(9/25/06) yin yang pisces rats; happy sick dog; lutheran codex of the dead

(Entered in paper journal at 7:20 PM at home in Brooklyn.)

Dream 1

I was in the doorway to "Ben & Jerry's" "at Times Square." Apparently I was volunteering on some project. The inside of the place was dim, as if it were night or early morning, and only a light or two in the back of the store was on, lighting solid, rich-colored walls of maroon and goldenrod and other similar colors.

The volunteer manager was telling someone working for them (my Americorps co-worker JS), "He's just here as a volunteer. Don't make him go back down into the garbage room."

I said, "No, don't worry about that. I've been there before. I can go there again. It won't bother me."

I thought about all the roaches and rats in that basement. They had grossed me out (i.e. when I had actually worked for Ben & Jerry's in Times Square in 1998 and 1999), but I had generally been okay with them.

I walked down the basement steps with JS. One or two steps from the basement a rat scurried up to the steps, then away. I was shocked, but I kept steady. Then another ran, and a few more. A couple started running up the steps. I got grossed out and ran back up the steps. JS continued down to the garbage room.

There was a girl at the top of the stairs. The girl asked, "What are you afraid of? The diseases? The grossness? That they'll bite you? I can't blame you, although I'm used to it."

The girl held out her right (?) hand, on which two rats (palm-sized) scurried around like the "pisces" (?) or yin yang style.

They actually crawled all around her hands -- like roly-polies! But I strongly remember them making the "pisces" (?) or yin yang shape at one point.

Dream 2

I sat or lay on a couch. My friend R lay in an odd position on the floor by the arm of the couch at my feet. I called for my friend's dog. The dog was sick somehow, but she jumped up on the couch and flapped around happily while I pet her.

I felt dog's hyperactivity in reaction to my petting was the result of her sickness and would lead to more sickness. But I also felt R was jealous that I was petting his dog. So I think I made the dog calm down and made her jump off the couch to appease R.

R was almost bluish skinned, greasy -- it was like he had been strangled and was now decomposing. But he was still alive. I think we even spoke about about how good I was with animals.

Dream 3

I was with a woman in a room. The woman spoke to me about a catechism I had in my hands as I read the catechism. She said this was what the Spaniards used to convert the Aztecs.

There were two columns, I saw, of glyphs, and then a column (in English) of text. Most of the glyphs were shaded out by diagonal lines over the squares. The catechism followed the normal Q & A format. It spoke of the brown wood of the cross and the pink (comb? knife?) that drove the nails into the Christ.

The Aztec ("A"nswer to the "Q"uestion) said something like, "That imagery alone should denote in an aware mind the greatness of Christ. Destiny brought him to those two symbols, which even alone mean greatness."

I "remembered" now that the woman in the room (Mexican-looking, youngish) had been holding brown wood and a weird, pink, plastic knife/comb/mirror before. She had been trying to tell me something -- about herself?