2001-08-08 - 11:04 a.m.
Strange dreams, Mondayisms, and the art of relaxation

I had a slightly unusual dream last night. Most of the details are lost to memory now, of course, but I still remember parts of the last sequence. I was in a dark asphalted place at night -- probably a parking lot. You know those streets in the one-way section of large towns that have all the angled parking spaces along the edges of them? I believe it was one of those. It was really black out, overcast, and I was between two of the cars, watching and waiting for someone.

There was an older man with me. I don't remember who he is or how I knew him in the dream -- most of the people I meet in dreamworlds are immensely familiar to me there, but don't seem to be based on anyone I'd know in real life. I think he was a detective of some sort, though, because I was there to help him catch someone. I wasn't a law official myself, but I had some special ability to tell when our quarry was around, so the detective needed me there.

I was wearing a trench coat or something similar, because I remember crouching on the asphalt between the cars and the ends of my coat were brushing the ground. I was looking all around, seeing car shapes and vague buildings from across the way and the dim distant light of a streetlamp. And then there was a shadowy shape at the edge of my vision, and I could feel/hear that it was our quarry. It felt like a high-pitched hum, if that makes any sense.

He was too quick for me, though. He knew I was there as surely as I knew it was him coming. He was there in front of me in a second's time, with sword drawn, already on the downswing. I seem to have been left-handed in this dream, because I blocked the blade with my right hand, catching it and halting the swing, and stabbed upwards with a dagger I held in my left. He collapsed to the pavement, dead. I made a sound of disgust, put the dagger away, and then turned towards the detective.

"Damn fool thing to do," I said. I'm not sure whether I referring to my blocking the sword, or the dead man's attempt to attack me, but I was I flexing my right hand as I said it. Miraculously, the sword had not cut through my hand or even broken the bones: I just had a deep cut all the way across my palm. It wasn't even bleeding, but it stung like a sonnuva-*ahem*. The detective looked at the wound, then up at my face, with a slightly unbelieving expression, then shrugged and started to speak.

Right then, of course, was when my alarm went off, and I was jolted out of the dreamworld. The really odd part? That line across my palm, where the cut had been in my dream, kept tingling for at least a half-hour after I woke up. I had to turn on the light and look to make sure there were really no marks on it (you know, sometimes people sleep in strange positions and end up with wierd creases and marks from blankets/clothes/whatever). There weren't. But it wouldn't stop tingling.

Where do dreams like this come from? *laughing* I should start keeping a dream journal and turn them into short stories, I think.

Anyway ... Life in the real world is much better. Things have been fairly relaxing the last two days, and the weather has turned absolutely beautiful -- clear and breezy. I love zooming down the freeway on a warm afternoon with my windows rolled down and the wind ruffling my hair.

Monday was hell, of course. Mondays always are. I'm usually working from short sleep because my brother's up all night with the TV on, and this Monday was worse than most. I was rushing around getting ready, glancing at my watch, on track to be exactly on time to work, when I bumped the table in my bedroom. Off flew my jewelry box, right onto my nightstand, where there happened to be a glass I was drinking water from the night before. It squarely impacted the glass and sent shards everywhere. So much for being on time. Then I got delayed by construction on the way to work ... late, late, late.

Then, since Secretary #2 doesn't work Mondays in the summer, control-freak Secretary #1 put me in main office again, under her nose. That ALWAYS multiplies my stress a thousandfold. She means well, but she's very critical. Traffic was hideous during lunch, even without getting misdirected and spending 10 extra minutes trying to get around construction problems. And then, when I got back from lunch, my mother called. She said I had a notice from the bank that she had opened for me, and it said my checking account was overdrawn ... with $88.00 in fees.

I resisted the impulse to collapse in tears and called the 1-800-number for the bank. I patiently explained to the man that the fees were ridiculous, since I asked in January for my savings account to be closed, and my overdraft protection switched to the credit card I had from that bank. He said that the savings account, although empty, was still open with the protection on IT. "What the hell?" thought I. What I said was, "Well, can you change it now, and do something about those fees for me?" "Of course, Ma'am," he said. Phew!

Hey. It could only go up from there. =) I am going to heartily resist any further depressing thoughts until my vacation comes up on the 16th. Then, I get five days of doing absolutely nothing except hanging out with my best friend and occasional others. *grin* I hope the weather holds: I haven't been to the beach in over a year.