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Showing posts with label dream. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dream. Show all posts

Sunday, March 12, 2023

A Dream

I dreamt that I took Lisa to a breakfast function at St. Adalbert's, my childhood parish. We parked on the 20th St side of the church building, in angled parking along the church itself - and nevermind that it was obviously nighttime (despite being breakfast) and that there is no such parking in real life, nor even room for it, on that side of the building. 

Inside was a bright, L-shaped room, with the vertical half of the L nearest the entrance, and set up for the buffet line, with seating along the bottom of the L. 

I got in line. Midway through the buffet was a stack of papers and pencils, and for reasons unknown you had to stop and write your name on a scrap of paper. I noticed the name that was being written by the man behind me. It was the name of my Godfather, but when I turned to greet him it was the face of Ted Turner, the old owner of CNN and the Atlanta Braves. But it *was* my Godfather, in name and personality. 

He offered me a job, a good one. I wondered, even in the dream, why he would wait nearly half a century to try and help me. 

Then I was seated a long table in the room,  Lisa and the family around me. 

There was a dramatic jump cut and I was somewhere else, home maybe, and my wallet had fallen out and I was missing all my credit cards and my driver's license. 

I knew, even in the dream, that this part of it was a dream, and moreover that it was the rare bit that could be tied directly to real-life concerns; before bed I had noticed that my wallet had fallen out of my jeans, and found and replaced it in its pocket. 

There was more, but the rest is lost in a haze. 

Monday, November 21, 2022

An Odd Dream

Saturday night I had a dream that there was dirt under my fingernails. I started to clean them out with a nail pick, but to my surprise it wasn't dirt. As I watched in disgust I pulled out a long, pitch-black, spiked worm that had burrowed under the skin beneath my nail. 

Time and again I pulled one out, two or three from every finger, each leaving an open wound under my fingernail. 

In the dream I remember being perplexed, not by their presence, but by all the many, many times I'd cleaned my nails before without realizing they weren't dirty at all. 



Wednesday, June 1, 2022

A Dream

 Last night I dreamt I was in a labyrinthine hotel that was falling apart. Not from abandonment or a lack of maintenance, but almost like bits and pieces of it were being consumed.  At some point I was put in charge of a group of people seeking to escape; when failure was certain, and all hope was lost, I let one of the group call her Grandma and say goodbye, and then she handed the phone back. I then gave it to the next person to make a farewell call  . . . 

And I was suddenly in the outfield of a softball field, playing in left center.  A batter hit a sharp blast that I chased down and caught, and I fired a perfect strike to first to chase the runner back. The second baseman - none other than Gov Tony Evers - gave me a thumbs up in appreciation. 



Yeah. Maybe somebody spiked the CCAP machine. 

Monday, September 24, 2018

2nd Dream of the NIght

2nd dream: I was driving to work but first taking LuLu to my Mom's place when I made a wrong turn. Frustrated with being late I backed out of a spot at Burger King and scraped the whole side of her car, then got pulled over by the police. Apparently I was under arrest for the property damage but suddenly Lisa was there but she wasn't Lisa but Jennifer Gardner, who convinced the cops I was a recovering alcoholic and suffering from concussion syndrome "he's the 15th victim" (of who/what she didn't say.) 

Then I was at the funeral for Angela from The Office, who was displayed in her coffin. Her corpse began chanting "I'm meat meat meat eat me I'm meat" so Kevin from the show took a slice of her belly and dug in.

Where's my Unicycle?

I've spent about 10 minutes of my life on a skateboard, and that was long ago as a teenager with Jon Z. None-the-less, I had a very vivid dream last night that I was skateboarding around town and misplaced my board. I woke up very upset . 

"Where's my skateboard?" I asked Lisa. 

She laughed. "I don't know. Where's my unicycle?"

HaHa. A liberal AND a comedian. "Lucky" me.

Monday, November 13, 2017

A Dream

Last night I dreamt that we took possession of my paternal grandparents' home, fully furnished. When Lisa and I toured it it was huge, a product of the dream, but the whole night I was keeping quiet about the fact that the next day was a mandatory bar exam (which I went to on a few hours sleep). 

Then I was at an outdoor lumber yard and involved in something shady, and spent part of the dream in a police interview. Don't worry, I ain't no 🐀. 

Then back to a dinner party at our "new" house, where I confronted my Dad's friend Jim, absent forty years, about his long silence. In the dream he claimed to be the mayor of Mequon and we discussed a predicted demise of Toys R Us.

Sunday, January 29, 2017

LOL

 My oldest came down this morning and said "I had the worst dream, you were screaming at me in the grocery store, really loud". I replied, "that's not a dream, that's a flashback". Lmao.....i amuse myself!! - Lisa

Wednesday, November 23, 2016

A Nightmare

I had a horrific nightmare. We visited a cursed house dedicated to some demon but outwardly normal. A child was burned alive, we (my family) stood in a boxcar w/ many others watching The Hunger Games, and I snuck a for sale sign on the lawn but a lady was quick to tell buyers the contract included service to the demon. Apparently it was a selling point. And LuLu had her iPod stolen in the dream, which she knows is my trigger. Best part? At one point I was covered by hundreds of quarter sized puppies. But I broke the spell and realized they were hairy spiders. Why is that good? I'm not scared of spiders, but my friend Tre. Even in the midst of this terrible dream I was just enough of an as**ole to snap selfies with the spiders and text them to him. LOL

Wednesday, June 29, 2016

A Nightmare

Woke up after half an hour from a wicked nightmare. I was at the 4077th - the hospital from MASH - and there was a blond Midwestern young man who was doing well and recovering from his wounds. I walked out of my visit with him and within minutes heard incoming shells. One struck the post-op unit, and when I ran back the whole building was in flames, with the patients inside -including the kid I talked to - screaming as they burned alive.

Saturday, May 21, 2016

A Dream

I took a nap and dreamt that I woke up in the St Francis ER, with no idea how I got there. The nurse said I'd driven there at noon and then passed out. She said my hip was horribly infected, hence all the pain, and that they'd reopened the surgical scar to drain it. When I came home, we were living on Arthur Ave and drove past Lisa on a scooter. She ignored me. When I walked in one of the kids said GusGus ran away and Lisa was out looking for him. What a swell dream. Not.

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

A Dream

I took a nap and dreamt that I was framed for a mass shooting by men that my Mom owed money. I went on the run with Lauren, who was ignorant of the events, and hid in a dark and watery cellar. Lisa, naturally, went on the news and said she couldn't believe I would do such a thing to my family, thereby implying my guilt. I woke up p**sed as hell at her.

Thursday, May 30, 2013

A nightmare I had earlier this week

So here’s the nightmare.

We’re all sitting on folding chairs around the perimeter of a dance studio – pale blonde floor, mirrored walls etc. It’s my family and another one with kids of nearly identical age, plus a middle school age boy who seemed to be a ward of ours. It was casual, friendly conversation, and then the boy tried on a gift from the other family – a pale blue uniform shirt for school. Only it was obviously meant for a girl; ruffled sleeves and frilly neckline.

I mocked the shirt in good humor, not knowing at the time it was a gift from the other family, then apologized sincerely. I went out to our car, stating I knew we had a proper uniform shirt somewhere. I dug through the car with no luck.

When I returned to the room I couldn’t find Lu, or the girl the same age from the other family. We couldn’t find them at all.

Cut to a few days later. My brother in law and his wife are walking with me towards the entrance of the studio, now seen as a white cinderblock building with a steel door and a chain link fence around the parking area. The sky is an odd color. My brother in law is blowing off her disappearance, saying she must have ran off, and in response I blow him off with a curt word.

Then I am somewhere else, face to face with an evil man who knows something of her whereabouts. He is not the perpetrator of the act, but he knows of it. He states that one of the two girls has already been killed – I react with fear, and relax visibly when he says it was the other girl and that Lu is still alive.

“See how far your Christian concern goes,” the man said, gloating. “You don’t care about that other girl at all, so long as your child is allright.”

I didn’t bother disputing this. “You’re right, my daughter means more to me than someone else’s child. I’m human. But don’t you dare think you’re going to get away with hurting that girl.”

The man laughed and for some reason pricked my finger to ID me. As the little GPS sized gizmo sized up my blood, it flashed scenes of worlds exploding, of rivers of lava, of action and destruction. Finally the result: the readout read “The Doctor”, and the man gasped.

Cut again, this time to the same geographic area, but now in chaos. I have done what the Doctor does, wreaked havoc and mayhem. I am running up a very steep hill covered in trees stripped of their leaves.  Someone is at my side. The sky is red.

The townspeople, long unaware of what was wrong,but aware of the evil alongside them, have risen up in fury.
Some of them confront loved ones ‘turned’ to darkness against their will. One man with a pitchfork pleads with his ‘turned’ wife  to bring her back to the light. Behind him, the monster responsible for this terror slips unopposed out of scene. She is a tall, raven haired woman with a billowing, bright red dress.

It is days later, and I am at a table drinking coffee. The family sets out (in a station wagon!) for parts unknown, Lu in the middle of her siblings in the backseat. She is safe and unharmed but clearly disturbed by what occurred.

And I wake up. 

Friday, November 23, 2012

A Dream

I had a spectacular (non-sexual) dream about . . . . Tommy Thompson. I was at a huge banquet, with a non-partisan crowd of maybe 1500 people. There was some issue, now lost to my memory, that was troubling the crowd, but no one was brave enough to voice their concerns. 

Then my Tommy stood up, dressed in a white shirt just like Smiley's. He started out by stating the obvious, that his political career was over in WI, but that that didn't change his love for the state. He went on to address this unremembered concern, laid into an honest and brutal assessment of Tammy Baldwin's inadequacy, and then, finally, hit the hot button issue on the table. 

"Do I think they did it?" [long pause, pained, regretful look, solemn sincere nod] "Yes. Yes, I think they did."

And with that the crowd rose to their feet, and WI once again took Tommy into their hearts. 

Said Lisa when I told her: "What kind of freak dreams about Tommy Thompson?"

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Another Nightmare

Yet another whack-a-doodle nightmare last night.

I was living my current life, with the kids and Lisa and a house of our own (although it seemed to have the layout of the upper flat of my Grandma's house). There was a mishap with our national defense, some minor but fatal flaw that allowed a enemy nation to invade us from the South. No, it wasn't Mexico. If I remember correctly, it was an Arab nation located in Latin America.

Don't ask.

Because of this flaw in our defense the invasion was succeeding, and it soon became obvious that Milwaukee would fall. I began to make plans to evacuate and head up North but Lisa pointed out that all roads out of the city were hopelessly jammed. I thought of of using our bikes and the bike stroller, although the thought of making all the way to Lisa's friend Jolene's house was daunting.

Then another shot to the heart: Jolene refused to house us, even if we brought a tent and stayed in the yard. We were stuck in the city.

The enemy arrived. Reports came that they were on 7th and Center, then 16th and Greenfield; ridiculous, as both locations imply invasion from the north. Anyhow, the clincher was when local radio station 102.9 changed it's frequency to 106.9 - for some reason, going up on the dial was a clear sign the city was doomed. Reports were coming in that every house was being searched, ransacked, and worse.

Lisa and I were a lost cause. Even my friend Tre, with his additional cash reserves, couldn't find a way out and was running out of time.

I piled clothes in the front closet, piles and piles of clothes and told the kids to hide behind them. I handed them bottles of water and some food, and begged them to be quiet. At the last moment I handed YaYa a hammer with a prybar at the end - a tool that I inherited from my paternal Grandfather in the real world - and told her to use it to defend her siblings. If the worst comes to pass, and all hope is lost, I said, use it to spare the kids from the horrors of capture.

There was the sound of boots on the stairs, and I woke up.

Yeah. Not a restful night of sleep.


Thursday, October 21, 2010

A bad dream - yeah, I'm aware that it makes me sound nuts

Ok, here's a nightmare I had two nights ago.

There was a killer on the loose. He'd killed before, but I don't know if he fit the bill of a 'serial' killer. He gave notice that he was going to strike on a playground east of some mangrove trees. I was on a balcony in a high rise apartment building, looking down on the beach, when I noticed a playset that matched the warning.

Immediately the cops were dragging in the killer, a blond man with curly unkept hair, along with a messenger bag of 'trophies' in his hand.

Then I was in a movie theater, once of the lush, velvet palaces that would be extinct if not for places like The Oriental. It was storming, and rain was pouring in from dozens of holes in the roof. There were five gallon buckets on many seats to catch the water. I knew it was my friend Tre's theater, and I literally climbed over rows of seats - passing his father as I did - to find him.

I did - Tre was weeping to the side of the stage. I seemed to know what was wrong; it was the reason I had journeyed there, but as I went to comfort him . . .
I was now outside a home, one superficially similar to my mother-in-law's home. It wasn't the same tho'. There was a long driveway, and there was a house with its side 'crossing the T' at the end of the drive, and another running parallel to it. There was dumpster full of large, broken pieces of blue ceramic. I asked what it was, and was told [Dirty Jobs host] Mike Rowe had a workshop there, and those were the discards of his attempts at pottery.

Then, presumably because Rowe's appearance sparked thoughts of reality TV, I noticed a very steep and snowy, forested hill across the road in front of the house. A huge pine tree was being cut down. It slipped out of control and slid down the hill at high speed, right into the busy motorway. Much of the tree broke off on impact, but the rest continued skiing down the road towards houses in the neighborhood. People began running after it to witness the carnage.

Then I was a child in the house I stood next to, and my 'mother', a woman dressed in an apron and house dress, picked up a large lambskin copy of the constitution and began to read aloud. She then declared we had a right, under law, to claim the lumber from the tree as our own. We set off to the scene of the accident.

Once again I was an adult, and I remember I felt very weary and emotionally drained. In my hands was the messenger bag from the start of the dream. I was in a garage with a workbench, and I told my (female) partner it was wrong that no one had looked inside the bag when the arrest was made. It was now old and water-logged, and removing the items was like sifting coins from the sea floor. The last item out was a womans wallet.

Inside was some money, misc. cards, and a high school ID that was now decades old, showing a girl about four years my junior.

"So he killed her," my partner said. "At least now the family can get some peace. Nice job."

And then I woke up.


Tuesday, October 5, 2010

A Nightmare

Last night a nightmare woke me up at 3 in the morning. I was absolutely convinced that Whoopi Goldberg had died, and woke Lisa up to tell her. Why my subconscious would give a sh** about her passing is still under investigation.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Rambles

Monday and Tuesday we had contractors in the house. On Monday Lisa minded the store, but Tuesday was my day off, and so I was stuck at home with the kids keeping an eye on the work (aka reading a book cover to cover). The sucky part for the wee ones was that, for safety reasons, they were prevented from going in the back yard or upstairs, and I wasn't leaving the house unattended so they were confined to the first floor all day. But they actually took it in stride, and somewhere along the line Ginger fell asleep on the couch. Even in dreamland, she refused to release her hold on her yellow balloon.

Photobucket

She talks like a champ by the way, and the way she says "OK" is the cutest thing ever.

Later that day LuLu wanted to impress (disgust?) the family by showing us how she could scratch her ear with her toes.

Photobucket

Smiley tried to repeat the trick but failed. Meanwhile YaYa, who is seemingly always in an over dramatic, sour mood lately, was actually happy and smiled for the camera.

Photobucket

I should mention that last week Thursday we grilled out for the first time EVER at our house. Keep in mind we moved in in the early months of 2007, so it was a full FOUR years since we pulled out the grill. I'm not sure why that is; we grilled out constantly at our old flat. I think we were too busy in '07 with the remodel and move to fire it up, and by 2008 it was buried in the shed. Pathetic.

Anyhow, I won't lie and say it went smoothly. It was rather chaotic, with kids running around trying to toss paper into the fire and Lisa claiming that I tried to set her hair ablaze.

That last bit is, of course, categorically mostly untrue.

Oh, speaking of firsts the day before the contractors arrived I finally got around to installing the handle on Smiley's sunlight, which meant he was able to open it and get some air at night!

* * *

Weird how the kids are a mix of their parents. Take the following:

YaYa: my complexion, Lisa's nose and hair. My passion for reading, her Mom's flair for the performing arts. My dramatics, her Mom's temper. A bit of a hoarder. Naturally outgoing but held back by a desire not to look the fool; as most adults know, that's just about a guarantee you'll wind up playing the part. A good sense of humor but sometimes unable to translate that into a joke or prank that 'works'.

LuLu: My gorgeous hair, Lisa's pale, quick to burn complexion. (Lack of) height that seems a throwback to an earlier generation. Sadly, my asthma, but no great love of books, although she's become a heck of a reader. "Not my thing," she told me last week. Very kind, if quick tempered.

Smiley: size from both of us; my complexion, Lisa's hair. Super sweet. Very concerned with eating healthy ("it heal-ty?" he'll ask about *everything*, even though he has a weakness for hot fries). Super diligent about following rules and maintaing social order; at present, on pace to be a cop. Loves being read to and helping cook.

LuLu: my eyes but with Lisa's great blue color; Lisa's hair and nose with a complexion that's a cross between us both. Easily the closest to Lisa in appearance. A known hoarder who often falls asleep with a dozen stuffed animals and as many books; a great love of stories and books like her Dad. VERY very independent and a quick learner; possibly the greatest natural intelligence of the lot.

All of them have my dimpled chin.

* * *

Last week I finished a drainage ditch I was working on and the 70ish neighbor across the alley stopped and asked me if that was to correct for my (downed) gutter, which he bluntly said "looked like shit." I told him truthfully that I'd had trouble getting someone reliable out to do a job with so little income potential. (I don't have a ladder tall enough, nor the interest in learning the job while 20 feet in the air).

He volunteered to do it, having worked construction all his life, and for the rest of the afternoon we rehung the fallen gutter and braced two more. He wouldn't take payment but I did buy him a pack of cigarettes, and he seemed genuinely pleased by how ecstatic I was with the results of his efforts.

Anywho, as we made small talk I asked him how long he'd lived in his house. The answer? Since 1941, when he was two years old. Nineteen forty-one, while the USS Arizona was still afloat and well in Pearl Harbor and Hitler owned half of Europe. Wow.

He went on to say that the neighbor beside him was moving in part because the garage on that house was built to accommodate a Model T and was unable to house anything larger than a compact. Fascinating stuff. Can you imagine how much change he's seen in the neighborhood? And he pays attention, because he remembered the very day my current gutters were hung (before I bought the place) and judged the workmanship poor at the time.

* * *

I'm still stuck with the vivid dreams. As a for instance I dreamnt that I was in Mexico City as a hurricane brewed, and yet the population wouldn't heed my warnings. Fearing it was a language problem I hired a young man as an intepreter, but he simply spouted a poetic version of my words that did little to arouse attention. When the storm hit the city was pulverised.

A moment later I was in a dark hallway with two Skittles vending machines against the wall. A quarter was in both machines, and I remember thinking how grand a gesture that was; how I should pay it forward in the future and brighten someone's day for the cost of mere pocket change.

Then a man appeared out of the blue, and announced he'd released the tiger. Sure enough, behind them a fierce wild tiger appeared.

In another dream I was in a grocery store trying to find/buy some Nutty Bars, and for some reaosn it was a very elaborate process, as if they were illegal to own. Soon I was in a prison that was more like an elaborate dormitory, and there was a crooked and sadistic guard who made sport of some of the prisoners. I tried to avoid him but got into it over - you guessed it - the Nutty Bars.

Sweet stuff huh?

Now I don't read anything into this stuff, and I sure don't believe it to be any reflection of my mental state, so please spare me the psycho-babble.

The bad part of this is my sleep is interrupted quite often; the good part is instead of having six blank hours a night, I now have a mini-movie to look forward to while I sleep. It feels, honestly, like I've gained extra hours in my life.

OK, way too long of a post. Have a good one!

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Two more dreams, and a poltergeist moment

For no reason other than "Cuz", I present another dream I had.

I was in the 2nd building at Job Prior, and Simon Cowell was working with me at the desk. News came of a near drowning in the pool, only the victim wasn't in the water but laying on the tile at our feet, and I think she actually was drowning then and there.

I called for help while Simon stayed with her, but no one came. I ran south down 27th St (but in a direction that, in the real world, is north). I found myself in the home of a Hispanic family that claimed the man of the house was the Sheriff (?) but that he wasn't home. I did not believe the wife, and I began to suspect her of delaying because she wanted the woman dead.

Then, as if it was a completely different day, I was seated w/ Lisa at a table near the door of a New York restaurant. Spike Lee came in wearing a silver Yankees cap, and I remarked to her how disrespectful it was to wear a cap indoors, even though I appreciated the nod to my Yanks. Then I noticed Archbishop Timothy Dolan, who stood and waved in acknowledgement as the restaurant cheered him; and finally Carol O'Connor entered with his wife.

I remember constantly dropping my bread during dinner, and being frustrated that the waiter wouldn't bring the proper place setting.

Then it was back to Job Prior. Simon was giving a music lesson to someone. After studying a song in depth, he told the student that he'd just been taught a comprehensive guitar theory, which I thought was odd because it was a song that featured no guitar at all.

At that point I grew very depressed. I took a weeding tool that I use every day, licked the end to make it wet, and shoved it in a live electrical wire to kill myself.

At which point I woke up to the alarm, literally the first time a dream/alarm have merged in that melodramatic Hollywood fashion.

It should be noted that three hours earlier I'd had what seemed like a dream, but turned out to be 100% real. At 3:15 my girls woke me up saying one of their bedroom windows had 'fallen down'. I remember thinking "Just open the damn thing. Why are you waking me?" but I didn't even have the energy to say that. Without putting on my glasses I went to their room.

Then things got weird. Their window had indeed fallen - OFF. As in, off the track and now laying on the floor. While no light was on the room was strangely well lit, and the sky seemed a dark gray. A fierce, cold wind was pouring in the open window and paper was swirling in the air. There was a strange howl that bothered the girls more than the cold. It was a Wizard of Oz/Poltergeist moment, depending on your point of view. Without my glasses, and fighting the wind, I got the window in, shook off a "WTF?" moment, and returned to bed.

When I woke up I assumed it was a dream, but the girls remarked upon it before school. Yikes.

BTW - I had another elaborate dream last week. Most of the details are lost now, but I remember riding a bike all the way to a gas station on 76th and Coldspring, where I bought some Hostess Cupcakes. The bike was a 10 speed, but oddly resembled the old blue bike my sister Katie once owned. I think I remarked upon that in the dream, and explained (to myself?) that it had been modified to the 10 speed and I'd borrowed it for the ride.

Weeiiiiirrrd.

Sunday, April 18, 2010

A Dream

For no reason worth noting, here's a dream I had last night. Make of it what you will.

It began with me observing a classroom taught by Samuel L Jackson. He was a marvelous teacher, and praise was rightly heaped on his shoulders. But then, I heard him tell his students that "America Isn't #1. America is nothing." His students nodded in agreement, and I was furious. His students were all on one or more government programs, and while that didn't bother me, the idea of them taking bread with one hand and slapping the baker with the other infuriated me.

Then I was in YaYa and LuLu's room, only the Ginger's crib was back in place. I moved it and there was the usual mess and piles of junk on the floor. Then it began to storm outside, and I went into Smiley's room. His sky light was leaking and I tossed a towel on the floor, but the drip turned into a steady poor as I added more towels. I went to Ginger's room and rain was pouring from a vent in the ceiling.

Then I was downstairs, and it was my house but not my house. It was a huge open space - think a cathedral, minus pews - and running the length of one wall were the stairs to our bedrooms. They were made of stone and ran straight, without landings or turns.

As I walked up the stairs they were wood again, and one of the risers came off in my hands. Now there was a gap, and through that gap I could see far down to the floor below. The staircase shifted, and I noticed it was no longer flush with the wall to my right. There were inches or more of space between the wall and the stairs, and a yard or more between the missing riser and the next stair.

I got it into my head that I could shift the entire staircase to the right and slam it up against the wall, fixing the problem. I did so - it moved like a rolling staircase you see employees use at Home Depot - but the gap at the top grew larger.

Now I was worried. There was no way we could jump that gap, and our bedrooms and the second floor were useless to us.

And that's it - I woke up.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

A dream

Despite the title of this post, it isn't a wistful water colored trip down memory lane. It's simply a nightmare I had last night. I wanted to preserve it for future shrinks to pick apart. Nothing that follows is exaggerated for effect - l don't normally remember dreams, but this one is very detailed. I guess it's an all-or-nothing affair, eh?

It began at the 4077th of MASH fame. Colonel Potter was there, and the later-seasons version of Hot Lips, when her hair was more silver than blonde and she was much more serious than in the early years. They were going to have a party or event of some sort involving a long line of white jeeps. You had the feeling it was near the end of an episode, and sure enough there was a close-up of Radar. "Choppers!" he yelled. Hot Lips pulled her jeep to the side of the road. Someone yelled 'Japs!' and pointed to the sky, and there was a Zero with an American Mustang behind it.

Odd, seeing as this was Korea, but whatever.

Then it was no longer Korea but a huge parade, the size of one of those old ticker-tape jobs. It was certainly a street much wider than any here in Milwaukee. The family and I were on a flat stretch of sidewalk a few blocks down from a large hill. Over a loudspeaker a male voice announced that the Zero and the Mustang were going to do some acrobatics for the crowds amusement.

All went well as they zoomed over the hill and past us, doing flips and whatnot. Then the Mustang  tried to flip backwards and spiraled quickly out of control. I remember being afraid and telling the family to 'get down'. It glanced off the pavement and violently skipped up the street, slamming in a firestorm into the crowd on the hlll..

And then it was the same place, same event, but no plane.

In its place was an orange stock-car. It  was in a violent head over tail flip down the length of the hill. At the hill's base the car burst into flame. Rescue vehicle's tried to surround the car but its driver, silhouetted behind the wheel, seemed intent on finishing the parade. It roared past me on fire, flames creeping up on the driver.

I had a clear view of him hunched over the wheel, eyes obsessed with finishing no matter the cost. I remember thinking that this sight, this tape of a man about to burn to death at a parade, was going to play forever on TV. Even in my dream I imagined the 'warning' that would proceed it ever time it was showed, and I knew it would just encourage people to stay and watch the carnage. I knew I would too.

I was scared, I was alarmed, and I was fascinated.

And then the alarm was ringing, the baby was crying, Lisa was sleepily asking me what time it was, and it was time to wake up and start the day.