1.
At lunch a few days ago, I talked about how I don’t remember my dreams anymore. Sometimes I wake up with a vague echo of one in my head, so I know that I do dream. But there’s rarely anything detailed or extensive or interesting.
I mean, I used to dream extensively and often lucidly. I had recurring dreams, where I’d be in some dream-only place where I’d dreamt many times before. I would wake up with vast, complex memories of adventures in my head — which of course would quickly evaporate to vague nothingness in minutes.
But I dreamt a lot, and that never happens anymore.
Well… I just had an extensive dream.
I woke up with the vast edifice of it in my head. I won’t pretend to retell the story, which never succeeds. But I’m wide-awake with the stress of it. My heart is racing. I’m wide awake at 4:00 in the morning. So let me do think about this…
2.
I met some old work friends the airport. The unspoken gist of it was that these friends knew enough of my ways to not rely on me, and they left me behind several times, tending to their own business, wisely uncoupling themselves from me.
We had breakfast. They got theirs easily. I struggled to find a place that had something interesting to eat. When I sat down, they were calmly eating. I was frazzled. Their daughter was with them, happily finishing her breakfast.
I realized that I was checked in for the wrong flight because of some notes I took in a meeting with my boss, who was on the same flight and had checked in before me. (It is annual review time at work.)
There was confusion and non-standard chaos when I checked my bags. I accidentally checked my work computer bag and some other small, red carry-on that I don’t remember now. And they got checked on the wrong flight. So I had to go back to try to fix all that and somehow get my computer back, because otherwise it was certain to get stolen (with all the HIPAA implications that would have).
II turned around and walked back to the checkout counter. Everyone was rushing to their flights, so I got on a moving sidewalk off to the side which ended up going in the wrong direction and taking me outside. I jumped off and found myself in a garden bed full of blossoming flowers and many buzzing bees and dense, pokey pines that I had to force my way thru, leaving me covered with pokey needles and biting, squirming bugs.
When I got back inside the airport, someone was talking about how my boss, about how he had decided to get a tattoo on his hip so that he could check in just by backing up to the scanner.
Then I ran into Ben, who was calmly showing up for the same flight.
I still didn’t have my bags. And I was still checked into the wrong flight. And time was running short.
3.
It’s 4:19am. My heart has stopped racing. I’m wide awake with nothing but the stress of that thing left in my head.
Perhaps it’s just as good not to remember these things.