(Entered in paper journal at 5:40 AM on Q-train from Brooklyn to Manhattan.)
Dream #1
I was in a park on a blue, but slightly cloudy, day. I was at the rounded top of a hill the lawn of which was slightly worn to dust. I was trimming a strange plant. Its stalk-part was bloated out and rubbery and green. It was maybe three or four feet in width and height. The top was like a big bouquet of roses. But the flowers were about twice as big as roses, and they were all dry. There were two other plants like this on the hill.
I had been told to trim these plants. They were weeds. By trimming them away piece by piece you would sap their energy until they finally died. But, I thought, these are summer weeds. As soon as it got cold (which would happen very soon), the plants' green parts would dry up. Then we could just dig down to the roots of the plant and pull the thing out whole.
TO, a person who led a volunteer project that I now led in waking life, walked up to me. I explained (as if by thought/feeling) my idea. TO "interrupted," laughed, and said, "No, it's more sensible to do it the way we're doing it."
We were finished for the day. TO was gone again. I walked away. I was in a college campus area. It seemed like late afternoon, dimmish, pale blue-grey light. There were some people milling around on a concrete courtyard. I didn't quite feel like I belonged. I felt like people were looking at me weird, that they might think of doing something bad to me to show me I didn't belong here.
Suddenly I remembered I h'd left my book bag over where I had been working. I was panicked. I started running back to the hill. But I also thought, Surely the bag's been stolen by now.
Showing posts with label fear of theft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fear of theft. Show all posts
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Sunday, January 13, 2013
(7/26/08) fool in the rain; guard the house; interior design gift
(Entered in paper journal at 8:32 AM at Flying Saucer cafe in Brooklyn.)
Dream #1
I walked on concrete walkway before first-floor apartments in an outdoor apartment complex. I was walking with DM, one of the heads of my company's research department. We may have been among a small group of people. DM and I were speaking about something business-related. I was trying to impress DM with my intelligence.
We turned and walked up a stairwell. I was opening up an envelope from the Department of the Treasury. I thought it would be really impressive if I got a letter from Treasury saying how smart they thought I was, especially right in front of DM.
But the contents of the envelope were a packet of forms, with yellow, carbon-copy pages, and a piece of paper (or a Post-It Note?) on the front telling me I hadn't yet filled out a registration that would allow me to trade commodities (which would have nothing to do with my job in waking life, anyway...).
DM asked me why I hadn't gotten my commodities registration yet. She told me to take care of it right away. She told me so gently, but I could tell she was really disappointed that I hadn't done it yet.
We walked into a small office that was almost like a principal's secretary's office space, or a dumpy, small office in a small town. I walked into a small meeting room. The area was very narrow, with a long, narrow table that almost filled the entire room. The light was a bleak, greenish fluorescent.
I sat down at an end of the table. The table was full. All the other people were older, grizzled-looking men in outdated suits and with awful hairstyles.
The men were all talking about who should be able to speak or who should be able to make ideas for this recurring meeting. One man, a black man wearing a green sweater and a tan blazer, and with huge, puffy hair and a fat mustache, was saying that he should do it.
Some other man, an oldish, fattish, white man with a dollop of hair and wearing a white polo shirt, said, "You always suggest that you should be in charge. That shows you aren't mature enough to be in charge yet."
Everybody kind of chuckled. There were two other black people at the table who kind of agreed with the white man. The discussion tended more toward a group of people, rather than one individual, being in charge of these meetings.
One of the black men struck me as very familiar. He had a dull but violent look to him. His expression was almost dead, decaying. His right eye didn't seem to work. It might even have been clouded over with grey. I tried very hard to figure out where I knew him from. I thought he was someone from my neighborhood, following me around town.
The man was sitting near the right, front corner of the table (if I sat at the back, left end). But now he sat at the head of the table, on the left side.
The man said, "And why were you out on the street, standing in the rain in only your underwear, shouting out such weird things? Do you think that makes a good impression for our group?"
I thought this was kind of funny -- someone standing out in the rain in their underwear, acting crazy. I was trying to figure out which person here would have done something like that.
The man said, "Are you paying attention? I'm talking to you." I felt like the man was talking to me. I looked at him. He was looking at me. His eyes looked almost dead. Everybody else was looking at me as well. They were all silent.
I tried to figure out when I had done what the man had said I'd done. I couldn't remember having done it, but somehow it seemed reasonable to think that I had done it.
Dream #2
I was in "my mom's house," which was like the house my family had lived in during my last three years of high school. My family was gone. I was watching the place for them.
It was night. I was going to be. I went into my mom's bedroom. The room was empty except for three beds, which were evenly spaced along the back wall. The floor was tile, grey or white. The beds were all small, maybe two and a half feet across, very boxy-looking, with only white sheets on them. The sheets were all slightly disheveled.
I was about to lay down in my mom's bed. But I suddenly realized that this place wasn't safe. I had to lock every door so nobody could get in -- a lot of people were trying to get into this place.
I first locked the front door. It had a normal padlock on it, but it seemed like there was a lot of junk and clutter in front of the door, so that it was difficult to reach the lock.
The effort made me feel like not going through the trouble of locking the other doors. But then I thought of the backdoor. At first I thought it would be reasonable to think that nobody would take the trouble to go all the way around to the backyard to get into the house. But then I realized that the house had been broken into before just because someone had left the backdoor open.
I walked through the dim kitchen (it seems like the only light on was in the living room, and that the other rooms were dim, catching whatever light they could from the living room) and to the backdoor, which may have been on a side wall. The lock was big and made of dull, silver metal with two thick, black cords looping from top to bottom. It somehow reminded me of a medical device.
I locked the door. But I still felt I wasn't safe. The windows were all unlocked. Plus, people could see me through the windows. If the wrong people saw me, they';d want to get at me, even if they had to break the windows to get into this place.
I was about to lock the windows, but the phone rang. The phone was sitting on the couch. I knelt on the floor and leaned against the front of the couch. I picked up the phone. I was in a really casual posture, like I might be in if I were speaking with a good friend.
The person on the other line was a no-good person. She was a white girl, about my brother's age. She thought I was my brother. I kind of let her keep thinking I was my brother. The girl was talking nice to me, trying to convince me I should let her into the place. I knew the woman was being put up to this by a group of trashy guys (white, hippie-ish looking) who wanted to attack my brother and take his money.
I told the girl something like I couldn't let her into the house because I was leaving soon, anyway. I thought if I could convince the woman I was leaving, I would then sneak through the house without being seen through the windows (none of which had any curtains) and turn off the lights. That way the people would think my brother had left the house, and they wouldn't bother me. I thought I'd lay in bed but probably not sleep, just in case somebody tried to break into the house anyway.
Then I realized my plan might be worthless already. It was so dark outside that nothing could be seen. There may even at this moment have been people outside the windows, looking directly in at me. I felt like I was already done for.
Dream #3
It was night. I stood on a sidewalk corner that was lit by orange streetlamp light. The corner faced a wide street that spanned off straight along to my right into the blackness of the desert, or perhaps over a wide river.
To my right was parked a semi-truck, its back end facing me. An oldish, toughish-looking, black man dressed in clothes like a freight-lifter might wear (darkish blue jacket and pants and a wool cap?) stood to my right.
Somewhere a radio was playing something like the transmission's from my company's morning meeting between the Research and Sales departments. News had come in that one of our analysts, DB, was going to upgrade a stock (a stock which, I believe, I had, within the few months before this dream, lost about 30% on -- the day after having bought the stock).
I suddenly knew why DB was upgrading the stock. The stock, I knew, would finally go back up to the price at which I had bought it. I would sell it as soon as it got there. The reason it was going up was, I thought, and then said out loud, right as the radio said the exact same thing, "Because it's getting bought out by a manufacturer!"
I smiled in triumph and looked up at the man beside me. He smiled back, knowing I'd just been a part of some really cool stock trading event.
The man and I crossed the street. I turned right and started walking up the "Brooklyn Bridge." It was the deep of night, but there were still a few people heading up and down the bridge.
I felt suspicious of all these people, like they'd know I'd had a good trading moment with a stock, and like they'd want to take my money because of it. But I thought, I don't have any money from the trade. I only got myself back to break-even.
The bridge I was on looked more like the Manhattan Bridge than the Brooklyn Bridge, with the walkways on the sides, and with stone arches over the walkways occasionally. But it was incredibly long, like it spanned over an enormous river.
I thought to myself, I didn't know this was going to happen with that stock when I bought it. But I also didn't know the same manufacturer was going to buy that other company, either. (A previous stock I'd bought had, in waking life, been bought by the manufacturer, sending the stock I'd bought up by about 40% soon after I'd bought it. It was luck -- I hadn't foreseen the buyout at all.) I thought, It looks like I'll always just be an accidental buyer of stocks whose prices go way up when they get taken out by this manufacturer!
For a moment I felt like I was psychic. How else could I have been so lucky twice? But then I told myself again, Nothing really great happened to you. You didn't make a ton of money off this deal. You broke even.
I was starting to feel winded by the walk. The bridge was so much steeper than I'd remembered, and it seemed to be so long. But, I thought to myself, I always take the bridge from Manhattan back home to Brooklyn. I seldom take it from Brooklyn into Manhattan. It's obviously more difficult this way because I'm going up instead of down.
I told myself to brace up and cross the bridge. I'd crossed it so many times before; I couldn't not cross it now. Suddenly the way flattened out. The bridge opened out into a wide street full of cars and edged with an area full of lit buildings. It might have been raining a little. I was slightly disappointed taht the bridge had suddenly been crossed so easily.
I was now walking through a building like a furntiture store or a museum of interior design. The front of the place had been like a warehouse, or lie the "ABC" design store just north of Union Square. Daylight came in through wide window walls. The place was full of beautiful items.
I was with a group of people, possibly older, somewhat wealthy, white people, and maybe also one or two female relatives of the people, who were about my age. We all turned right and walked into a small hallway that had small displays that were set into the walls. The displays were of china and porcelain figures and furniture like wood-and-leather chairs.
We stood at the intersection of a few different hallways. The "father" of the group said, "Yeah, we're all a bunch of tourists, or, at least we're acting like tourists right now. Too bad for us if we are, I guess." He walked through a hallway up and to the left.
I hesitated before following. I thought to myself, He said that just to piss me off. I came here to have fun with these guys. But this guy chose this activity because he thought it was something I wouldn't like. He thought I'd think it was too touristy! He wanted to make me feel like I had no control over what we did, that I'd have to so something, even if I didn't like it.
For a moment I thought I'd just leave, just to show the "father" that I could control what I did and didn't do. But then I reminded myself that I actually did like what we were doing. I told myself I should just hang out and have a good time, regardless of how controlling the "father" thought he was being.
I walked into the room with everybody else. This room looked like ABC as well, except smaller. It was also full, with beautiful merchandise everywhere. There were beautiful, clear, colored-glass plates, bowls, and other vessels all over the place. Some items had golden and silver line-drawings on them, something like peacock designs. There wee a lot of red, blue, and black vessels. The black vessels, unlike the other vessels, weren't transparent.
I couldn't remember the name of this place. But I tried hard to recall it. I wanted to ask my girlfriend H next time I saw her if she'd ever been here and what she'd thought of it.
Suddenly I remembered -- the place was called Shiseido. As soon as I remembered the name of the place, I found a little, black, glass vessel, rectangular, about two inches wide and three inches long. I thought this was perfect for H. I decided I'd get it for her.
The people with me (not the same as the people who'd been with me before) made a half-joking, half-positive comment about my buying a present for H. I felt like they thought I was a little silly, a little cute, and goodhearted overall. I felt proud. I may have paid for the item at a crowded counter where I could barely see the cashier.
Suddenly H was here and she had the present. H was a tallish, thin, girl from India (instead of being Japanese). She wore a tiny, purple shirt and thin jeans which may also have had a purplish tint. She was so happy to receive a gift from me. We sat in a big, green chair. She sat on my lap. I kind of cradled her.
Dream #1
I walked on concrete walkway before first-floor apartments in an outdoor apartment complex. I was walking with DM, one of the heads of my company's research department. We may have been among a small group of people. DM and I were speaking about something business-related. I was trying to impress DM with my intelligence.
We turned and walked up a stairwell. I was opening up an envelope from the Department of the Treasury. I thought it would be really impressive if I got a letter from Treasury saying how smart they thought I was, especially right in front of DM.
But the contents of the envelope were a packet of forms, with yellow, carbon-copy pages, and a piece of paper (or a Post-It Note?) on the front telling me I hadn't yet filled out a registration that would allow me to trade commodities (which would have nothing to do with my job in waking life, anyway...).
DM asked me why I hadn't gotten my commodities registration yet. She told me to take care of it right away. She told me so gently, but I could tell she was really disappointed that I hadn't done it yet.
We walked into a small office that was almost like a principal's secretary's office space, or a dumpy, small office in a small town. I walked into a small meeting room. The area was very narrow, with a long, narrow table that almost filled the entire room. The light was a bleak, greenish fluorescent.
I sat down at an end of the table. The table was full. All the other people were older, grizzled-looking men in outdated suits and with awful hairstyles.
The men were all talking about who should be able to speak or who should be able to make ideas for this recurring meeting. One man, a black man wearing a green sweater and a tan blazer, and with huge, puffy hair and a fat mustache, was saying that he should do it.
Some other man, an oldish, fattish, white man with a dollop of hair and wearing a white polo shirt, said, "You always suggest that you should be in charge. That shows you aren't mature enough to be in charge yet."
Everybody kind of chuckled. There were two other black people at the table who kind of agreed with the white man. The discussion tended more toward a group of people, rather than one individual, being in charge of these meetings.
One of the black men struck me as very familiar. He had a dull but violent look to him. His expression was almost dead, decaying. His right eye didn't seem to work. It might even have been clouded over with grey. I tried very hard to figure out where I knew him from. I thought he was someone from my neighborhood, following me around town.
The man was sitting near the right, front corner of the table (if I sat at the back, left end). But now he sat at the head of the table, on the left side.
The man said, "And why were you out on the street, standing in the rain in only your underwear, shouting out such weird things? Do you think that makes a good impression for our group?"
I thought this was kind of funny -- someone standing out in the rain in their underwear, acting crazy. I was trying to figure out which person here would have done something like that.
The man said, "Are you paying attention? I'm talking to you." I felt like the man was talking to me. I looked at him. He was looking at me. His eyes looked almost dead. Everybody else was looking at me as well. They were all silent.
I tried to figure out when I had done what the man had said I'd done. I couldn't remember having done it, but somehow it seemed reasonable to think that I had done it.
Dream #2
I was in "my mom's house," which was like the house my family had lived in during my last three years of high school. My family was gone. I was watching the place for them.
It was night. I was going to be. I went into my mom's bedroom. The room was empty except for three beds, which were evenly spaced along the back wall. The floor was tile, grey or white. The beds were all small, maybe two and a half feet across, very boxy-looking, with only white sheets on them. The sheets were all slightly disheveled.
I was about to lay down in my mom's bed. But I suddenly realized that this place wasn't safe. I had to lock every door so nobody could get in -- a lot of people were trying to get into this place.
I first locked the front door. It had a normal padlock on it, but it seemed like there was a lot of junk and clutter in front of the door, so that it was difficult to reach the lock.
The effort made me feel like not going through the trouble of locking the other doors. But then I thought of the backdoor. At first I thought it would be reasonable to think that nobody would take the trouble to go all the way around to the backyard to get into the house. But then I realized that the house had been broken into before just because someone had left the backdoor open.
I walked through the dim kitchen (it seems like the only light on was in the living room, and that the other rooms were dim, catching whatever light they could from the living room) and to the backdoor, which may have been on a side wall. The lock was big and made of dull, silver metal with two thick, black cords looping from top to bottom. It somehow reminded me of a medical device.
I locked the door. But I still felt I wasn't safe. The windows were all unlocked. Plus, people could see me through the windows. If the wrong people saw me, they';d want to get at me, even if they had to break the windows to get into this place.
I was about to lock the windows, but the phone rang. The phone was sitting on the couch. I knelt on the floor and leaned against the front of the couch. I picked up the phone. I was in a really casual posture, like I might be in if I were speaking with a good friend.
The person on the other line was a no-good person. She was a white girl, about my brother's age. She thought I was my brother. I kind of let her keep thinking I was my brother. The girl was talking nice to me, trying to convince me I should let her into the place. I knew the woman was being put up to this by a group of trashy guys (white, hippie-ish looking) who wanted to attack my brother and take his money.
I told the girl something like I couldn't let her into the house because I was leaving soon, anyway. I thought if I could convince the woman I was leaving, I would then sneak through the house without being seen through the windows (none of which had any curtains) and turn off the lights. That way the people would think my brother had left the house, and they wouldn't bother me. I thought I'd lay in bed but probably not sleep, just in case somebody tried to break into the house anyway.
Then I realized my plan might be worthless already. It was so dark outside that nothing could be seen. There may even at this moment have been people outside the windows, looking directly in at me. I felt like I was already done for.
Dream #3
It was night. I stood on a sidewalk corner that was lit by orange streetlamp light. The corner faced a wide street that spanned off straight along to my right into the blackness of the desert, or perhaps over a wide river.
To my right was parked a semi-truck, its back end facing me. An oldish, toughish-looking, black man dressed in clothes like a freight-lifter might wear (darkish blue jacket and pants and a wool cap?) stood to my right.
Somewhere a radio was playing something like the transmission's from my company's morning meeting between the Research and Sales departments. News had come in that one of our analysts, DB, was going to upgrade a stock (a stock which, I believe, I had, within the few months before this dream, lost about 30% on -- the day after having bought the stock).
I suddenly knew why DB was upgrading the stock. The stock, I knew, would finally go back up to the price at which I had bought it. I would sell it as soon as it got there. The reason it was going up was, I thought, and then said out loud, right as the radio said the exact same thing, "Because it's getting bought out by a manufacturer!"
I smiled in triumph and looked up at the man beside me. He smiled back, knowing I'd just been a part of some really cool stock trading event.
The man and I crossed the street. I turned right and started walking up the "Brooklyn Bridge." It was the deep of night, but there were still a few people heading up and down the bridge.
I felt suspicious of all these people, like they'd know I'd had a good trading moment with a stock, and like they'd want to take my money because of it. But I thought, I don't have any money from the trade. I only got myself back to break-even.
The bridge I was on looked more like the Manhattan Bridge than the Brooklyn Bridge, with the walkways on the sides, and with stone arches over the walkways occasionally. But it was incredibly long, like it spanned over an enormous river.
I thought to myself, I didn't know this was going to happen with that stock when I bought it. But I also didn't know the same manufacturer was going to buy that other company, either. (A previous stock I'd bought had, in waking life, been bought by the manufacturer, sending the stock I'd bought up by about 40% soon after I'd bought it. It was luck -- I hadn't foreseen the buyout at all.) I thought, It looks like I'll always just be an accidental buyer of stocks whose prices go way up when they get taken out by this manufacturer!
For a moment I felt like I was psychic. How else could I have been so lucky twice? But then I told myself again, Nothing really great happened to you. You didn't make a ton of money off this deal. You broke even.
I was starting to feel winded by the walk. The bridge was so much steeper than I'd remembered, and it seemed to be so long. But, I thought to myself, I always take the bridge from Manhattan back home to Brooklyn. I seldom take it from Brooklyn into Manhattan. It's obviously more difficult this way because I'm going up instead of down.
I told myself to brace up and cross the bridge. I'd crossed it so many times before; I couldn't not cross it now. Suddenly the way flattened out. The bridge opened out into a wide street full of cars and edged with an area full of lit buildings. It might have been raining a little. I was slightly disappointed taht the bridge had suddenly been crossed so easily.
I was now walking through a building like a furntiture store or a museum of interior design. The front of the place had been like a warehouse, or lie the "ABC" design store just north of Union Square. Daylight came in through wide window walls. The place was full of beautiful items.
I was with a group of people, possibly older, somewhat wealthy, white people, and maybe also one or two female relatives of the people, who were about my age. We all turned right and walked into a small hallway that had small displays that were set into the walls. The displays were of china and porcelain figures and furniture like wood-and-leather chairs.
We stood at the intersection of a few different hallways. The "father" of the group said, "Yeah, we're all a bunch of tourists, or, at least we're acting like tourists right now. Too bad for us if we are, I guess." He walked through a hallway up and to the left.
I hesitated before following. I thought to myself, He said that just to piss me off. I came here to have fun with these guys. But this guy chose this activity because he thought it was something I wouldn't like. He thought I'd think it was too touristy! He wanted to make me feel like I had no control over what we did, that I'd have to so something, even if I didn't like it.
For a moment I thought I'd just leave, just to show the "father" that I could control what I did and didn't do. But then I reminded myself that I actually did like what we were doing. I told myself I should just hang out and have a good time, regardless of how controlling the "father" thought he was being.
I walked into the room with everybody else. This room looked like ABC as well, except smaller. It was also full, with beautiful merchandise everywhere. There were beautiful, clear, colored-glass plates, bowls, and other vessels all over the place. Some items had golden and silver line-drawings on them, something like peacock designs. There wee a lot of red, blue, and black vessels. The black vessels, unlike the other vessels, weren't transparent.
I couldn't remember the name of this place. But I tried hard to recall it. I wanted to ask my girlfriend H next time I saw her if she'd ever been here and what she'd thought of it.
Suddenly I remembered -- the place was called Shiseido. As soon as I remembered the name of the place, I found a little, black, glass vessel, rectangular, about two inches wide and three inches long. I thought this was perfect for H. I decided I'd get it for her.
The people with me (not the same as the people who'd been with me before) made a half-joking, half-positive comment about my buying a present for H. I felt like they thought I was a little silly, a little cute, and goodhearted overall. I felt proud. I may have paid for the item at a crowded counter where I could barely see the cashier.
Suddenly H was here and she had the present. H was a tallish, thin, girl from India (instead of being Japanese). She wore a tiny, purple shirt and thin jeans which may also have had a purplish tint. She was so happy to receive a gift from me. We sat in a big, green chair. She sat on my lap. I kind of cradled her.
Sunday, December 16, 2012
(3/4/09) the crumbling edifice; uncle steals my phone; where we really wanted to go
(Entered in paper journal at 8:42 AM at Starbucks on 43rd Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan.)
Dream #1
It was night. I was with a group of people from "my job" (i.e. the job I'd just gotten laid off from). The group of people may have been my boss BS, my teammate DE, and someone else.
We had just gotten out of a meeting, and we were probably going to go to another one in just a little while. Both of the meetings were possibly with the same person: a tall, pretty, blonde woman. The woman may have suggested that there was a place in the building where we could get some good coffee. But for some reason BS wanted to go outside the building.
The building faced something like a vacant lot, as if the building were somewhere in a desert or an undeveloped business complex. The sky was black and flashing as if with lightning. But we could see everything around us, as if it were lit for a movie. It may have started raining a little. The building was as big as a New York skyscraper.
We got to a corner (we had turned right going out of the building) and turned right. We now walked up a slight slope. We were under a structure like the walkway overhang seen on some shopping plaza buildings (and on some skyscrapers). The columns were square and may have been made of a conglomerate material, like concrete full of round pebbles. The ceiling was concrete.
We had gone a long way, just to find some coffee, and now our meeting would start in just a short while. BS now said we should go back to the place the woman had suggested to get some coffee. But I knew that by the time we got back there, it would almost be time for the meeting to start. We wouldn't have time to get the coffee. We were about to emerge from the overhang. We'd have to run through the rain to get to the next overhang.
But now the ceiling of the overhang cracked. I heard it and looked up. The ceiling was divided into large squares. The square directly over us had a crack through the center. The square in front of us, the last square of the overhang, now cracked very loudly. A few cracks in it caused that section of the ceiling to sag downward. It looked like there was earth above the concrete. I don't now how thick the concrete was. Possibly not very thick at all. I called to everybody to get away from the building altogether because the whole thing was going to go down.
I ran up the slope and across the street or into the street. I looked down to the overhang. There were a lot of people there, all people I knew from work. In particular I saw my senior co-worker, mentor, and friend ES, who may have been wearing a vivid, darkish blue, v-neck sweater with a white undershirt. I yelled to ES in particular to get away from the building. But everybody, including ES, was standing still under the overhang, as if they were waiting for the rain to stop.
At some point the building may have collapsed. Everybody was huddling over by the (other?) building, sitting, maybe, under blankets. It may not have been raining, or else the rain may not have mattered.
ES sat somewhere to my left -- or I simply may have heard/felt her in my head. ES said something like, "Even when you were gone, we all knew, It'll be like this with Preemie: buy side, buy side, bam, Preemie right here on the sell side." As ES said this I saw glowing rectangle outlines (like gun-sights in a video game). As ES spoke, it was like she was referring to rectangles farther and farther to the left.
Dream #2
It was night. I was in a house with my family. It was more than just my immediate family. There were members from my dad's side of the family as well.
The house was dark. There may have been some light somewhere, but not much, and I couldn't make out the source (possibly outdoor streetlamp light coming in through curtained windows). It was like this place was on a floor in an apartment building. The apartment may have been very large.
The main room, the living room, was very large, maybe thirty feet by thirty feet. There were occasional chairs and other pieces of furniture. But most or all of the space was taken up by people, my family members, sleeping under sleeping bags and blankets on the floor. It seemed like most everybody was asleep.
I was walking through the room, as if I had just gotten into it, as if I had just come to whatever this gathering was. There were a few people awake, some in the center of the room, kind of arranged as campers might be around a fire (except with just empty floor between them, and not fire) and some people standing at the other end of the room, as if in the doorway for a kitchen.
As I walked through the center of the room, a man, my uncle R, called to me. He asked me what my phone was. I told him it was a BlackBerry. He asked me if he could see it. I handed it to him.
Someone from the doorway to the kitchen was also talking, either to me and my uncle or just to my uncle. The people around my uncle all lay around talking about things, possibly technology. There may have been small lights before them, like the lights from small electronic devices.
I now stood in the room in the daylight. There were still blankets and sleeping bags throughout the room, where everyone had slept. But now there was nobody around.
I walked to the circle of blankets where my uncle R had been, so I could grab my BlackBerry. I knelt down and picked the BlackBerry out of a messy pile of electronic devices. I now saw that my BlackBerry was missing its back, and that the battery was also gone.
I was panicked. I had trusted my uncle and let him look at my phone, and now he'd taken stuff out of it. I tried to see if the SiM card was still in it, but I didn't have enough composure. I sifted though all the other stuff on the ground, but I couldn't find either the back or the battery.
I now got pissed off. I turned around and yelled toward the kitchen, to someone, to my mom or anyone, "Somebody took the battery out of my BlackBerry! If anybody sees my battery and back lying around, let me know!"
On the wall to my left was the front door of the apartment. (Just to the left of that door?) was a small hallway to a couple of bedrooms. My uncle now ran out of that hallway. He had the battery, which was hooked directly to a thick, coiled cord, as if the battery were being charged directly instead of through the device.
The charger wasn't mine, but my uncle hurriedly handed me both the battery and the charger. He had obviously stolen my battery. Now he wanted to get rid of it as soon as possibly, even if that meant losing the charger as well.
My uncle looked worn out, dried out. He may have had purple sacks or even pale bruises under his eyes. He was trying to explain something to me, either how he'd made a mistake in taking the battery, or how he had taken the battery to charge it for me as a favor. I could tell just by the way he was acting (and by the condition in which he'd handed me my battery) that he was lying. I was't even trying to listen to what he said.
Dream #3
I had driven to some place with my mother and brother. It was dark outside, but we could see everything fine, as if it were lit for a cartoon or a movie. We were in some place like an asphalt lot with a cinder block wall, which was directly before us, and a chain-link fence, with barbed wire on top, which was to our right. We stood outside the car, which may have been something like an old Ford Gran Torino, maybe goldish colored.
We spoke about directions to where we really wanted to go. I may have "seen" something in the wall, like a display rack of red clothing, up about ten feet on the wall. We knew we had to turn around.
Dream #1
It was night. I was with a group of people from "my job" (i.e. the job I'd just gotten laid off from). The group of people may have been my boss BS, my teammate DE, and someone else.
We had just gotten out of a meeting, and we were probably going to go to another one in just a little while. Both of the meetings were possibly with the same person: a tall, pretty, blonde woman. The woman may have suggested that there was a place in the building where we could get some good coffee. But for some reason BS wanted to go outside the building.
The building faced something like a vacant lot, as if the building were somewhere in a desert or an undeveloped business complex. The sky was black and flashing as if with lightning. But we could see everything around us, as if it were lit for a movie. It may have started raining a little. The building was as big as a New York skyscraper.
We got to a corner (we had turned right going out of the building) and turned right. We now walked up a slight slope. We were under a structure like the walkway overhang seen on some shopping plaza buildings (and on some skyscrapers). The columns were square and may have been made of a conglomerate material, like concrete full of round pebbles. The ceiling was concrete.
We had gone a long way, just to find some coffee, and now our meeting would start in just a short while. BS now said we should go back to the place the woman had suggested to get some coffee. But I knew that by the time we got back there, it would almost be time for the meeting to start. We wouldn't have time to get the coffee. We were about to emerge from the overhang. We'd have to run through the rain to get to the next overhang.
But now the ceiling of the overhang cracked. I heard it and looked up. The ceiling was divided into large squares. The square directly over us had a crack through the center. The square in front of us, the last square of the overhang, now cracked very loudly. A few cracks in it caused that section of the ceiling to sag downward. It looked like there was earth above the concrete. I don't now how thick the concrete was. Possibly not very thick at all. I called to everybody to get away from the building altogether because the whole thing was going to go down.
I ran up the slope and across the street or into the street. I looked down to the overhang. There were a lot of people there, all people I knew from work. In particular I saw my senior co-worker, mentor, and friend ES, who may have been wearing a vivid, darkish blue, v-neck sweater with a white undershirt. I yelled to ES in particular to get away from the building. But everybody, including ES, was standing still under the overhang, as if they were waiting for the rain to stop.
At some point the building may have collapsed. Everybody was huddling over by the (other?) building, sitting, maybe, under blankets. It may not have been raining, or else the rain may not have mattered.
ES sat somewhere to my left -- or I simply may have heard/felt her in my head. ES said something like, "Even when you were gone, we all knew, It'll be like this with Preemie: buy side, buy side, bam, Preemie right here on the sell side." As ES said this I saw glowing rectangle outlines (like gun-sights in a video game). As ES spoke, it was like she was referring to rectangles farther and farther to the left.
Dream #2
It was night. I was in a house with my family. It was more than just my immediate family. There were members from my dad's side of the family as well.
The house was dark. There may have been some light somewhere, but not much, and I couldn't make out the source (possibly outdoor streetlamp light coming in through curtained windows). It was like this place was on a floor in an apartment building. The apartment may have been very large.
The main room, the living room, was very large, maybe thirty feet by thirty feet. There were occasional chairs and other pieces of furniture. But most or all of the space was taken up by people, my family members, sleeping under sleeping bags and blankets on the floor. It seemed like most everybody was asleep.
I was walking through the room, as if I had just gotten into it, as if I had just come to whatever this gathering was. There were a few people awake, some in the center of the room, kind of arranged as campers might be around a fire (except with just empty floor between them, and not fire) and some people standing at the other end of the room, as if in the doorway for a kitchen.
As I walked through the center of the room, a man, my uncle R, called to me. He asked me what my phone was. I told him it was a BlackBerry. He asked me if he could see it. I handed it to him.
Someone from the doorway to the kitchen was also talking, either to me and my uncle or just to my uncle. The people around my uncle all lay around talking about things, possibly technology. There may have been small lights before them, like the lights from small electronic devices.
I now stood in the room in the daylight. There were still blankets and sleeping bags throughout the room, where everyone had slept. But now there was nobody around.
I walked to the circle of blankets where my uncle R had been, so I could grab my BlackBerry. I knelt down and picked the BlackBerry out of a messy pile of electronic devices. I now saw that my BlackBerry was missing its back, and that the battery was also gone.
I was panicked. I had trusted my uncle and let him look at my phone, and now he'd taken stuff out of it. I tried to see if the SiM card was still in it, but I didn't have enough composure. I sifted though all the other stuff on the ground, but I couldn't find either the back or the battery.
I now got pissed off. I turned around and yelled toward the kitchen, to someone, to my mom or anyone, "Somebody took the battery out of my BlackBerry! If anybody sees my battery and back lying around, let me know!"
On the wall to my left was the front door of the apartment. (Just to the left of that door?) was a small hallway to a couple of bedrooms. My uncle now ran out of that hallway. He had the battery, which was hooked directly to a thick, coiled cord, as if the battery were being charged directly instead of through the device.
The charger wasn't mine, but my uncle hurriedly handed me both the battery and the charger. He had obviously stolen my battery. Now he wanted to get rid of it as soon as possibly, even if that meant losing the charger as well.
My uncle looked worn out, dried out. He may have had purple sacks or even pale bruises under his eyes. He was trying to explain something to me, either how he'd made a mistake in taking the battery, or how he had taken the battery to charge it for me as a favor. I could tell just by the way he was acting (and by the condition in which he'd handed me my battery) that he was lying. I was't even trying to listen to what he said.
Dream #3
I had driven to some place with my mother and brother. It was dark outside, but we could see everything fine, as if it were lit for a cartoon or a movie. We were in some place like an asphalt lot with a cinder block wall, which was directly before us, and a chain-link fence, with barbed wire on top, which was to our right. We stood outside the car, which may have been something like an old Ford Gran Torino, maybe goldish colored.
We spoke about directions to where we really wanted to go. I may have "seen" something in the wall, like a display rack of red clothing, up about ten feet on the wall. We knew we had to turn around.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
(3/9/09) blackberry confiscated; transvestite work meeting
(Entered in paper journal at 8:29 AM at Starbucks on 29th Street and Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.)
Dream #1
I was in a place like an airport terminal, in one of the joining areas between concourses or hallways. There was a small crowd of people, all watching a group of executives from my old company giving a presentation or press conference. I stood at the back of the crowd. The area I stood in was open and somewhat bright, with light coming from a large window-wall.
Closer toward the stage area, the ceiling got lower and the lighting got darker. The executives all stood in a somewhat constricted area, like a small seating area for special passengers, behind waist-high, plexiglass gates. One or a few podiums lined up at the front of this area, before the crowd.
The company's CEO stood at the podium, possibly with a moderator-like person. The CEO was trying to justify something about my company's business.
I was trying to justify it myself at the same time. I started looking up articles on my BlackBerry to prove that my company wasn't bad. I did a Google search, using my company's name and then some specific type of business (can't remember what).
As I did this -- noticing that someone just to the right of me was using a smaller model of BlackBerry than the one I was using -- the CEO interrupted himself and said, "I am confiscating all handheld devices." The reason, I knew, was that the CEO thought we (I?) were trying to trade the company's stock instantaneously with the news the CEO was giving.
A black man, a few inches taller than I, round-headed and somewhat round-bodied, wearing a nice, black suit jacket and slacks and a muted, maroon or red shirt and tie, came up to me and took my BlackBerry right out of my hands. He didn't touch the other person's phone.
The presentation or conference continued on for a couple more minutes. The man had walked over to a wall to my left. He had put my BlackBerry in the left breast pocket of his suit jacket.
The conference cleared out a little. Most of the executives had headed out. This was, I thought, a break time between presentations. I thought I could wait for the next set of presentations. But I was so upset that the man had taken my BlackBerry, and I was so nervous that he wouldn't ever give it back, that I wanted to leave right then and there, just so I could go up to the man and get my BlackBerry back.
But I was afraid to go up to the man at all. I was pretty sure his intention had from the beginning been to steal my BlackBerry, and that now he'd find all kinds of excuses to keep it from me.
I thought, If only one of the executives could help me. I looked at the stage area. Of the few people who remained there I recognized only one: MB. MB sat in a comfortable chair, holding a bottle of water and stretching out his legs. I was pretty sure he wouldn't even recognize me.
Dream #2
I walked into an office. The office was maybe twelve feet by twelve feet. It was really dumpy. The light was an almost green fluorescent.
The person whose office this was (my old boss BS?) sat in a desk that was set maybe two-thirds of the way back into the room, and oriented so that the back of the person seated at the desk would face the door.
A black man sat across the desk from BS (?). The man was supposed to be a transvestite or a drag queen. But he just looked like an effeminate man. He was dressed in regular clothes, although they were possibly casual, like a grey t-shirt.
I sat down to the left of the man. The man and I spoke with BS. Another person walked in. I hoped this other person wouldn't think that I was a transvestite, too, just because I was getting along with this other guy so well.
Dream #1
I was in a place like an airport terminal, in one of the joining areas between concourses or hallways. There was a small crowd of people, all watching a group of executives from my old company giving a presentation or press conference. I stood at the back of the crowd. The area I stood in was open and somewhat bright, with light coming from a large window-wall.
Closer toward the stage area, the ceiling got lower and the lighting got darker. The executives all stood in a somewhat constricted area, like a small seating area for special passengers, behind waist-high, plexiglass gates. One or a few podiums lined up at the front of this area, before the crowd.
The company's CEO stood at the podium, possibly with a moderator-like person. The CEO was trying to justify something about my company's business.
I was trying to justify it myself at the same time. I started looking up articles on my BlackBerry to prove that my company wasn't bad. I did a Google search, using my company's name and then some specific type of business (can't remember what).
As I did this -- noticing that someone just to the right of me was using a smaller model of BlackBerry than the one I was using -- the CEO interrupted himself and said, "I am confiscating all handheld devices." The reason, I knew, was that the CEO thought we (I?) were trying to trade the company's stock instantaneously with the news the CEO was giving.
A black man, a few inches taller than I, round-headed and somewhat round-bodied, wearing a nice, black suit jacket and slacks and a muted, maroon or red shirt and tie, came up to me and took my BlackBerry right out of my hands. He didn't touch the other person's phone.
The presentation or conference continued on for a couple more minutes. The man had walked over to a wall to my left. He had put my BlackBerry in the left breast pocket of his suit jacket.
The conference cleared out a little. Most of the executives had headed out. This was, I thought, a break time between presentations. I thought I could wait for the next set of presentations. But I was so upset that the man had taken my BlackBerry, and I was so nervous that he wouldn't ever give it back, that I wanted to leave right then and there, just so I could go up to the man and get my BlackBerry back.
But I was afraid to go up to the man at all. I was pretty sure his intention had from the beginning been to steal my BlackBerry, and that now he'd find all kinds of excuses to keep it from me.
I thought, If only one of the executives could help me. I looked at the stage area. Of the few people who remained there I recognized only one: MB. MB sat in a comfortable chair, holding a bottle of water and stretching out his legs. I was pretty sure he wouldn't even recognize me.
Dream #2
I walked into an office. The office was maybe twelve feet by twelve feet. It was really dumpy. The light was an almost green fluorescent.
The person whose office this was (my old boss BS?) sat in a desk that was set maybe two-thirds of the way back into the room, and oriented so that the back of the person seated at the desk would face the door.
A black man sat across the desk from BS (?). The man was supposed to be a transvestite or a drag queen. But he just looked like an effeminate man. He was dressed in regular clothes, although they were possibly casual, like a grey t-shirt.
I sat down to the left of the man. The man and I spoke with BS. Another person walked in. I hoped this other person wouldn't think that I was a transvestite, too, just because I was getting along with this other guy so well.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
(5/9/09) time poisoning; protected rather than stolen
(Entered in paper journal at 7:05 AM on Q-train into Manhattan from Brooklyn.)
Dream #1
I was in a car with my mom and my brother. I possibly sat in the backseat, on the passenger side. It was a darkish, grey day. We were driving through an area of rolling, lawny hills, like in a cemetery.
On our right was a tall wave of green hill, atop which were structures like crypts. I called these structures buildings and was pointing them out as if they were famous buildings in New York City.
There was one "building" that seemed to have a Greek/Egyptian style and seemed to be made out of gold. The next "building" we passed was very strange and thin. It seemed to be made in two sections. The section on the left was like a half-cylinder, encrusted in dark stones (?) which had an iridescent glaze and may have been broken up somehow, with traces of gilding. The section on the right may have been something like a stone pedestal on which sat a statue of a jackal.
I pointed out this building, maybe to my brother in particular, and said that the building was the Metropolitan Museum of Art. But as we passed to the next buildings, I thought back to the museum. It suddenly truck me that this building no longer existed. It used to be the building which housed the museum, in the 1960s. But the museum had been moved to a bigger building. I tried to get my mom to back the car up so we could see the building again.
We were now in a kitchen. My mom was busy with something. The kitchen was smallish, with a lot of wood-tones and earth colors. It was lit with a cold, incandescent light. I had climbed up onto a countertop and was probably pulling big books, like art books, off the top of a cupboard. I was trying to show my brother that we had driven past a building which no longer existed.
(At this point I got off the Q-train and walked over to the Starbucks on 17th Street and Broadway in Manhattan, where I resumed my paper journal entry.)
I was trying to show that we had gone back in time or had been a part of some kind of anachronistic phenomenon. My brother didn't quite understand, or didn't quite seem to be paying attention. I took him back outside to try and illustrate the point.
When we got back outside, I may have had no idea how we were supposed to get back to the museum. We stood before a wide, green field which sloped slightly downward to something like a wide square of concrete, like the floor of a demolished building.
Just beyond that, though somehow obscured, was another building, which looked like a 1970s style building, and which may have had a section like a half cylinder lined with vertical wood slats. I knew that something about this area was also very different from what it "presently" was (wherever that "present" may have been).
I asked my brother, "Don't you recognize that building? Don't you remember what it was, and that it isn't there anymore?"
I now stood back inside the kitchen. My maternal grandmother walked into the kitchen. She looked a little upset. She told me that the son of XXXXX (a mutual friend of my mother and her best friend, though I can't remember her name) had just died. The son seemed to have been doing fine. But one day he drank two glasses of liquid at once and died.
The beverages were like water and chocolate milk. The cause of harm might have been, I knew, drinking two different beverages at once. But it might also have been the fact that the boy (young man, now) had been poisoned, and possibly by his mother.
My grandma had mentioned the boy's death as an explanation for why we would be delayed in getting out of the house and going where we had planned to go (to the museum?). I may have hugged my grandma to comfort her.
We walked through a small but dark hallway at the end of the kitchen and into a wide, emptyish living room lit by a single harsh, cold, incandescent light. There were a few people in the room, all relaxing as if this were one of my mother's holiday parties.
Two large couches sat against the front wall and the wall to my right. My mom's friend sat on the couch to my right. She seemed to be sad but alright. But I thought of the woman as a poisoner. I thought I would have to be careful around her.
Dream #2
I was possibly in an airport. I walked into a buffet-style restaurant. There was a huge, maze-like set of wood railings set up to form a line before the buffet. The place was almost completely empty. The atmosphere was red, as if lit by a red neon light.
I may have been waiting for a friend to arrive, or I may have been trying to figure out what I needed to pick up for a friend's meal. I was walking toward the buffet, possibly cutting through the "maze," when a couple big guys, both like white businessmen dressed business casual, cut in front of me. One of the men may have been a short, Indian man.
I caught back up to the men at the buffet. The men spoke back and forth with one another casually, like they hadn't even noticed having cut in front of me. I did something to bully them so they'd at least have to pay attention to me.
I may have been heading toward a seating area in the restaurant. The seating area apparently had no or very little light in it, lit only by natural light coming into the room from the windows in the concourse outside.
A voice now called over the loudspeaker. There was going to be some kind of fire drill or emergency evacuation drill for the building. The voice (a polite, female voice) said, "We would appreciate it if the customers could also please participate in this drill."
I figured I'd have no trouble participating. But I needed to go pick up my book bag before I did the evacuation. Before I had gone into the restaurant, apparently, I had been reading at a large, circular table, like one might see in the food court of a common area at a university.
The concourse now seemed to be a mostly windowless hallway full of these large, circular tables. I was running to find my bag. I could see the area where I had been sitting, but I couldn't see my bag. I was certain my bag had been stolen. I felt like I wasn't getting to the table fast enough.
I began flying. At some point I may have been pulled backwards. Then, possibly, I had been given my bag back by a security guard, a black woman. I was relieved. My bag had, apparently, been protected rather than stolen. But for some reason I now couldn't believe that this was actually my bag.
Dream #1
I was in a car with my mom and my brother. I possibly sat in the backseat, on the passenger side. It was a darkish, grey day. We were driving through an area of rolling, lawny hills, like in a cemetery.
On our right was a tall wave of green hill, atop which were structures like crypts. I called these structures buildings and was pointing them out as if they were famous buildings in New York City.
There was one "building" that seemed to have a Greek/Egyptian style and seemed to be made out of gold. The next "building" we passed was very strange and thin. It seemed to be made in two sections. The section on the left was like a half-cylinder, encrusted in dark stones (?) which had an iridescent glaze and may have been broken up somehow, with traces of gilding. The section on the right may have been something like a stone pedestal on which sat a statue of a jackal.
I pointed out this building, maybe to my brother in particular, and said that the building was the Metropolitan Museum of Art. But as we passed to the next buildings, I thought back to the museum. It suddenly truck me that this building no longer existed. It used to be the building which housed the museum, in the 1960s. But the museum had been moved to a bigger building. I tried to get my mom to back the car up so we could see the building again.
We were now in a kitchen. My mom was busy with something. The kitchen was smallish, with a lot of wood-tones and earth colors. It was lit with a cold, incandescent light. I had climbed up onto a countertop and was probably pulling big books, like art books, off the top of a cupboard. I was trying to show my brother that we had driven past a building which no longer existed.
(At this point I got off the Q-train and walked over to the Starbucks on 17th Street and Broadway in Manhattan, where I resumed my paper journal entry.)
I was trying to show that we had gone back in time or had been a part of some kind of anachronistic phenomenon. My brother didn't quite understand, or didn't quite seem to be paying attention. I took him back outside to try and illustrate the point.
When we got back outside, I may have had no idea how we were supposed to get back to the museum. We stood before a wide, green field which sloped slightly downward to something like a wide square of concrete, like the floor of a demolished building.
Just beyond that, though somehow obscured, was another building, which looked like a 1970s style building, and which may have had a section like a half cylinder lined with vertical wood slats. I knew that something about this area was also very different from what it "presently" was (wherever that "present" may have been).
I asked my brother, "Don't you recognize that building? Don't you remember what it was, and that it isn't there anymore?"
I now stood back inside the kitchen. My maternal grandmother walked into the kitchen. She looked a little upset. She told me that the son of XXXXX (a mutual friend of my mother and her best friend, though I can't remember her name) had just died. The son seemed to have been doing fine. But one day he drank two glasses of liquid at once and died.
The beverages were like water and chocolate milk. The cause of harm might have been, I knew, drinking two different beverages at once. But it might also have been the fact that the boy (young man, now) had been poisoned, and possibly by his mother.
My grandma had mentioned the boy's death as an explanation for why we would be delayed in getting out of the house and going where we had planned to go (to the museum?). I may have hugged my grandma to comfort her.
We walked through a small but dark hallway at the end of the kitchen and into a wide, emptyish living room lit by a single harsh, cold, incandescent light. There were a few people in the room, all relaxing as if this were one of my mother's holiday parties.
Two large couches sat against the front wall and the wall to my right. My mom's friend sat on the couch to my right. She seemed to be sad but alright. But I thought of the woman as a poisoner. I thought I would have to be careful around her.
Dream #2
I was possibly in an airport. I walked into a buffet-style restaurant. There was a huge, maze-like set of wood railings set up to form a line before the buffet. The place was almost completely empty. The atmosphere was red, as if lit by a red neon light.
I may have been waiting for a friend to arrive, or I may have been trying to figure out what I needed to pick up for a friend's meal. I was walking toward the buffet, possibly cutting through the "maze," when a couple big guys, both like white businessmen dressed business casual, cut in front of me. One of the men may have been a short, Indian man.
I caught back up to the men at the buffet. The men spoke back and forth with one another casually, like they hadn't even noticed having cut in front of me. I did something to bully them so they'd at least have to pay attention to me.
I may have been heading toward a seating area in the restaurant. The seating area apparently had no or very little light in it, lit only by natural light coming into the room from the windows in the concourse outside.
A voice now called over the loudspeaker. There was going to be some kind of fire drill or emergency evacuation drill for the building. The voice (a polite, female voice) said, "We would appreciate it if the customers could also please participate in this drill."
I figured I'd have no trouble participating. But I needed to go pick up my book bag before I did the evacuation. Before I had gone into the restaurant, apparently, I had been reading at a large, circular table, like one might see in the food court of a common area at a university.
The concourse now seemed to be a mostly windowless hallway full of these large, circular tables. I was running to find my bag. I could see the area where I had been sitting, but I couldn't see my bag. I was certain my bag had been stolen. I felt like I wasn't getting to the table fast enough.
I began flying. At some point I may have been pulled backwards. Then, possibly, I had been given my bag back by a security guard, a black woman. I was relieved. My bag had, apparently, been protected rather than stolen. But for some reason I now couldn't believe that this was actually my bag.
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