Last night I dreamed of tornadoes. More than usual. The usual is one. One skinny, whip-like, terrible finger of wind reaching down to touch grass and water and brick. Last night, I dreamed of many.
One, two, three. They all reached down to earth and moved toward me. Fast. Unbelievably fast. The only building in which to seek shelter was a barn, and the barn was missing one of its walls. I screamed and screamed and screamed and tried to get everyone else into the barn, but I knew it was no use, the tornadoes were coming, and they wouldn't be stopped by a barn with only three walls.
Later, after the people I was hiding in the barn with got sucked into the sky, I dreamed I could no longer fit into the shower at my apartment. I hadn't gotten bigger; it had gotten smaller. It was shrinking and shrinking and shrinking. I had to shower quickly or else I wouldn't be able to get out. And the problem was I needed to be clean and I needed to be out of the shower because I was about to go to prom. Prom. And then after I escaped from the shrinking shower, I dreamed that my best friend had brought me yellow shoes to wear to prom when I had a purple dress.
And here's the thing: I'm not exactly sure if these disasters speak to the disasters that have already come or the disasters that are ahead. It's that second possibility that scares me. An awful lot.
3 comments:
Oh, man, the tornado dreams. They recur like crazy for me, but I can't connect them to any certain thing. The dream books say they mean what you think they do--disaster.
But here's what I think of this one: It's the stuff that's already happened that's created a storm in your sleeping head. I say this because you are so AWARE of the tornado dreams, yes? So, psychology, subconsciously (and consciously, even) you know that the dreams signify a disaster. So your dream mind is catching up with what's going on in your life.
I know this doesn't make the sad things easier. It seems to me that the tornado dreams especially come not when there is one thing wrong--but when one things leads to other things. It's like the BFW is a cold front, and the foreclosure is the warm front--they meet, and: tornado.
But the fronts will move on.
Just think of my short story "Tornado" from workshop and you'll probably never be able to take a tornado seriously again. Because the story was that bad.
Thanks, Jean. I think you're right. Very, very right.
Also, Jason, I DO remember that story you wrote. I remember the big "aha" moment when you revealed what you had done. I remember everyone in class going, "Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..." It's one of those grad school moments that'll stay with me forever.
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