the blanket Run

I first remember it was late, there were three of us including her, and my friend who is a he, both of which will be unnamed.  We were among the rocks and trees somewhere, it was humid and cloudy, then the breeze blew gentle sprinkles on us.  We were looking for a safe spot to put up some tents, there were only two tents. I put ours up and realized my backpack was without the blanket I meant to take.  My friend, who had just finished his tent told me he forgot some things as well.  She said it's okay I'll wait here, I remember feeling bad about leaving, I had to go but just walking away made me anxious, as well as the rain.  I started jogging, back to the car, with my friend close behind.  We went through a cave, like a tunnel, that had a campfire lighting it that I don't know where came from.  We flew by that and across some rocks, in the dimness there were city lights on the horizon, which was where we had parked.  There was an area we had to go through, it had a dirt road between two very steep hills  covered in jagged rocks that looked soapy and slick in the moonlight, like a kitchen sink soaking a thousand dirty razor blades in dish soap.  The road was clear of the cluttered sharpness, but tiring and slowed me to a crawl climbing up and over.  We got to the parking lot, dig through the trunk and head out.  It felt like we accomplished what we needed but there was nothing on our backs.  We started back, and I again started running and I felt anxious to get there.  I decided to take a short cut, which was through a large building complex, and once inside I realized it was the college.  I knew the way, but it was late and I had to find the way without us being seen and kicked out, as well as reaching dead ends because I expected a few doors to be locked already.  It was dark, only emergency lights on, then we came across a lit door just as a class was letting out.  They saw us, and a security officer told us to stay put, then the instructor came out, who I knew.  He said it's okay (instructor to the security dude), they're with me, and he made my friend and I carry some things from the class to his car, which turned out to be four twenty pound boxes of  framing nails each.  He asked the security guard if he didn't mind unlocking the doors for us towards the area he parked in, which turned out to be our way out, which could not be any faster than the guard fumbling with his damn keys.  When we left the campus it was already dawn, yet it felt like a five minute night.  I felt sick, and I ran.  I didn't pace myself to my friend who is shorter and heftier than I, but I ran for her, besides I was sure he knew his way there.  I was running along a chain link fence on a path of gravel, a thousand tumbleweeds caught along it.  I felt my thighs and my chest grow hot, and a tight pulling pain sensation behind my collar bones with each deep breath.  In the back of my mind I was debating another shortcut that would take me to the cave tunnel quicker, but it would lead me far from the dirt road and I would have to climb through the soapy razor blade rocks.  I thought no, I should be safe, but then that thought led to thoughts of her safety.  A thousand scenarios flipped through my head and the urgency made me panicked.  I took my shirt off and wrapped it around my hands to protect them from the razor rocks, which I also thought would be hot in the Sun by now.  I felt thankful that the rain the night before and my sweat had soaked the shirt, then I woke up.

the white Horse

First I remember how sore my thighs were.  I stopped on the side of a dirt road in the middle of nowhere it seemed.  Lot's of sagebrush between two sloping hills miles apart, all i could see.  I was on a mountain bike, and i started to stretch my quads.  It seemed silent, until a wild horse appeared far off.  It was white, almost satin like it was wet and reflected the sun's rays, what would be a majestic look if not for the sheen accentuating it's emaciation.  It had a slightly sunk in belly, skin sinking around its hips and shoulders, and I could make out the ribs.  Suddenly, the sky became loud and buzzing, choppy like a lawnmower.  From every direction, and without order or formation, specks of planes appeared, low on the horizons.  Countless specks, every time I turned around it seems like more spawned behind me, with some featuring colorful banners streaming behind.  They came closer and closer, and seemed to all head toward the space above the horse, who was trotting in circles and stomping the earth energetically.  One by one, like watching a parade if the parade was not limited by a single street, the planes dipped low and passed over the horse.  It was a slow and steady chaos watching them, as each released what looked like confetti in the distance, showering the area around the horse.  Now I feel extremely curious and I start to walk toward the sight.  When I get closer I discover its actually garbage being dumped, and the horse was scavenging through it.  Now a big plane was coming, it looked like a WWII bomber and had an extremely long banner of red and white stripes streaming behind it.  It dipped very low toward the sight, and started to release an avalanche of garbage while pitching up.  It started to look like a disaster, like watching a slow but inevitable destruction, the bomber doesn't make it up before its tail smashes into the ground.  The entire plane flips over itself in a violent burst of flame.  I felt shocked and scared, and I was running back toward the road with an urgent feeling like I'm not supposed to be here or I had been caught trespassing, that feeling if you ever had it. I imagined the horse galloping away also, but didn't actually see it doing so.  That's all I remember.

the knives and the Ghosts

First I remember the gifts given to the three of us, and the three of us were still children.  Three butter knives with different color-tinted clear plastic handles, each having a blade designed to neither cut or stab.  Sister got the pink handled one, my brother got the blue, and I was left with the red handled one, which I was disappointed about.  My mother told us to take our knives, the bread, the butter and the jam to the campfire.  There we sat, toasting bread slowly, which were dinner rolls shoved on the ends of sticks.  I remembered a short story or a rhyme I had read in elementary school, but I only remembered one line of it, and it was being repeated in my head as I watched the fire crackling and tended to my toasting.  The line went "We three ghostesses, eating our buttered toastesses...", over and over, adding fuel to my agitation originally started from not getting the blue knife.  I took my red knife behind my back and pressed it into the rock I sat on, until it broke.  I pretended to bitch about it and, to my satisfaction, my brother was forced to share the coveted blue knife with me.  We passed the knife between us and it became slick and sticky at the same time, messy from both butter and jam.  In the end, we had to help our little sister butter and jam her toast with the blue knife as well, as she was still uncoordinated and had dropped her pink knife in the dirt.  That's all I remember.

the dirty Money

I remember those two boys, I remember their names and a certain traumatic event in elementary school.  True story.. Stanley tried to take my shoes, and I kicked him in the face.  So he stabbed me in the leg with a No.2 pencil, and in desperation, gave me $5 to not cry or tell anyone.  Nicholas was his accomplice, and I never told on them.  I think they thought I was tough, because I didn't cry, I felt empowered, when actually I was more scared if I did tell and my mother found out I'm "fighting".  Anyway, I dreamed I was on the playground, which is a lot full of dirt and rusted poles assembled for us to climb or swing from.  I used to bring a random handful of Legos in my pocket to school, limiting myself to make anything with whatever pieces fate had chosen.  I also had to explain to the teacher that these Legos belonged to me, and I wasn't trying to steal the classrooms cheap-ass MegaBlok knock-offs (haha).  Anyway, back to the dirt.  I had taken out my Legos and was feeling pretty excited, Lord knows I loves me some Legos, then Nicholas approached me.  I felt irritated, because I had to hide my Legos from him, and not because I believed he would take them but for fear he would publicly make fun of me.  I tried to distract him until I could put them back in my pocket.  I asked him why he always wears white, because in high school he used to wear plain white t-shirts, baggy white denim pants and white K-Swiss shoes.  He said because he believed that's the only way to get into heaven, and I made a face, which successfully distracted him from my Legos, because now I was in for an ass-whooping.  Stanley joined him, and I found myself re-living that actual event, pulling a No.2 pencil out of my calf.  The wanna-be thugs were spooked, and proceeded to act genuinely concerned of my wound.  Stanley offered me money to not tell the teacher, and I made more faces of pain and agony, yet it was all good.  It hurt but I knew I would survive and dream about it when I grow older.  I ask him "What if I get lead poisoning?".  We're like educated adults having a conversation, in child bodies.  He says "You won't, there's no lead in pencils. Only graphite and wood."  Blackmail, I could buy more Legos... "No!... There's lead in the yellow paint, dipsh*t!"  I get more cash, and tell him I won't tell if Nicholas helps clean up the blood with his white t-shirt as well.  He does, and as they left I remember a sudden bad feeling coming over me, I felt distraught for taking advantage of them on my end, and decided to bury the cash in the dirt.  However, the guilt didn't pass because I next thought, "Oh no... what if Nicholas goes to hell because he has my blood on his shirt?!"  That's all I remember.

the Womb

First I remember everything being dark, having eyes was useless yet my body seemed highly sensitive to physical feeling.  It started in my core, from the the back of my neck where my spine starts, and moved slowly down my spine in icy pulses.  I suddenly became aware I was lying in a fetal position, and I wanted to lay on my back to warm that sensation, but I couldn't move.  I felt too lazy, and my eyes began to work.  It was a very dim, soft fleshy glow.  I lay thinking I'm awake, and that I would really like to continue back to sleep now.  Then the ice in my spine turned to vibrations, and tingling began in my fingers, toes, and forehead.  It pulsed and grew through me slowly, as if my body was water and I felt every uncomfortable ripple disturbing me as it rained.  Now I wanted to move, and I tried but I couldn't.  I felt my body lifting up into the air, yet my gut wrenched as if I were falling.  It started to hurt, I wanted to kick the sheets off and feel a cool breeze.  The glow became more brilliant and more reddish, and I saw darker red lines like streams on a map.  It really hurt. The pulses moved so fast they almost became continually one, or I had become paralyzed in time itself at the climax of those vibrations.  I started to scream, but my lungs refused to take or expel a breath.  I gave up fighting against it, because it's familiar, and I knew I need to just hold on and endure it and it would soon go away.  Then it did, so unexpectedly as I always expect it to, and I woke up shivering and a violent shoulder shake, hyperventilating until I took control of my tongue and breath.  The Sun had risen and was shining directly at my face through the window, I suppose my mother had opened the curtains to wake me up.

*When I was a child, I used to frequently have paralysis/levitation/falling nightmares, where I became conscious and self-aware yet my body was still at rest, from which I always awoke in a sort of seizure.

bizarre Dream

I felt irritated that everyone wanted to leave, because I had started cooking.  I went to check the food, I don't remember what it was I was cooking so maybe I was also trying to remember what to remember about what the hell I'm doing.  It was in a large pot, boiling on the stove in the kitchen of the house I grew up in.  I opened the lid and found large chunks of white puffy flesh, chunks the size of a soup can each.  I stirred it and looked into the pantry for seasoning and found an alligator carcass hanging from it's head.  The tail was missing and from the wound dripped blood, filling a bucket with maggots (real gross).  So we left in a large black SUV to I don't know what destination or who I'm with on this expedition, but I believe it was a Ford, (haha... Ford Expedition).  When we stopped and I climbed out the backseat, I realize we are at the Anasazi cliff dwellings in Mesa Verde.  I remember not remembering how the hell we got up here in an SUV.  It was sunset and I was feeling intimidated of the campfires and moving shadows that had appeared behind the ruins.  I was also worried that the food would burn, smolder and smoke, mandating the fire department to break down the front door because no one is home, which would be embarrassing.  So, I try to start the vehicle, it wouldn't turn over and the oil light was on.  For some reason, against any good mechanical judgement, I decide that I should immediately change the oil.  I couldn't find the jack so I drove the SUV on top of a Kiva ruins' opening... (I drove the damn thing!)  Then, I climbed down into the Kiva on the crazy looking ladder and unbolted the oil drain bolt, draining oil down the ladder and onto the Kivas' floor, not a f*** given.  I placed the bolt on a stone slab that made up the fire place, so as not to lose it.  Then, the last thing I remember is remembering the gift shop carries motor oil (they don't), and looking through the vehicle for a flashlight to walk down the cliffs in the dark with.

the telephone wire & the Angel

First I saw the canyon, and I know where it is, the very spot.  A stream bed, usually dry yet defined like a natural highway.  I know where this road leads and begins, and it lies between Castle Rock and Angel Peak.  There is a cool wind and it is overcast.  The air smells like rain but it hasn't come.  I know for sure I'm in a potentially bad situation and start clambering over myself to get out.  I'm not going to follow it to the exit, I need to climb out to the top of the canyon.  The ground is moist, each dry step collapses, revealing mud and clay underneath, my thighs burn as I collect more sticky mud weight on my boots and ankles.  Then I feel a sense of panic, a sense of dread and urgency, at a small amount of water trickling past and filling my deep footprints slowly.  I can hear thunder clapping miles away.  Then everything happened exponentially.  The trickle turned several larger, and made me sink to my knees, my heart pounded hot pulses into my ears as I stepped into what felt like cables or telephone wires.  Someones long forgotten, buried garbage, and I curse all of humanity, the only way to include the f***head who dumped this.  Suddenly life gets very awkward to hold onto, I can't get a solid footing to pull.  The ground is thick, and hides the mess that seems to wrap itself and tie itself at my ankle more, matching the rushing water that had reached my waist line.  I dig and dig, but it kept refilling itself, I pulled at the wires until I had to take a breath and dive to reach them, then I took out the knife and dove again, plunging it into the earth, trying to catch any length of wire on its edge.  It was not working, I surfaced again, the hyperventilating shortens my ability to hold a breath, and soon it seems I will not be able to hold onto even that one.  I felt a sense of unfairness, like I lost control and I want to beg but there is no one to beckon.  As the water reached my shoulders, as I beckoned with my own brain to produce a damn good idea right now, I heard a voice behind me.  Suddenly, I felt hope, the adrenal rage warming me robbed by the water and I started to shiver. She asked what I'm gonna do now, and I can't turn around to face her.  I feel debris in the rushing water slam into my body, weeds forming around me, helping the flow force me deeper.  I scream "I don't know!!", she answers, "Sometimes you have to cut off pieces of yourself!".  I felt the knife in my near cold dead fingers and a sickening feeling.  An urgent gut wrenching wave of adrenaline at this messed up decision I have to make.  I remember ,before I woke up with a fluttery heart, trying to take the deepest breath I ever made and strategizing how to get through the bone.

the Shepherd

First I saw a concrete jungle. It was a city block, like so many, but then I recognized this one.  It is the street just outside the Yokohama train station, a daft feature having a Starbucks Coffee across the street from a Starbucks Coffee.  However, the streets were not busy with people like they should be, but busy with wolves, who snarled and crept between alleys and open doors.  Black, grey and brown menacing features, yellow eyes looked up at me as sniffing noses and bushy tails swept the ground.  The wind picked up and blew garbage under abandoned taxicabs and empty crosswalks.  No electricity lit the traffic signals, no plumbing fueled the fountain, no society to interact with.  I felt more fearful of being mentally gutted from loneliness, turned inside out and spilled onto quiet concrete, than that from being hunted by the more ambitious looking wolves.  They seemed to be looking for something very intently, yet unorganized and dumb.  Suddenly, I see a man.  An elderly man, his clothes are filthy looking and seem to have become part of the corner he sat in, he has been there a very long time.  I carefully move to him, to not attract attention, and as I got close I felt safer.  I said hello very happily, and we shook hands.  He smelled like cigarettes and body odor, and looked twice as gross.  I asked him what happened here, where is everyone and about the wolves.  He looks up to me very lazily and begins his answer with awkward hand gestures first, then a lazier voice arrives.  "See, the wolves are here because the Shepherd has left us all."  It was not scary as I thought about it, and I didn't feel anything except acceptance as I woke.

the Canyon

First I saw the moon low on the horizon, highlighting the few slivers of cloud in brilliant neon purple.  There are silhouettes of juniper trees and rocks before me.  The air is cool and damp, and I can hear water rushing somewhere unseen.  Making out the terrain becomes hard, so I stare at the stars.  Suddenly, I'm watching them all fall towards the horizon opposite the moon.  It is as if the Earth rotated so fast to show the other half of the skies, which was without any star including the Sun, hollowing the sky.  I watched the stars fall but to my surprise they did not disappear, they fell between the silhouettes of trees and rocks, collecting in pairs. I heard the rushing sound of water turn into the rushing sound of beating wings, like when you spook a flock of pigeons in the park. I watched the pairs of stars move like silver specks of eyes, still twinkling like they do, and I felt intimidated. I closed my eyes, winced in pain as the thousands of feathers beat the air into a flurry of wind and wet dirt.  It was deafening, and I felt paralysis set into my core and tickling numbness in my extremities.  The source of that sound had crept from countless wings into my head, each beat of my heart louder and more sickening, and blackness as the canyon faded from around me.  Then, with a sudden hush, everything stopped and I woke up, and after the adrenaline left my body, I felt an overwhelming sense of loneliness for the few moments before I fell back to sleep.