(This one’s from yesterday.) I dream that I’m reading a strangely handwritten book about a group of paranormal investigators in their forties. There are two bisexual women and two men with long hair and big mustaches, one blond and one black haired, they’re in a loving relationship with each other. The fifth member of the group is Prince Charles.
Then I dream that I’m at the mountain house with my whole family. We decide to walk to the village but I forgot my camera and need to run back. I find a homeless man in front of the door, he is using a coin to trick our fingerprint lock. He’s very surprised to realize there are people in the house today, he begs me to let him stay the night. I call out loud for my dad who promptly kicks the man out. I feel slightly guilty.
I dream that I’m the one visiting C. this time. I bring over a library book for her to read, the police shows up to seize it because it’s illegal to bring library books outside the border. C. gives me a doll house shaped like Buckingham Palace, says that in the future even if we’re apart, we’re gonna meet inside it.
I dream that I’m randomly messaged by a nice older girl on a forum. We decide to meet up on the beach, she asks about art, what are my favorite paintings? I show her a kiosk selling street art: my favorite painting is all of them, combined, all the nuanced colors they create together. We sit together on a rock, cuddling. I think I’m in love.
The next day I’m at school, not interested at all in the literature class I’m attending. We’re reading the first book of a trilogy (His Dark Materials, maybe?), I didn’t even bring my copy with me. What’s the point, I read it so many times already. The teacher is annoyed by my attitude, the other kids are astounded. I’m so glad I’m an adult with better priorities.
Beach girl invites me over to her place so I can meet her roommates. Wait, roommates? Maybe I totally misunderstood her and she’s straight after all. Suddenly shy, I refuse to go and send my cat instead. I have to go to school and sit through a Harry Potter movie with dozens of TV ads. I’m again pretty annoyed and yelling my displeasure at the big screen. In the movie, the actors are digitally de-aged to look like children, it’s rather uncanny valley.
My cat gets lost on the way home. She finally arrives chased by five other cats, black and white like her. She’s so scared, and I love her so much and feel so guilty. The five cats are rattling the balcony window, we can see their silhouettes behind the white curtain, they’re terrifying.
I dream that I’m yelling at my sister in the living room. I look down and there’s a small toddler sitting on the table, looking at us with interest. She’s very thin and has a full head of brown hair. Her face looks serious, older than her age.
I’m told that she belongs to our neighbors’, so I pick her up and carry her to their window. They all look incredibly relieved to see her. As we talk, more and more toddlers start to appear. I realize that they are all adults being shrunken down and we’re in a Star Trek episode.
I dream that I’m at the store and there is a long line of customers standing all together. I yell that they need to social distance, they ignore me. The customer I’m serving passes me his credit card, but the reader has turned into a videogame and I don’t know how to reset it. The customer grows impatient and leaves in a huff. My cousin is so angry at me because I’m an incompetent loser.
On my way home I stop at a stationary store, I want to buy a bright yellow umbrella I saw from the window, but the guy inside says,
I’d love to give you the umbrella, bus someone else just bought it.
I’m now a Victorian girl and the umbrella I wanted was actually a book, The Count of Monte Cristo. I arrive at my cottage feeling dejected, then surprised and elated when I see someone has bought the book for me! I gather my siblings and read out aloud to them, they dissolve in giggles and “Well I never!”s
I dream that I’m reading the 3rd Harry Potter book. The kids have to write essays on fashion history for professor Lupin, Harry has taken a lucky potion so his essay is as good as Hermione’s. Both their full essays are printed in the book and it’s weird how I’ve never bothered to read them before. Hermione’s essay is full of pictures, she went the extra mile and glued in magazine clippings. I wonder why she only talks about muggle fashion, shouldn’t wizards be included somewhere?
There is a white Bull Terrier living in my building, and I dream that the owner asks me to walk her around the parking lot. I’m excited because I love that dog, I take a lot of pictures as a butterfly lands on her big noggin. More neighbors arrive with their dogs, we get into an argument, I’m filming the man yelling at me so twitter can doxx him.
Then I dream that I’m home with my cousin, she’s upset because she realized everyone hates her. It’s because she’s such a bully, I tell her. Boss Lady is there too, scowling at my mother’s very bitter coffee. There’s also a previously unseen Boss Man, he’s quizzing me on American Founding Fathers. He gives me a book about Aaron Burr.
There is a man chasing us, he’s wearing an animal skull on his head. He’s immortal, no matter how much we hurt him he keeps getting up; eventually I throw a bomb and blow him to smithereens. I know this is gonna buy me some time so I go to class; I can’t pay attention though, ever few moments I glance at the door, wondering when the man with the animal skull will be back.
I’m taking a walk in town with Gran, we’re not wearing a face mask and I feel guilty about it. She buys a notebook and I pay for it, then she gets a coffee to go (more sanitary!) and I pay for that too, so now I don’t have any money left.
I go back home and use the notebook to copy down a Sudoku board, I make a big mess of inky splotches and have to rip out the page. An old schoolmate comes over, he shows me a book he’s writing: the plot is about a rich young boy (self insert much? I think) with a kidnapped little sister. The book*I* am writing is much better, it’s about a genius little girl living in Victorian times.
He notices a picture of Narcissa Malfoy on the cover of one of my books, says she’s the most beautiful woman in all Harry Potter canon. I argue that would be Rowena Ravenclaw’s daughter, I try to google her but there’s something wrong: I’m writing her name on my notebook instead of a computer, and each two words I write, a drawing that combines both of them appears on paper. I immediately start combining pornographic words, and I’m still having fun with the results when my alarm rings, dangit.
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.
My boss is giving out birthday presents, I knew it, I knew she was generous! One of my coworkers unwraps a black console, and I gasp: is it… a Playstation 2? No, it’s a cheap Made in China rip-off. I unwrap mine, there is an old SNES inside. I already own one, though! Not to mention, the Super Mario cartridge in it is fake.
On my way home I stop at the local toy store, I’m planning to buy some toys to entertain bored children at work*. I choose a wooden truck, a white plushie and pink plastic goggles. The man at the register says it’s gonna be 18 bucks, I’m taken aback because I only have 20 in my wallet. It should be 12, max! The man points out I’ve taken two pair of goggles instead of one. I confess I can’t pay that much money and walk out the store.
At home my dad is opening some boxes that were just delivered. Inside there are black-covered Penguin books for my brother, we tease him but he insists he won them. I pick up one, Anne of Green Gables, and decide to enter a contest with it.
The night of the contest I present an essay on the book alongside a cake inspired by it: it’s lemon cream, honey and cookies. There is a big ceremony happening in a hotel on Lake Como, and all my family came along. It’s a summer night, the hotel garden is green and glistening, all the guests are dressed fancy and laughing pleasantly. I want pizza so I venture outside, order some from an intercom outside a big yellow gate. More of my family arrives and I find out they are serving pizza at the hotel, I wasted my money. A movie is being showed in the garden.
I win the contest, alongside three more kids from around Europe. The morning after we are gathered for a photoshoot on the lake. I choose what to wear, gray pants and a gray waistcoat to go with it, I feel very elegant. My hair is red, short and unruly, it gets bushier and bushier with the humidity until I look like Annie Warbucks.
Each of us is given a sign saying our name, our age and the title of our essay. Mine says I’m 18, older than the other kids. We walk in the lake and are told to hold our signs up and smile the wildest, happiest smile. Our pictures are taken. I review them later and they are not bad, I’m jealous about the professional camera’s quality compared to my phone’s. There’s also a photo of the cake I baked perfectly framed against the lake.
I want to send some of these pictures to my penpal C., but I decide I look too bad. Not the ugliest, because with my puffy hair I look a bit like my Grandma, but I don’t want C. to think I’m anything else than gorgeous. Instead I write her about a chapter from Anne of Green Gables that I really liked.
In it Anne is sitting in a wooden train car with her mom and newborn brother. A black woman walks in with a little boy, who is crying because he was too late to enter the book contest. The woman is about to get mad, when Anne’s mom asks his name. “Chemical,” says the boy.
“Well, I’m not gonna call you that, it sounds like a pill.”
Anne’s mother tells him everyone is tired and sad sometimes, he just needs to take a deep breath. The boy’s mom is so moved hearing these words that she takes the baby from the other woman’s arms and start breastfeeding him.
I need to go to the hospital to get my blood tested. It’s almost 11 in the morning and I’m running late, but I decide to stop at a local bookstore.
Sitting at the counter inside the store there is my nosy, gossipy neighbor C. She eyes me suspiciously and asks me why I’m not at work. I explain I’m going to the hospital, she doesn’t seem convinced. A bit miffed, I ask if she has The Secret of NIMH books, she says absolutely not. I’m sure I saw a children’s book with Mrs. Brisby on it, right there near the entrance, but maybe I’m mistaken?
I don’t want to argue, so I leave the store. I look at my watch (I’m wearing an old analog watch on my wrist) and see it’s still 11. Then I remember the hospital does blood work only very early in the morning, so my neighbor must have thought I was lying! Also, I forgot all my prescription papers at home, and I somehow have in my pocket my old Nokia phone from fifteen years ago. I have no choice but go back home.
I explain to my mother what happened, she says there’s still a little time to go to the hospital. When we arrive, it’s 8 P.M. and the long hallways are bathed in twilight. There are a lot of people waiting, I see a young blonde woman lounging on a chair, she is wearing a lilac shirt and looks bored out of her mind.
A doctor peeks inside the waiting room, she asks if there are any patients here to see doctor Hans (or a German-sounding name like that). Mom realizes this is who we need to see and chases the doctor in the hallway. I think maybe I won’t be waiting so long after all.
DECADE DREAM JOURNAL 