Saturday 30 July 2011

Dreaming of you

An odd dream last night, which means it's like most of the dreams I remember. At first I was in my car, setting it up so that I could drive from the back-seat. I wanted to do some writing and reading during the drive, and this was easier back there without the steering wheel in the way. Don't ask how I'd have steered. No idea. The car somehow got itself started, and ignored my increasingly-pointless pressing of the brake-pedal. Stuck halfway between the front controls which didn't respond, and the back controls which I couldn't reach, I suddenly realised that my friend, Nathan, was in the back seat, and that I could get him to steer the thing. Unfortunately, I blocked his vision, and then we trundled onto an elevated motorway. Somehow we must have got out of this, because the scene shifted. I may have woken and fallen back to sleep.

Next, I was holidaying with friends, and we had to go to a hotel. On packing to leave it turned out that I must have stayed in the same room the previous year, as books I own in bags I recognised as mine were stored under the bed. Entrusting two or three bags to friends, I was about to follow them downstairs when a Greek girl began weeping. Rory McGrath, who was her brother, told me that she was weeping on account of their sister. The mother sat in a chair looking sad. We went outside onto a patio area, with a steeply-sloping unrailed roof. Rory ran down it, and flung himself off the building in a fit of despair. The girl, her mother and I hurried as fast as safety would permit after him.

By the time we got to the edge of the roof we could only see his body tumbling mannequin-like and lifeless across scrub and a small railway line. My attention was arrested momentarily by what appeared to be a portable toilet on railway wheels, somehow going up the track. It had no windows, so attempts to signal the driver to stop and help us look for Rory were in vain. Realising we would have to find a safe route to Rory, I outpaced the others, hastening back up the slope. I hurried downstairs, and then realised that I was in danger of missing my flight. In the dream this was far more important than checking on the health of Mr McGrath. Apologies for my callous unconscious mind, sir, on the off-chance that you're reading this.

So I rushed back up the spiral stairs, which seemed to be pressing down on me, allowing barely enough room to squeeze through. Unsure whether this was an illusion or a dream, I put my back into lifting the stairs, and they easily got out of my way. I over-stepped my target and reached the sixth or seventh floor (rooms labelled 6xx, note difference between US and British use), where Frankenstein's monster was working as a room cleaner. He recognised me as a fellow worker as we both were wearing fluorescent safety jackets. I started hurrying downstairs again, but woke up before reaching the airport or finding out if Rory was ok. I think either he was dead or it was an insurance scam.

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