dream!
LADYTRAP, INC.
the flip side of reality
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have you ever been to electric laserland?
[Again, slept in Joshua Tree. Dream transcribed from a torn piece of graph paper in a hand-frozen scrawl.]
A woman (sometimes my mother) loses her two cats or two daughters and is looking for clues. She is amazingly calm and level-headed for having lost her two daughters. In one version, her two cats appear and I enjoy petting their noses. They feel like my childhood cats Chester and Pavarotti. In the other version I say I know nothing but later I remember hearing girls screaming all night in a Joshua Tree canyon, probably less than a mile from where we camped. Maybe I was really hearing coyotes (in the real world).
Erica picks me up from work and we have plans to go out. We must first stop at the UCSD gym/pool/locker rooms for me to pick up a bunch of my old stuff. We get it and when she goes to the ladies' room I realise I am barefoot and go back into a classroom to retrieve my flip flops. It takes me a lengthy time to fetch them from under the desk of a talkative and taunting guy and by the time I return Erica has given up and left! I try to call but my phone is not happening and I get the feeling that someone stole it and relapsed it with a non-working exact replica.
I put down my armfuls of stuff on a suburban doorstep (feels like Casa Bonita Dr. in Bonita, where I lived as a teenager) while I fiddle with the phone. Then some people come home (two middle-class suburban black women) and demand that I get off of their property. It takes me quite a while to get all my stuff out of there, especially since it somehow ended up in the dimly-lit dining room beyond the living room in the back of the house when I set it down. While I am shuttling stuff through their house, all sorts of people, young and old, black and white, start to arrive and I feel self-consciously like a stranger (which I am). Apparently it's someone's grandmother's house, and they are preparing for a holiday dinner (easter? christmas?). Just as I am hauling out the last of my gear I hear Ben McNeil's voice, simultaneously cursing and telling an entertaining tall tale. By the time I get into the living room to investigate he is gone and I ask for him but all the kids say that they have at least three cousins named Ben. One comes out and he is about 15 and clearly not the Ben I had in mind. I leave.
Outside, two girls are scraping the window of the Nova with utilities knives and I yell at them to cut it out. They casually head to the next car in line and to the same thing. Someone drives by and hollers at them so they proceed up the line to the next. I can't believe they are trying to do this in broad daylight!
I drive off and at the rim of a canyon hear some electronic shooting noises. Down in the canyon is the grand finale of an extensive laser tag -type game. Very flashy. Instead of just one army against the next, it is full-on global warfare. Different players are the soldiers, the generals, the politicians, and the peasantry. At the end of this game, the invading army seizes the dictator, and with the back of the proletariat, executes him. Electronically. All part of the game. When it is finished, they all brush themselves off and climb out of the canyon. Mostly teens and early twenties, it is a whole cult of renaissance fair/neo-hippie-style kids. They assume dramatic positions on top of rocks and in trees for the debriefing. A slightly older man (30?) who appears to be the leader runs through the debriefing. "Rogers, do you think we need flashier electronics sounds?" "Accounting, can we afford that?" "Geary, how did you feel about your performance?" The whole operation seemed more like a cultish obsessive performance/political art piece.
I finally get the phone to work and call Erica. It's a new message on her cell: "Simon: I can't call you now." DISMAY!
percussion master
[Slept in Joshua Tree. Dream transcribed from a half-full bag of Betty Crocker Special Blend Potatoes and Seasoning.]
Pete's Roast Beef Party: Big Pete (a.k.a. Dr. Dub) is having a "roast beef party" down by the beach, which I think is just a sort of sandwich-making social. Kelly arrives. She was someone from the dorms freshman year at UCSD who I probably haven't thought of in about five years and exchanged a total of probably fifty words with in the real world. All kinds of random memories must be locked away in my brain like that. Kind of gives me hope that I'll one day remember where I put the corkscrew.
This city by the beach is remarkable in that about ten meters above the city is a giant grid to which apartments have been attached. There are enough gaps that it is still sunny and clear below, but enough development upstairs for a multi-level city. I somehow discover an old chimney or outdoor barbeque that has long since been used for fire and is conveniently free of ash. It is made from ceramic tiles. Each tile is a different size, and only loosely connected, so that striking them with one's hand creates a lovely percussion sound. I start to play this chimney as a set of hand drums and, of course, it sounds excellent. Whenever I play music in my dreams it is the best music I have ever heard and I am the most skilled musician that ever was. Similar to my Spanish being flawless in the dreamworld. I play latin, rock, you name it, all on the drums. At on point a trio of women singing a cappella stroll by and I join them on the percussion machine. Fabulous! Entertaining!
Next I go to San Francisco. I and a few others have been commissioned to build a shed or an addition to a garage or something like that , at a private home. The guy who arranged it is either Sam or Erik. Well, unfortunately, a coworker from his firm shows up with two assistants and is a total jerk about everything, and suddenly thee whole idea becomes not so fun. We procrastinate all weekend, waiting for jerk-off to go away, and come Sunday night have not done a thing, not even the framing. We feel kind of bad about that since the middle-aged couple will be out of a functional garage for a few more days but, hey, screw it, we were doing it for free anyway. WE went out that night and had fun in the Bay Area instead.
- - -
woke up too early and in a hurry to remember to recall...
simon the action hero
Typical Hollywood action shoot-em-up crime story. (I watched the Usual Suspects last night.) Notable features:
David Carta masterminding our escape where we just disappear from jail.
Hiding out for a few days on a beach in Mexico.
The thug sent to finish me off chases me to a high tower at the top of a spiral staircase where old ladies live and 5th -graders visit. He is a trained machine His fancy throwing knife misses my heart and he panics. I take advantage of this momentary weakness and win.
Our silver Jaguar convertible with all the money gets stolen... either repossessed by the lawyer of the man who owned it or just heisted by street gangsters. One of us thinks we'll find it in the tow lots somewhere. The rest of us are not convinced.
A friend dies of a mysterious disease but is able to leave an uplifting message on my cell phone from the afterlife.
A security goon at Cubic is told to keep me from leaving the building but is too late. He chases me through rush-hour city traffic and somehow I take advantage of a speeding fire truck situation to shake him.
Fun times!
the story of derek brazil
school-bus yellow oddly-shaped surfboards with grip tape instead of wax. other bits edited.
the story of derek brazil
easter sunday 1985 carnival brother knew something was up. trenchcoats and black oakleys ("low-riders"?) got shot in chest, sternum and zipper stopped the bullet
brother built like superman, acrobatic, walk on hands, genius, bored at school. went to swap meet. derek and others were stealing. he told them not to. one guy got caught, brother hit the assailant, the rest all ran. brother couldn't go over fences ("the incredible midget?"), went back for bro, saw large triangle behind brother, throwing punches... near lake merritt in oakland. back in those days it was even more violent than now. you can just sense something is up. when you grow up there you have a really good intution for danger... you can tell when something is going to happen, even if you don't know what it is.
derek brazil came to SD in 1985 to study mech eng at SDSU. he toured UCSD and it was uptight... the tour guide at state was late, had a surfboard under his arm and asand on his feet, pointed out about four things and left. this was derek's kind of place. got his masters there.
derek was concerned about something behind him and was reallly freaking out when we met him... need a light? shit! shit! anyone got a light? shit! Was it turetts, or was he tweaking? got off ot take the 7.
others on bus... red transvestite, she knew everyone, big pirate, meixcan girl... everyone knew everyone there! such a great scene.
- - -
nothing
life on the trolley line and simon's tainted psyche
Pat and I decide to get a new place and move downtown into a slick apartment! It faces the interior of Horton Plaza (the residential end) and the back side is all glass, with a fourth-story view of an enormous canyon. High ceilings, a big plush red couch, blue tile in the kitchen, and even plenty of storage. The place is bigger than our current house. The living room wall (facing the interior of the building) is all glass and we see all the busy bustle of the city. The Horton Plaza in this dream is way cooler than the Horton Plaza in real life.
Each of our bedrooms also has a door to the main corridor of the city. We still get the previous tenants' mail, including several fantastic photography magazines and National Geographic. (There is also an unfortunate magazine called SUV Lifestyles, which is a catalog of gear for the type of people who have SUVs in the middle of the city...) The neighbors are cool and friendly, and a trolley line runs right outside out front door.
How cool!
No parking whatsoever so we walk around downtown to find a lot to rent a space in. Part of downtown looks ;ike Anchorage, and there is a grassy hilly field that serves as a family-run lot. Mom and her daughters. They say we can stay there for $40/month if our cars are not gas-guzzlers. I consider ditching the car altogether since in this ideal San Diego the trolley runs everywhere!
The back patio will be great for barbeques.
I go to sleep in my new bedroom and have a not-so-pleasant dream-within-the-dream:
I am walking up a hill through an outdoors airport security checkpoint with an ex-girlfriend, and I swoon. I dream some violent dream (A dream-within-the-dream-within-a-dream!) When I come to, I am in the forest. When I walk back into town I am arrested and held in an interrogation room. They claim that I have murdered in cold blood and will be put on trial! From their account (and hence the newspaper articles) here is what I gather happened. I don't believe a word of it:
After passing through the security, I flat-out strangle her. I think there is some stabbing involved as well. I then supposedly stuff her body into a locker (where it is later found by a Native American) and drive the Nova down a windy wooded road. I turn off and abandon the car way up a dirt road in the forest.
I can't imagine that I am capable of such violence or hatred (since she and I were on fine terms) and don't believe them at all. I am certain I was framed.
They release me on bail and I am determined to prove that I have been set up so I go out to the forest where I supposedly had ditched the Nova. Sure enough, it is there, compete with my bloody fingerprints and my favorite audio tape in the deck. This is all so shocking. I hike back into town to the airport security area and everyone is glaring at me. Suddenly the whole world hates my guts. The trial will be right at the scene of the crime (security gate) and I sit with my back against a skyscraper to wait. I haven't talked to my lawyer, not even sure if I have one. Pigeons are dive-bombing me from the top of the building fifty floors above my head; it is very distressing. Turns out some people put chips in their little avian heads and programmed them to target me, just to harass the evil man.
Someone has diverted the back-pipe of a laundry drier to face the area I am sitting in. In my dreamworld the air is very dry (as opposed to in the waking world where it would be moist as it draws water from the clothing) and it leaves me parched (in the outside world it was very dry last night). A kind old lady, the only person to pity me, points it out to me and helps me redirect it.
I woke up from that dream-within-a-dream directly into the waking world, panting and upset. Pee - Water - Back to sleep.
Now we return to the new flat and that particular ex-girlfriend comes to the housewarming party! (Erik and my mother and sister and a few others are also there). I have already told her about this dream I had about her and it makes for a rather uncomfortable and confusing dynamic, unsurprisingly. She tells me that she, too, has been keeping a dream log, and she shows it to me. It's in one of those eight-page bluebooks for exams in college, or on one of those similarly-sized manila-covered notebooks from elementary school. It has only one entry: Last night Simon dreamed that he killed me. She also remarks that it's incredible I need a dresser that big for my clothing. Do I have that much clothing? No, the bottom drawer is full of camping gear.
It seems several of my dreams lately have included violence, which is an odd rarity. I don't know how to explain it, since I can't perceive any pent-up frustration or hatred on this end of my consciousness. I also have war dreams often, which I'm certain spring from the saturation of our media with the despicable fast-action high-paced ultra-exciting real-life world-domination war movie that is currently running without any foreseeable ending. Damnit, war, get out of my psyche!
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