Caper; Comedy; Ghost Eyes; Cab; Eagle Museum

1/5/10

I'm back in Virginia, getting ready for some important trip or mission. I can't remember what it was--I think I might have been getting ready to blow something up, or going on a tryst, or running away. Something that made me anxious but terribly excited. I filled my bag with socks, pastries, and juice. I had to talk normally and pretend to be asleep at points. A really delicious feeling.

At a summer camp. The director--my grandmother? Says that we should all come up with jokes. We all do and then she says the boys will go on stage at midnight. I'm kind of outraged that girls can't tell the jokes. I think about how hard it is to buck the system. We go across a Chinese lake in a boat. Another woman puts my hair up into cute buns on the top of my head and talks about her life in comedy.

We land and go to a big pavilion. The MC is all ready to introduce my old roommate H when some old guy with a blood pressure cuff on his arm takes the second mike. The MC starts nudging H off but she's not going without a fight. The MC and the old guy try to be conciliatory. "Do you want to go next?" they ask. "No!" says H. "Do you want a stick with a nail through it?" I ask. (Meaning like a weapon for H to attack the old guy with.) I think it's a hilarious joke but I don't know if anyone else hears.

Walking through the streets of New York. It's like that scene in Ghost when Whoopi Goldberg cashes the check and Patrick Swayze has to convince her to give it to nuns. She's upset. I can't tell where I am in this dream. And then I see that Whoopi is dead too, her head is a skull. Everyone is dead. Everyone has a gauze patch over their right eye. I ask someone why and they say it's just something pleasant when you're dead. I don't know if this means it enhances vision for dead people, or it keeps us from having to look at their eyes. Why just the right one? I also see a man with an incredibly long thin nose. It looks like an insect antenna.

We climb into a cab, my companion reassuring me the living will never notice. But everyone notices us right away. We drive through the city to a newly restored Greek temple/museum. O says he's excited about seeing a play there soon. I counter with some other fancy play. The cab driver, a feisty woman, drives the cab right up the front of the building, bumping against the columns and ridges. It's fun and hilarious. We all overtip the driver and she tells us she'll drive us anytime.

We go into the temple/museum. The old guy from the comedy show is there. We walk through halls and there are rooms where there are "eagles". They're really beautiful young men with wings. One of them sees the crowd of tourists coming and shuts his door. I think of it as being in the zoo and the lion goes into his cave. I'm disappointed but not resentful.

I remember a lot of detail from that first part of the dream, like the flaky pastries I packed and sorting through the laundry in the basement. It was a very realistic version of my home back in VA. I wish I could remember what was going on. I think it might have to do with my memory of going to the inauguration a year ago. Lots of my friends came down from NY and spent the night. We all got up super early and my mother packed us tangerines and Kleenex and hand warmers. My mother is the best. There was that same caperish feel in the air. But in the dream, I was doing it secretly, which made it even more delicious. What was it?

I really liked the summer camp/ghost town/museum sequence. I liked the feeling of defiance at the comedy show. The cab ride was hysterical. The eyes with gauze on them feel like they should mean something but I don't know what.