(3/17/07) i know it wasn't an accident

(No time or place information for this paper journal entry.)

Dream 1

I sat in a cafe lit like a Starbucks but wider and quieter and cleaner. I faced the right wall,  if the door wall were the front wall, and was a table or two away from the wall.

A father and his  son sat at a table against the wall. A girl, who might have been the daughter, sat a table away from them and the wall, with her back to them. She may have been writing or reading. The father was older, with a full head of grey hair and possibly with dimmish glasses on. The son was around nine or ten years old. The daughter seemed to be about the same age, blonde, wearing a nineteenth-century dress.

I was writing. The son got up and walked toward me. Passing me he made a grab for my backpack, which was in the seat across the table from me. I grabbed the top of the backpack, stopping it from falling simultaneously with the tug the boy gave it to make it fall.

The boy had obviously pulled on my bag just to start trouble. But being stopped, he walked a few steps, then turned around and came back. This time I held the bag before he got to it. The boy took a good grab and pulled as hard as he could. But I kept the bag steady until he let go. The boy stomped back to his table.

I knew the boy would be back to start trouble if I didn't take care of things. I walked up to his table. There was a third seat. I sat down (father to my left, son to my right, wall in front of me) and looked at the father, who was huddled behind a mass of coats and bags and was himself wearing a big, grey coat. I was talking to the father, trying to get through to him, but his head was buried under his arms. He wore a grey wool cap. I saw he was a bald, black man. He sneered at me with dirty teeth.

But somehow I managed to connect my words to him. I said, "Your son tried to throw my bag on the floor. He had no reason to: the bag was up on a chair and out of his way. And now I think he's going to do something worse."

Now the father was back to being a rich, white dad, though somehow different looking than the white man from before. The father tried to throw me off guard. He interrupted me and questioned me like a lawyer. He asked, "How are you so sure he was trying to start trouble? How are you so sure what he was doing was intentional?"

The father had asked a couple quick "balance" questions which I answered quickly and surely. But now I took my chance to speak at length. I said, "I know it wasn't an accident. The first time I caught him making a grab for my bag. I stopped him. The second time I held onto my bag in advance. He purposely pulled and pulled until he knew he wasn't --"

The father interrupted me again. His head had been buried in his arms (again) and he lifted it out, regarding me. He had bright white hair, a thin, soft face, and eyes round and jellyish, like fish eyes. They reminded me somehow of lime-flavored hard candy wrapped in white plastic with a quaint picture of limes on it.

The father yelled, "Shut up! Shut up! Just -- Listen a minute! Listen a minute!"

I was so shocked and frightened by the father's appearance and shouting that I stopped talking immediately. I knew the father could tell his son was wrong, but that he still wan't going to give in without a fight.