Escorted Through Sleep By My Muses

I walk into the room and set down my bag. The room is dim and foggy, as yet unformed. The only tangible things are my overnight bag and my sense of dread. I am at a retreat of some kind. Like summer camp for adults. Excruciating sharing and splashing in the pool, small talk with strangers around a fire and someone will surely weep openly over an ancient wound before the weekend is done. I sense networking. The very word crawls up under my skin like an invasive weed and drains my energy. I want to be alone.

 I look around the room. My subconscious has done well. Thick carpets of Central Asian origin, a window seat without a window, piled with pillows. Inviting and safe, like a nest. The bed is a dense thicket of silk, velvet, fresh cotton sheets, more pillows. All of it - the carpets, the pillows, the blankets, the walls - is done in the rich jewel and earth tones I prefer. There is an empty desk - simple, small, of dark wood. I am comfortable here.

The dread starts to abate and I turn to grab my bag and find some clothes. My trickster mind has hidden my bag and replaced it with a closet. Resigned, I know I will find my clothes there. The closet is filled with negligees, all of them white. They are beautiful, tasteful, thrilling, revealing. My thought is not: I can't go out dressed like that, but instead: I will have to shave in order to go out dressed like that. I hate to shave, but I need to wear those dresses. I want to wear those dresses. They will make me beautiful.

 A basin appears on the desk, rich shaving lotion and a good, sharp razor. I'm naked now, perched on the edge of the desk, carefully shaving my legs. There is a pounding at the door and I'm gripped with doubt. Am I late for an activity? Is it a welcoming committee? Is it a roommate? Go away, I silently tell the pounding and go back to my legs.

The door bursts open and there are three. A jostling crew of burly men. Handlebar mustaches, large piercings, covered in beautiful tattoos. They don't frighten me. They amuse me and I bid them come in. They are playful and large and they fill the room. They touch everything and exclaim. They bounce on the bed and toss pillows at each other. They pull the nighties out of the closet and say it's time to get dressed. Not yet, I tell them, I'm not ready. They pick me up and toss me back and forth between each other like a game of keep-away - naked and soapy, half-shaven legs. Stop it guys, I tell them, I'm trying to do the tricky part behind my knee. They only laugh and toss me some more.

Somehow I have managed to finish shaving and get dressed. My new clothes glow white against the darker tone of everything else in the room. They are slippery and cool against my skin. They fit perfectly, but feel foreign on me. Too beautiful, like an impostor. My burly men laugh through absurd facial hair and assure me it is really time to go. One on either side, one in front - my entourage. My sidekicks each offer me an arm. I look down to take them and realize their tattoos are words. Thousands and thousands of words. I am excited, I am relieved. I look toward the open door and I wake up.

Flypaper

When my sister was in 6th grade she started a new school. Her first day she asked my brother to give her a ride in his 1971 MG so she could "look cool". When we dropped her off, I yelled out the window in my best PeeWee Herman voice: "Goodbye Rachael! Have fun! Don't forget your giant underpants!" She no longer has any interest in "looking cool". I think I taught her a valuable lesson.

Remember in college that girl that would go to all the parties and then sit in the corner and cry and want to talk about her problems and then get roaring drunk and go puke in someone's bedroom? I was never that girl.

Apparently it's not considered "normal" to have your entire family gather 'round the clearance rack at Target and help you pick out new underwear.

Darshan, my pal who works at 7-11, told me I looked tired. I was so relieved. I thought it was my imagination.

Remember that girl in college we talked about? I think I accidentally turned into that girl by mistake last week. My puke was verbal, though. And I wasn't roaring drunk.

My internet went out for several hours yesterday. I had no idea what was happening anywhere except right where I was. It was one of the best things that's happened to me all week.

Once when I was 4, I spent an entire dinner party trying to cross my legs like a lady. When I finally did it, I hollered "Look! I learned how to stack my knees!" I didn't really understand why the grown-ups were laughing. I still think of it that way.

Figure 1

I met the person who is now one of my best friends on this planet at a New Faculty Family Barbecue when we were 15. She later told me she was very intimidated by me that night. "I thought you were going to eat me." I sometimes have that effect on people. There is no explanation for this phenomenon. [See Fig. 1]

It is nigh unto impossible to explain my husband's and my inside jokes in any way that other people think are funny. The best I get are puzzled stares. I find this comforting.

Sometimes as a tiny act of rebellion, I don't bring my own bags to the grocery store. I immediately feel guilty afterward and go home and scrub my recyclables.

One of my recurring dreamscapes is a gigantic shopping mall. Invariably, there's a secret staircase to a secret floor where you can get amazingly discounted ball gowns. What varies is whether or not I'm allowed access.

I dated a guy once who said I shouldn't say things like "nigh unto impossible" because no one really talked like that. He didn't ask me to marry him. He didn't even acknowledge that we were dating. I was obsessed with him for months

My husband describes his Junior High self as "that kid with thick glasses and dandruff". He and his friends sat outside for lunch. They called themselves "The Popular Table".

Some people throw bird seed at their weddings, some blow bubbles or release butterflies. At my wedding, as we were leaving for our honeymoon, my entire family stood on the grand staircase of the country club and shouted in their best PeeWee Herman voices: "Goodbye Suzanne! Have fun! Don't forget your giant underpants!"

Distracted

Is it just me, or is there a whole lot of nasty stuff going down here, lately?! It seems there are a lot of things floating around my world these last few weeks that I don't want to think about. I will think about them eventually. I've set them in the back of the fridge like a sourdough starter and when they're ripe, I'll make some delicious decision bread. Not today. Today I am completely distracted.

I dreamed last night that an old friend and I were standing in what looked like a Soviet bread line. We huddled outside with a lot of grim faced strangers, shuffling our feet andlooking at the ground.


 Smash cut. We emerged in a dark, Warhol-esque warehouse sort of scene. Standing at a cocktail table, my friend and I squabbled over who would speak to Billy D. Williams. I wanted Friend to because he has connections "in the industry". He was afraid of looking uncool when he asked Billy D. to sign the Lando Calrissian action figure I had smuggled in. Friend finally agreed to do it, but every time he touched the action figure, it turned into a talking Kelsey Grammer / Frasier Crane doll.

  Insert cartoonish struggling over action figure and scuffling onto the floor. [Ever conscious of sticky things, I am a little appalled, even in my dream, that I am rolling around on the floor of a club.] Landed sweating and dissheveled in front of the stage just as David Bowie came on. But it was like Labyrinth David Bowie and he gave us the stink-eye for ruining his entrance. I recoiled from the inexplicably spooky dream subtext that is impossible to explain, but then was oddly excited because I got some Bowie glitter on me. I turned around to show Friend and he was gone. So was my Lando Calrissian action figure. The latter was more ominous than the former for some reason.

Needless to say, it was a strange way to start the day. My day that only got stranger for myriad reasons that I am still not thinking about. This day that will conclude with going to see David Shields give a talk at the library for National Write a Novel Month. I want to bring a book for him to autograph, but being the library addict bibliophile that I am, the only book of his that I actually own is a copy of Reality Hunger that he, himself, sent to me last year. [Free plug for the book: if you read, write, think about reading, think about writing, you should read this book. It could really change your world.] Would it be strange to have him autograph it again? And why, oh why?! did I not do laundry in preparation for this? I have only ridiculous pants left to wear. It may be more than this girl can handle.