Author: Decade Dream Journal

Work Day

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I’m late for work, and I don’t even have my coat because I came home for lunch wearing my employee jacket. As I rush out in the cold my sister is sitting in front of the TV watching Sailor Moon.

In town I come across two old ladies, they are hanging outside an ice cream parlor and talking about phones. I stop and invite them to visit my store. They ask me if I’ve already done my homework. I say,

Ma’am, I’m 33.

The store looks exactly like my home, but there are a bunch of desks in the living room, with girls sitting at them working. Boss Lady calls to announce she’s running a fever and will have to stay at home.

I go to my room, where my cat is sleeping. Just then Boss Lady arrives even though she said she wouldn’t, and she looks pale and sick, with bags under her eyes. A coworker whispers to me that she looks horrible, B.L. turns around angrily and asks what we are talking about. I try to look innocent and say we’re just really worried about her. I go back to my job which is apparently cooking, and we are using Bluetooth plates to share recipes.

Now I’m watching (or living?) a movie about an Indian woman flying to Italy to visit her children and grandchildren. Her plane crashes, killing her husband. She is confined in an embassy, where she has a series of wacky hijinks with ladies of all nationalities.

The woman wants to reach her family in northern Italy, but a massive flood is stopping her. Meanwhile her family is watching the flood on the news: the pets recognize their owners’ grandmother on TV and leave on a crazy adventure to try and rescue her.

0

A Little Walk

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I’m walking with my siblings in town, we’re looking for a stationary store. We stop to look through the window of a new ice cream parlor, they have a giant vat of vanilla cream covered with Nutella.

We are now walking on a mountain road, you can see the night sky so perfectly from here. I try to take a picture, but people keep walking in front of the camera and it’s so frustrating. A UFO appears, and still people are pushing me and trying to grab my phone so I can’t take a clear picture and I’m so, so, so angry.

0

Four More Snippets

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I remember this little scene: my coworker S. tells me to take 20 from the cash register and then he hugs me. It feels really nice.

A young man with red hair and glasses knocks at my door. He’s carrying orange flyers and I can tell he’s from a rival phone company. I smile, cross my arms and lean against the door. “Ok, convince me,” I say.

I have a baby with me! Not mine technically, but a sibling’s. I think it’s a boy at first but it’s actually a black-haired girl named Logan. Then I’m sitting at a trial where they’re deciding who’s gonna take care of the baby, and I realize I’m inside an actual TV soap opera.

I watch an old Star Wars movie set in the 1970s. The characters are high school students, they form a band to join in a musical contest, Luke Skywalker is playing the electric guitar and Princess Leia is the drummer. They lose against two white kids rapping, but it’s amazing to see them dancing on stage. I feel so lucky to have new footage after all these years, especially of Carrie Fisher.

0

Four Snippets

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

There’s been a murder inside a big, white cathedral, two people, quite gruesome by the look of it. I’m with a couple of friends, one of them is my old classmate L. We are not allowed to go inside, but we leave a sad note with a fountain pen and our best wavy handwriting.

It’s a foggy, dark day. I meet both my grandmothers: they are sitting together on a bench outside a house. Grandma G. gives me a ring, it’s silver and heavy, I snatch it out of her hand right away with no shame. I tell them both to be careful and stay safe from the Coronavirus outbreak.

I’m at home, but home is a small RV. I’m waiting for my penpal C. to visit as she promised, because I want to propose to her. She arrives at night, wearing a white spring dress and pushing a shopping cart. She slips in my tiny bed.

It’s Easter, I’m celebrating with my siblings but I’m also missing work. I feel a bit guilty about it, and just then my boss shows up and looks at me and I can tell she’s silently judging me. I have my period and bad cramps, but I tell her I’m gonna wash my face, put my jeans on and go to work.

0

Soup and Wine

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I’m building a pyramid of merch to put in front of the store (like I’m supposed to IRL tomorrow morning), except it’s not phones, it’s jars of chicken broth, each one in its brown paper box. One of the jars is empty, I fill it with cheap soup from a can and run around the store looking for the box. My boss is rather annoyed about it all, she takes me to the side and reveals that she’s pregnant with twins, so she’s going home.

Now there’s a bunch of children in the store and we are supposed to learn how to take care of them. We watch “Mary Poppins and the False Gospel“, a modified version of the beloved movie set during Hanukkah. Even in the dream I surprised this thing exists.

My middle school teacher, sweet Mrs R, arrives to continue the lessons. She draws and ink a really good picture of a man riding a motorcycle, and my dad starts coloring it with brown watercolors. I’m jealous because they are both such good artists.

On my way home I kill the mayor of a small town and take his ruby ring. By killing him I gained the right to own his big old mansion, I find a nice bottle of red wine hidden inside it. I go home and find my late grandpa P. sitting at the living room table. He loves wine so I give him the bottle and he’s rather happy.

0

Some Good Advice

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I have a vague memory of meeting Captain Janeway. She tells me that, when playing Pokémon, most people just rely on brute force instead of strategy. I am definitely guilty of that, but I don’t say it out loud.

0

Unsettling Grandmother

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I’m with my cousin in the building’s parking lot, we are about to go inside the basement door when a black cat approaches us, he looks very chill and not afraid at all. My cousin asks if it’s my cat, I say it’s not, because my cat’s eyes are green and this one’s are yellow.

We go inside and the building has now turned into a tall maze with different stores and events on every floor. This is a recurring dream of mine, and I tell my cousin I can never find my way out when the it changes like this.

There is a giant pharmacy on the first floor, then a stock exchange. My dad makes his way through the various businessmen, he looks like Ricky Moranis did in the 90s. He stars yelling,

I want money! I want money! I WANT MONEY!

and he’s so convincing that one of the businessmen cedes him the right to some old songs. We go through them to figure out how much they’re worth. They come mostly from pulpy old movies, but there’s also a Christmas album from the cast of the cartoon “Sing”.

They are filming a Spiderman VS Thor movie in my neighborhood, but it’s very low budget. I’m watching Spiderman jump on top of my gate, and I can clearly see he used a trampoline badly hidden under a blanket.

I follow the actors as they run down the streets I’m so familiar with. We arrive at my late Grandma G.’s house: she and my dad are sunbathing in the yard. My brother approaches her and asks,

What is your true form?

She open her eyes and I shiver because I’m sure she’s about to unleash some ancient, unspeakable Eldritch horror on us. But my brother dips his hands in water and gently tickles and massages her bare feet. My grandma laughs and refuses to answer. Instead she tells us to keep our soulmates close.

My brother says he met his soulmate in a videogame. Grandma says out loud the name of mine, but I can’t remember it anymore.

0

Pigs and Veggie Bowls

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

I’m at a hair salon inside the mall; my hair is big and bushy, Hermione Granger style, and I desperately need a haircut. The place’s owner is a scrawny guy with an evil smirk, he shaves off a patch of hair in the back of my head, so it looks like I’m going bald, and then kicks me out. I’m desperate because I’ll have to shave everything off now.

I wake up in the morning to find my sister sitting on the living room floor, I’m enraged because she’s supposed to be at her own house, I tell her that she’s not gonna sleep in my room. She locks herself in the bathroom and I start banging on the door because I’m late for school. I don’t know if I went to school at all these past days, I can’t remember. Then I realize that’s because I went to work instead.

I arrive in my classroom and I’m greeting by the usual philosophy teacher, he announces we are going on a school trip. A moment later I’m sitting at lunch in a hotel dining room, so I wonder how I got there if I was at home with my sister in the morning. We are given free food samples, they come in small packages and one of them is pink and says “tuna for cats”.

We are brought bowls of veggie soup, I’m about to dig in mine when another girl opens one of her little packages and pours some truly nasty stuff in my bowl, so now I can’t eat anymore. As I wait for the others to finish I happen to fart; it’s just a little toot, but there’s no hiding it so I say “Sorry” out loud. One of the teachers says,

There are some people that never apologize, and that’s bad. But there are also people who apologize when it’s too late and the room already stinks.

We are shown a video taken from a security cam in the city of Venice, where we were apparently visiting that morning. I see myself on the screen as the chubby teen I used to be in high school, I’m reading a book and some bad guys steal it. I chase them down some tunnels, I cringe watching myself because I run so awkwardly.

Now we are led outside, where we see a beautiful pink sunset against the mountains. I take some pictures of the sky and of some local kids that are doing somersaults. A group of pigs are crossing a little fence, they are also pink and shiny and beautiful. They are led by a girl and her grandfather, who is a white haired detective Columbo. I take pictures of the pigs too and my teacher says I shouldn’t because it’s rude. Columbo says it’s all right, as long as I send him prints.

0

A Lonely Puppy and a Trip by the Sea

Posted on by Decade Dream Journal

From my room’s window I see an older woman speaking to her grandson. The child has a puppy with him, small and gray and furry, and the woman is trying to convince him to abandon it. The puppy’s name is George.

Later that day I’m talking to a group of friends in my house, who also happen to be veterinarians. I tell them about poor George and how worried I am about him. Couldn’t they take him to the vet clinic with them? He’s so small it wouldn’t be too much of a bother! No, they tell me, they already have too many dogs as it is.

I look out of the window again and see George running in the park, he’s all alone. I go downstairs and there are more vets in the parking lot, washing dogs with a water hose. I call George and he runs to me waggling his tail, I notice he’s not a puppy after all, but a big pit bull with gray and brown fur and the sweetest eyes.

While I’m walking in town a man approaches me. He explains he’s a phone technician and he’s looking for a certain local village. I realize he’s going the wrong direction, so I invite him to follow me.

As we walk I show him the town’s churches and squares and explain their history. We eventually reach a cliff by the sea, and I don’t know how to proceed beyond that. My black shoes get all sandy. I find a lost, old-fashioned cell phone on the ground, I go through the contacts to find out who it belongs to, but a red-haired boy arrives to claim it.

I start chatting with two black girls. I tell them I’m an independent woman who can support herself with her work, my gran is listening from the phone in my pocket and she says out loud that I’m lying. One of the girls stop at a restaurant on the beach because she’s a waitress there. I stop at the soap store, I look for disinfectant but it’s all gone because of the new Coronavirus. I buy banana toothpaste instead.