more weird scenes that I just didn't have enough information to commit to paper. At one point I was working for a company, and the main benefit was that I could telnet into their system. Most people who worked there did not have access. I wish I could remember the password that was required--it was something like "Dr. Wretched". Then, apparently I wasn't working for the company anymore, but I was able to walk in, take a folder that contained info on how to telnet into the system, and deliver it to someone who did still work there (I guess he was a friend of mine). Someone was about to alert a roomful of people about this transaction (she must have known I'd been canned), but then this friend said rather desultory things about this woman, and she was emotionally crushed. I felt this was all very stereotypical, but it apparently worked.

There were also scenes in a dorm room, but I don't remember those clearly. I just remember a woman holding a doll--a Winnie the Pooh doll, I think--and talking to it.

And the last sentence that was spoken (by whom, I don't know) in my dream was this: "A volcano in the shape of a leprechaun."

I have no idea what my psyche is trying to tell me.

I had several dreams last night (oh, the wonders of O), but the last one is the one that I'm wondering about.

I was in the old, run-down mess that was my old house (the house that no longer exists in real life). There were 8x10s of me on the wall, where the family pictures used to be, and my two spelling bee trophies from when I was in elementary school (I'd forgotten all about those!). I wanted to take them with me, but it seemed the floor would cave in, and somehow I knew it wasn't my house anymore. So, F and I were in the house, looking at things, and my friend Kisha walks in. It's her house now. And there I was, caught in the middle of breaking and entering.

I played it off, tried to. But my vision was extremely blurred at that point, as if I were no longer wearing my glasses. And my balance was affected, like when I'm on a second-tier DXM trip. In sum, I was not myself, and it was plainly obvious. It seemed that Kisha had a disbelieving look on her face. It seemed that she understood why I was there, but was still mad about it.

I went into the kitchen, but the kitchen area was from my old Grinnell attic apartment, kind of in the middle of the room. Instead of a stove, there was this strange, ancient machine that... seemed to talk. It worked by "reading" greeting cards that one stuck into what looked like a letter drop. I tried to insert a card for it, but it got jammed in internal spokes, and I couldn't get it unjammed before Kisha came in the room. So I yanked it out and threw it between the machine and an adjacent table. I pretended I was perusing the room. She walked out, and I turned to my right 270 degrees. On the north wall was a recess, and in it were two stone heads--one Egyptian (similar to Nephretite), the other of Jesus. Nephretite seemed chiseled out of obsidian; Jesus of smoke gray marble. I remarked how lovely the statues were. I wished I could take one with me. In my mind, I could imagine how heavy those to-scale heads would be. Their necks were broken, as if the statues to which they belonged had fallen and broken into hundreds of body parts. Now, the heads were all that were left.

The three of us had decided to go somewhere, so we went outside to the parking lot (!) to try to find my car. F's mother came at us from the right and asked us to take some of her bags, since we were going to the same place. We told her we didn't think we'd have enough room in my car, since it was so small. I went to put my key in the trunk keyhole, and realized, hey, this isn't my car. This is some 70s model. I brought my vision up, and saw that the car was certainly quite retro. We scanned the lot for my car, but we never eyed it.

... I don't know what to make of this dream. But when I awoke, I spent several minutes going through my old house's blueprint in my mind. It was almost like I had to verify I knew where every room was, and which rooms led into the next. I didn't want to forget the house in which I grew up. I know that all I have now are my memories, and a handful of photos. There is nothing to go back and touch.

I'm still upset. My friends my age can't empathize with me; they don't know what it is like to lose your childhood home, to have nothing tangible of things that meant something to you when you were young. I woke, thinking of my sticker book (which had pictures of my family and friends, pictures I didn't want to lose), my diary, my poems from my pre-teen years. These are all gone, never to be recovered. And if I feel this way at 26, I do not look forward to being even older and having to look back.