(Entered at 10 AM at some Starbucks somewhere.)
Dream 1
Fragment. -- I ran into my mom's backyard with my friend CV, chasing after two dogs: one mine, the other, CV's. CV's may have been brownish red and white. Mine was black. Both were puppies.
CV picked my dog up. I was jealous of CV for having a good dog. Mine was black and therefore portrayed something earthly or even subterranean. But when CV picked up my dog I realized that CV could even be friends with my dog better than I was.
I stuck out my hand, hoping the dog would at least kiss it. But it just groaned and stuck out its tongue lazily. The tongue was dry and glow-in-the-dark green. It was small at first. But then it was big like a cow tongue.
Showing posts with label jealousy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label jealousy. Show all posts
Saturday, March 18, 2017
Sunday, February 24, 2013
(8/3/07) what makes people want this job; catching boxes from the sky; hook, line, and walking papers
(Entered in paper journal at 6 AM on Q-train from Brooklyn to Manhattan.)
Dream #1
I sat at a desk on an office floor that looked like a living room. The "office" was dim. In an office room, my co-worker DE was on the phone. There may have been a small, fluorescent light on in DE's office.
DE was praising a few people for always staying late. I felt ashamed for not always staying late.
One of the people DE praised was a tall, fat woman with pale blonde hair. Her name may have been Diana. She sat in the office next to DE and was an Administrative Assistant. DE listed a number of things she did, the last of which was, as DE said, to, "Yell a professors I wish I could yell at."
DE said, "In short, she does everything that makes people want to do this job in the first place."
Dream #2
It was a sunny day. I stood out with a group of people at the top of a wide, lawny hill. There were some office-type objects on the lawn. The group had been performing a task, which I may have had a hand in devising. Now we ran to a different part of the hilltop to perform a different task. I may have been angry that we dropped my project, but I tried not to show my anger.
The leader of the group said, "If everybody doesn't like doing this one task, each person can choose his own task." Some of us went back to our original task, which had something to do with catching boxes from the sky. Others did other things.
I was afraid to go back to my original task: I didn't want my boss to think I was a spoiled sport. But then I felt like she was okay with me doing whatever I genuinely wanted to do, so I stood at "my position" to catch boxes from the sky.
But a woman called out to me, "Watch out if you're standing here that you don't let the boxes fall on me." I looked down to the ground. A blonde woman in cream-colored exercise pants and a backless, black leotard was in a stretching position in which her legs stretched out on either side of her at right angles. The woman had her back straight, parallel to the ground, and her face almost flat against the ground. Even though I couldn't see the woman's face, I could tell it was really pretty.
I was about to step away, but I think the woman said, "You don't have to move; just watch out for me."
I suddenly realized I was really turned on by the woman's healthy, sexy body and her stretching position.
Dream #3
I was in a dim bar, getting drunk with my co-worker CJ and some other people. CJ and I had gotten so drunk that we were now wandering the streets.
CJ had a rusty hanger, probably bent out of shape, into something more like a prong, with a sharp end. CJ would put one end of the hanger in his mouth and then swing the rest of the hanger around by wiggling his head. Then he would take the hanger out of his mouth and throw it down the street. I was worried, each time CJ threw the hanger, that the hanger would hit somebody.
The street was lovely, clean, clean-bricked, and softly lit, all under a dark black sky. We walked some more, then found ourselves in a circle in some suburban-looking area. The circle felt like a street for cars, but it was probably paved with tan-colored cobblestones that seemed to me to be more fit for a walking path.
It was now broad daylight. CJ had a straight, metal rod, rusty and thin, like the hanger had been. CJ was still sticking this rod in his mouth and throwing it around. He laughed, like this was a really liberating activity. I still kept worrying that the projectile would stab somebody.
Now CJ wanted me to throw the rod. I decided that this was the wrong place to be.
I saw a crystal-white, almost fairy-like airplane high in the air. It was diving almost straight downward. It had crystalline contrails streaming back behind it. I thought the craft would crash.
I backed away from CJ. I stood in front of a small shop. I looked into the window. The shop looked like a barber shop. It looked very nice, like very rich people were inside, relaxing before a weekend morning haircut. I didn't want the people inside to think I was some bum, so I walked away from the window. I caught a glimpse, looking down to my right, of a quaint, tree-lined street.
I walked back to the circle. I heard CJ had been fired. I may have been in a dim room and standing behind a nice couch.
Dream #1
I sat at a desk on an office floor that looked like a living room. The "office" was dim. In an office room, my co-worker DE was on the phone. There may have been a small, fluorescent light on in DE's office.
DE was praising a few people for always staying late. I felt ashamed for not always staying late.
One of the people DE praised was a tall, fat woman with pale blonde hair. Her name may have been Diana. She sat in the office next to DE and was an Administrative Assistant. DE listed a number of things she did, the last of which was, as DE said, to, "Yell a professors I wish I could yell at."
DE said, "In short, she does everything that makes people want to do this job in the first place."
Dream #2
It was a sunny day. I stood out with a group of people at the top of a wide, lawny hill. There were some office-type objects on the lawn. The group had been performing a task, which I may have had a hand in devising. Now we ran to a different part of the hilltop to perform a different task. I may have been angry that we dropped my project, but I tried not to show my anger.
The leader of the group said, "If everybody doesn't like doing this one task, each person can choose his own task." Some of us went back to our original task, which had something to do with catching boxes from the sky. Others did other things.
I was afraid to go back to my original task: I didn't want my boss to think I was a spoiled sport. But then I felt like she was okay with me doing whatever I genuinely wanted to do, so I stood at "my position" to catch boxes from the sky.
But a woman called out to me, "Watch out if you're standing here that you don't let the boxes fall on me." I looked down to the ground. A blonde woman in cream-colored exercise pants and a backless, black leotard was in a stretching position in which her legs stretched out on either side of her at right angles. The woman had her back straight, parallel to the ground, and her face almost flat against the ground. Even though I couldn't see the woman's face, I could tell it was really pretty.
I was about to step away, but I think the woman said, "You don't have to move; just watch out for me."
I suddenly realized I was really turned on by the woman's healthy, sexy body and her stretching position.
Dream #3
I was in a dim bar, getting drunk with my co-worker CJ and some other people. CJ and I had gotten so drunk that we were now wandering the streets.
CJ had a rusty hanger, probably bent out of shape, into something more like a prong, with a sharp end. CJ would put one end of the hanger in his mouth and then swing the rest of the hanger around by wiggling his head. Then he would take the hanger out of his mouth and throw it down the street. I was worried, each time CJ threw the hanger, that the hanger would hit somebody.
The street was lovely, clean, clean-bricked, and softly lit, all under a dark black sky. We walked some more, then found ourselves in a circle in some suburban-looking area. The circle felt like a street for cars, but it was probably paved with tan-colored cobblestones that seemed to me to be more fit for a walking path.
It was now broad daylight. CJ had a straight, metal rod, rusty and thin, like the hanger had been. CJ was still sticking this rod in his mouth and throwing it around. He laughed, like this was a really liberating activity. I still kept worrying that the projectile would stab somebody.
Now CJ wanted me to throw the rod. I decided that this was the wrong place to be.
I saw a crystal-white, almost fairy-like airplane high in the air. It was diving almost straight downward. It had crystalline contrails streaming back behind it. I thought the craft would crash.
I backed away from CJ. I stood in front of a small shop. I looked into the window. The shop looked like a barber shop. It looked very nice, like very rich people were inside, relaxing before a weekend morning haircut. I didn't want the people inside to think I was some bum, so I walked away from the window. I caught a glimpse, looking down to my right, of a quaint, tree-lined street.
I walked back to the circle. I heard CJ had been fired. I may have been in a dim room and standing behind a nice couch.
Sunday, February 10, 2013
(10/10/07) flying to the front of the race; looking good but gaining weight
(Entered in paper journal at 5:50 AM on Q-train from Brooklyn to Manhattan.)
Dream #1
I was watching a marathon which was run at night. It was in a city like New York City, but there was almost no light. There were crowds of people, maybe three or four rows deep, on either side of a road like a road in Central Park. It might have been raining a little.
I was with a group of friends. We had hurried toward the sidelines of the race. We had just missed seeing the leaders. The second pack was now running by. I strained (one direction or the other) to see the leaders. But I couldn't see them. I thought that if I ran I could get up to the head of the race to see the leaders. I started running. But then I began to fly, or to hover (in a standing position?) about a foot or two above the ground.
I was now on some hillside road, probably just outside of and overlooking a medium-sized city. I thought I could catch the marathoners if I shortcut the course. Plus I was now moving quickly enough to get ahead of them with plenty of time to spare.
But as I hovered/flew down the road at increasing speed, I wasn't sure I'd be able to stop myself. I headed down another hillside road. I reached out for some dried-looking, orange-leafed shrub to stop myself. I ended up a little tangled in the shrub.
I now stood beside a car that was parked along the road. The car's passenger's side doors (and maybe the driver's side doors, as well) were open. The inside lights were on. The car was like a minivan-car hybrid. It was beige-silver.
I could hear the voice of a man, probably my age but a little more mature than I. It was as if the man stood somewhere to my left and slightly behind me. The man said something like, "We're jealous of you because all you have to do is blink your back lights --" The back lights of the car blinked. "-- blink your front lights --" The front lights of the car blinked. "-- and suddenly you're out of it."
I now stood in front of the car, right in front of its open front, passenger's side door, looking into the cabin.
Dream #2
I stood in front of a mirror in a bathroom. I may have noticed how, somehow, my face looked so much nicer than usual. I also seemed to be a little bit taller. But in some respects, especially around my jaw. I noticed that I had gained some weight.
Dream #1
I was watching a marathon which was run at night. It was in a city like New York City, but there was almost no light. There were crowds of people, maybe three or four rows deep, on either side of a road like a road in Central Park. It might have been raining a little.
I was with a group of friends. We had hurried toward the sidelines of the race. We had just missed seeing the leaders. The second pack was now running by. I strained (one direction or the other) to see the leaders. But I couldn't see them. I thought that if I ran I could get up to the head of the race to see the leaders. I started running. But then I began to fly, or to hover (in a standing position?) about a foot or two above the ground.
I was now on some hillside road, probably just outside of and overlooking a medium-sized city. I thought I could catch the marathoners if I shortcut the course. Plus I was now moving quickly enough to get ahead of them with plenty of time to spare.
But as I hovered/flew down the road at increasing speed, I wasn't sure I'd be able to stop myself. I headed down another hillside road. I reached out for some dried-looking, orange-leafed shrub to stop myself. I ended up a little tangled in the shrub.
I now stood beside a car that was parked along the road. The car's passenger's side doors (and maybe the driver's side doors, as well) were open. The inside lights were on. The car was like a minivan-car hybrid. It was beige-silver.
I could hear the voice of a man, probably my age but a little more mature than I. It was as if the man stood somewhere to my left and slightly behind me. The man said something like, "We're jealous of you because all you have to do is blink your back lights --" The back lights of the car blinked. "-- blink your front lights --" The front lights of the car blinked. "-- and suddenly you're out of it."
I now stood in front of the car, right in front of its open front, passenger's side door, looking into the cabin.
Dream #2
I stood in front of a mirror in a bathroom. I may have noticed how, somehow, my face looked so much nicer than usual. I also seemed to be a little bit taller. But in some respects, especially around my jaw. I noticed that I had gained some weight.
(10/16/07) where the new building was; emergency party; like a worm made out of brains
(Entered in paper journal at 5:50 AM on Q-train from Brooklyn to Manhattan.)
Dream #1
I watched, from the back passenger seat, a car pass a field with trees like cherry trees. Somehow I thought this was where my company's new building would be (in waking life, my company was in the final planning stages for moving into a new building -- we would be fully moved in, if I remember correctly, by about July of 2008 -- only to be moved into another building in January of 2009!)
I thought, This would be a nice area to take runs. There was a path running through the field. We passed along a creek or river at the bottom of a slope of rocks. The creek itself was rocky. An empty boat, with two paddles, clanked along some of the rocks.
I thought, But this is New York City. The roads are bad on (my boss) BS' knees. We really couldn't come up with a running route that would be good for BS. I also thought of asking my co-worker CJ if he wanted to run.
We passed another river, which ran at the bottom of a waterfall. The waterfall gushed over huge, round, coppery rocks and flooded the river.
We passed a building that was built in three sections. I saw it from the back. The two back sections were roundish with green, metallic framing for the windows. The front section rose slightly above the back sections and was octagonal, probably of pink stone, with a shallow, a-frame roof. It was in a field of dry, yellow-tan and orange-tan grass.
Now it was like I sat backwards, looking out the back window, in the backseat and on the driver's side. My mom was driving the car. My brother and sister were also in the car. We drove on a straight road, through slightly rolling stretches of flat plains -- yellowy-tan grass with some hints of green and orange and some glimpses of rich (?), brown soil beneath. There were occasional, thin clumps of trees, the green of their leafs as pale as floating clouds.
Then I saw a white tree. It was de-limbed, so all it was was a white trunk with four limb-stumps coming off of it. It looked like a wild, raging horse to me.
I thought my mom would be impressed by how much I liked looking out the window. I asked my mom some question relating to telling her about the things my siblings and I had done. My mom surprised me by answering something like, "I don't care. Don't tell me anything." I tried to change that statement into something more positive in my mind.
We passed a stand of thin aspen trees that edged before some tall, redbrick buildings like apartment complexes.
Dream #2
I sat in my desk at work. There was an alarm. A man's voice came on over the alarm's intercom speaker. The man announced a party (?) in XXXXX's office.
When the alarm had first come on, I had been afraid, wondering if the announcement would be for an actual emergency. I had worried whether I would do everything alright and help everybody effectively through the emergency. Now I was a little disappointed. It was just a birthday party?
For some reason I wasn't wearing shoes. But my shoes were sitting right next to me. I picked up my shoes and walked to the cubicle in front of the office where the party was. The party was, somehow, both in the office and down the hall.
The party was for one of my co-workers, AR, who was, like myself, an Administrative Assistant. Someone told AR, "You could be head of GM (i.e. Global Markets) one day! You throw parties so well!"
I was disappointed. Hadn't my old co-worker and mentor ES, now herself an Analyst like my (and, before, her) boss BS, said to me once, "You could be CEO of this company one day"? (I'm pretty sure that in waking life ES never told me that, although she has always complimented me on my "abilities" -- whatever those abilities are/were!)
I now reflected, Maybe you just said all that stuff to kind of puff up your assistants, make them feel more important than you really think they are, just so you can keep them working. How else, I thought in my jealousy, could someone make such a kind statement about AR, who, I peevishly thought, scarcely worked as hard as I worked?
I didn't even want to go into the room now. I was too ashamed. I took my time putting on my shoes.
AR called, "Preemie, get in here!"
I said, "I'm coming."
She said, "I've been making decisions to be nice. But pretty soon I'm going to have to stop making decisions!"
I thought, Nobody's going to talk to me that way!
But now both AR and ES were out in the cubicle with me. They were both saying nice things to me.
Dream #3
I sat watching a movie. I walked out and then back in. I walked up to my seat as the movie was ending. There were shots of blue sky and power lines, vistas of plains, and other shots I loved. The narrative of the film ended, a song began playing, and the credits began to roll.
But as the song started, a voice (of some Hispanic boy?) called out, "Hey, uh... The film is pretty much ended, everybody. We would appreciate it if you got up and left."
I was in a front row. I had my stuff sitting against the railing in front of me. I stood to pick it up. I had forgotten that I had brought a coat. I had actually brought a lot more than I had remembered.
I walked out into the hallway, which was like the hallway in a city building, just off from the reception lobby. I stood in a weird junction of hallways and right by a garbage can. I stood talking with two black girls.
The girls mentioned a young man, one of their co-workers (they all worked at this movie-house), who did a lot of other stuff. I wasn't sure what the "other stuff" was. I asked, "Does he work somewhere else, too?"
The girls got upset, like I had insinuated that all the boy could do was work in places like this. One of them said, "No. He goes to school. He's studying to be a scientist."
We talked a little more. Then I had to leave. One of the girls walked with me out into the dark, blue-grey evening. The girl smiled and said, "I've always wanted to see the car you drive."
We stood in a mostly empty shopping mall parking lot. The movie-house was now more like a restaurant. I saw my car in the distance. It was an old, beat-up car, like one I drove in my last year of high school -- except that the paint job on the car was now all new and shiny.
I thought, I can't let the girl see that thing. Besides, this girl wasn't the girl I wanted. Both girls were pretty. But the girl I liked, the other girl I'd been talking with in the movie-house hallway, had rounder eyes, not thin eyes like this girl.
The girl with me stopped to talk with a mother and her kids, who stood by a van. I thought, While the girl's not paying attention I can drive away. That way she won't see my awful car.
I turned to tell the girl goodbye. But I saw her from behind and was too surprised to say anything. The girl was now short, ugly, and poor-looking (???!!! -- I'm sometimes shocked by the things I've said!). She wore a blue t-shirt and tight blue jeans which showed off her big bottom. Her big bottom really turned me off.
A black man who was about my height and a little bigger than I, smart-looking, with thin-rimmed eyeglasses, walked past me. I must have thought this was the friend the two women had been talking about in the movie-house hallway.
I thought, Now's my chance to prove I don't think the girls' friend is capable only of working in a movie theater. I apparently thought I could do this simply by making small talk with the man in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. I said, "Hey, man, we'll see you later."
The man walked past me without even regarding me. I thought, Okay -- you show kindness and it isn't returned!
I walked toward my car. My mom walked beside me and to my left. I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket. The phone (a regular, old-style flip-phone -- as I remember it from waking life, a black Nokia) was cracked. I thought, Maybe it's just cracked on the surface. But I opened it to see that the crack ran across all its surfaces. I looked at the sides. They were messed up, too.
I almost started crying. I thought, What did I do to make this happen? Can't I take care of anything I own?
It was now more like daytime. The car was by the entrance to the mall. My mom and I were at the end of the parking aisle, maybe twenty feet from the car. We passed a needle-leafed tree in a planting island.
I had been speaking with my mom and barely attending the stout tree. But, reflecting on the tree after we'd passed it, it struck me that the tree had weird, tiered, pink and white flowers on it. I told my mom, "Let's go back. That tree looks weird."
We went back. I looked at the branches. There were strange, but somehow sensible, tan-brown, brittle, cone-shaped things standing atop the thin branches. I thought, Maybe I just mistook these things for flowers.
But then I saw, out of the corner of my eye, the pink and white flower. I hadn't seen the flower because it was on the periphery of the tree, not in the center, where I had focused my gaze.
The trunk of the tree seemed to end about two feet up from the ground. From the top of the trunk came an agave-like plant with spiny, yellow, purple, and green leafs. I said, "That's what I thought I saw! Isn't it odd?"
I reached out to touch the plant, to make sure I was seeing leafs and not more cones. The plant felt odd. And when I pulled my hand back, I noticed the top leafs moving, as if of their own volition. I thought, That can't be real. I have to be seeing things.
My mom and I were walking away. But the plant really bugged me. I had to look at it again. I told my mom, "Something else didn't make sense." I didn't want to tell my mom what didn't make sense -- namely, that the plant seemed to be moving on its own.
We went back to the tree. Now I saw that the plant grew out of a hollow in the top of the tree trunk -- although it was a part of the tree. I saw steady, directed movement from within the trunk. I knew the movement wasn't volitional, but that it was growth -- life.
I saw a spiky (like a sea-cucumber), worm-like appendage emerge from beneath the leafs. I shouted to my mom, "See?! I wasn't imagining! This thing is growing quicker than normal!"
The thing emerged, as huge as a boa constrictor, and wove its way through the thin branches of the tree. It was like a worm made out of brains, with a head like a gigantic breast. It hung over a branch above us. I knew if it touched us it would incorporate us.
I told my mom, "Run to the car!" We ran and got in.
The thing was growing. It had taken over the tree and spread toward us through the parking lot. I didn't know if we could get started and drive away quickly enough.
I saw a car coming from an underground parking garage to the left of the tree. Now the parking garage was like a car wash. It sprayed water all over the car. Jets of water flew outside the garage. They hit the plant-thing. As soon as they did, the thing dissolved into yellowy, thickish, soapy-looking water.
I hoped that more cars would come through the garage to get washed. The thing was dissolved now, but I felt like it would regain its consistency. I thought that more water needed to hit the thing before it would lose its ability to re-stabilize.
Dream #1
I watched, from the back passenger seat, a car pass a field with trees like cherry trees. Somehow I thought this was where my company's new building would be (in waking life, my company was in the final planning stages for moving into a new building -- we would be fully moved in, if I remember correctly, by about July of 2008 -- only to be moved into another building in January of 2009!)
I thought, This would be a nice area to take runs. There was a path running through the field. We passed along a creek or river at the bottom of a slope of rocks. The creek itself was rocky. An empty boat, with two paddles, clanked along some of the rocks.
I thought, But this is New York City. The roads are bad on (my boss) BS' knees. We really couldn't come up with a running route that would be good for BS. I also thought of asking my co-worker CJ if he wanted to run.
We passed another river, which ran at the bottom of a waterfall. The waterfall gushed over huge, round, coppery rocks and flooded the river.
We passed a building that was built in three sections. I saw it from the back. The two back sections were roundish with green, metallic framing for the windows. The front section rose slightly above the back sections and was octagonal, probably of pink stone, with a shallow, a-frame roof. It was in a field of dry, yellow-tan and orange-tan grass.
Now it was like I sat backwards, looking out the back window, in the backseat and on the driver's side. My mom was driving the car. My brother and sister were also in the car. We drove on a straight road, through slightly rolling stretches of flat plains -- yellowy-tan grass with some hints of green and orange and some glimpses of rich (?), brown soil beneath. There were occasional, thin clumps of trees, the green of their leafs as pale as floating clouds.
Then I saw a white tree. It was de-limbed, so all it was was a white trunk with four limb-stumps coming off of it. It looked like a wild, raging horse to me.
I thought my mom would be impressed by how much I liked looking out the window. I asked my mom some question relating to telling her about the things my siblings and I had done. My mom surprised me by answering something like, "I don't care. Don't tell me anything." I tried to change that statement into something more positive in my mind.
We passed a stand of thin aspen trees that edged before some tall, redbrick buildings like apartment complexes.
Dream #2
I sat in my desk at work. There was an alarm. A man's voice came on over the alarm's intercom speaker. The man announced a party (?) in XXXXX's office.
When the alarm had first come on, I had been afraid, wondering if the announcement would be for an actual emergency. I had worried whether I would do everything alright and help everybody effectively through the emergency. Now I was a little disappointed. It was just a birthday party?
For some reason I wasn't wearing shoes. But my shoes were sitting right next to me. I picked up my shoes and walked to the cubicle in front of the office where the party was. The party was, somehow, both in the office and down the hall.
The party was for one of my co-workers, AR, who was, like myself, an Administrative Assistant. Someone told AR, "You could be head of GM (i.e. Global Markets) one day! You throw parties so well!"
I was disappointed. Hadn't my old co-worker and mentor ES, now herself an Analyst like my (and, before, her) boss BS, said to me once, "You could be CEO of this company one day"? (I'm pretty sure that in waking life ES never told me that, although she has always complimented me on my "abilities" -- whatever those abilities are/were!)
I now reflected, Maybe you just said all that stuff to kind of puff up your assistants, make them feel more important than you really think they are, just so you can keep them working. How else, I thought in my jealousy, could someone make such a kind statement about AR, who, I peevishly thought, scarcely worked as hard as I worked?
I didn't even want to go into the room now. I was too ashamed. I took my time putting on my shoes.
AR called, "Preemie, get in here!"
I said, "I'm coming."
She said, "I've been making decisions to be nice. But pretty soon I'm going to have to stop making decisions!"
I thought, Nobody's going to talk to me that way!
But now both AR and ES were out in the cubicle with me. They were both saying nice things to me.
Dream #3
I sat watching a movie. I walked out and then back in. I walked up to my seat as the movie was ending. There were shots of blue sky and power lines, vistas of plains, and other shots I loved. The narrative of the film ended, a song began playing, and the credits began to roll.
But as the song started, a voice (of some Hispanic boy?) called out, "Hey, uh... The film is pretty much ended, everybody. We would appreciate it if you got up and left."
I was in a front row. I had my stuff sitting against the railing in front of me. I stood to pick it up. I had forgotten that I had brought a coat. I had actually brought a lot more than I had remembered.
I walked out into the hallway, which was like the hallway in a city building, just off from the reception lobby. I stood in a weird junction of hallways and right by a garbage can. I stood talking with two black girls.
The girls mentioned a young man, one of their co-workers (they all worked at this movie-house), who did a lot of other stuff. I wasn't sure what the "other stuff" was. I asked, "Does he work somewhere else, too?"
The girls got upset, like I had insinuated that all the boy could do was work in places like this. One of them said, "No. He goes to school. He's studying to be a scientist."
We talked a little more. Then I had to leave. One of the girls walked with me out into the dark, blue-grey evening. The girl smiled and said, "I've always wanted to see the car you drive."
We stood in a mostly empty shopping mall parking lot. The movie-house was now more like a restaurant. I saw my car in the distance. It was an old, beat-up car, like one I drove in my last year of high school -- except that the paint job on the car was now all new and shiny.
I thought, I can't let the girl see that thing. Besides, this girl wasn't the girl I wanted. Both girls were pretty. But the girl I liked, the other girl I'd been talking with in the movie-house hallway, had rounder eyes, not thin eyes like this girl.
The girl with me stopped to talk with a mother and her kids, who stood by a van. I thought, While the girl's not paying attention I can drive away. That way she won't see my awful car.
I turned to tell the girl goodbye. But I saw her from behind and was too surprised to say anything. The girl was now short, ugly, and poor-looking (???!!! -- I'm sometimes shocked by the things I've said!). She wore a blue t-shirt and tight blue jeans which showed off her big bottom. Her big bottom really turned me off.
A black man who was about my height and a little bigger than I, smart-looking, with thin-rimmed eyeglasses, walked past me. I must have thought this was the friend the two women had been talking about in the movie-house hallway.
I thought, Now's my chance to prove I don't think the girls' friend is capable only of working in a movie theater. I apparently thought I could do this simply by making small talk with the man in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. I said, "Hey, man, we'll see you later."
The man walked past me without even regarding me. I thought, Okay -- you show kindness and it isn't returned!
I walked toward my car. My mom walked beside me and to my left. I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket. The phone (a regular, old-style flip-phone -- as I remember it from waking life, a black Nokia) was cracked. I thought, Maybe it's just cracked on the surface. But I opened it to see that the crack ran across all its surfaces. I looked at the sides. They were messed up, too.
I almost started crying. I thought, What did I do to make this happen? Can't I take care of anything I own?
It was now more like daytime. The car was by the entrance to the mall. My mom and I were at the end of the parking aisle, maybe twenty feet from the car. We passed a needle-leafed tree in a planting island.
I had been speaking with my mom and barely attending the stout tree. But, reflecting on the tree after we'd passed it, it struck me that the tree had weird, tiered, pink and white flowers on it. I told my mom, "Let's go back. That tree looks weird."
We went back. I looked at the branches. There were strange, but somehow sensible, tan-brown, brittle, cone-shaped things standing atop the thin branches. I thought, Maybe I just mistook these things for flowers.
But then I saw, out of the corner of my eye, the pink and white flower. I hadn't seen the flower because it was on the periphery of the tree, not in the center, where I had focused my gaze.
The trunk of the tree seemed to end about two feet up from the ground. From the top of the trunk came an agave-like plant with spiny, yellow, purple, and green leafs. I said, "That's what I thought I saw! Isn't it odd?"
I reached out to touch the plant, to make sure I was seeing leafs and not more cones. The plant felt odd. And when I pulled my hand back, I noticed the top leafs moving, as if of their own volition. I thought, That can't be real. I have to be seeing things.
My mom and I were walking away. But the plant really bugged me. I had to look at it again. I told my mom, "Something else didn't make sense." I didn't want to tell my mom what didn't make sense -- namely, that the plant seemed to be moving on its own.
We went back to the tree. Now I saw that the plant grew out of a hollow in the top of the tree trunk -- although it was a part of the tree. I saw steady, directed movement from within the trunk. I knew the movement wasn't volitional, but that it was growth -- life.
I saw a spiky (like a sea-cucumber), worm-like appendage emerge from beneath the leafs. I shouted to my mom, "See?! I wasn't imagining! This thing is growing quicker than normal!"
The thing emerged, as huge as a boa constrictor, and wove its way through the thin branches of the tree. It was like a worm made out of brains, with a head like a gigantic breast. It hung over a branch above us. I knew if it touched us it would incorporate us.
I told my mom, "Run to the car!" We ran and got in.
The thing was growing. It had taken over the tree and spread toward us through the parking lot. I didn't know if we could get started and drive away quickly enough.
I saw a car coming from an underground parking garage to the left of the tree. Now the parking garage was like a car wash. It sprayed water all over the car. Jets of water flew outside the garage. They hit the plant-thing. As soon as they did, the thing dissolved into yellowy, thickish, soapy-looking water.
I hoped that more cars would come through the garage to get washed. The thing was dissolved now, but I felt like it would regain its consistency. I thought that more water needed to hit the thing before it would lose its ability to re-stabilize.
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