The House of the Three Rats; Garden Party

I saw/was a man in a small, spooky town was looking around his affluent neighborhood and realized there was something wrong. I narrated to myself, "It won't be too long." People wore pale clothes, old-fashioned suits and long white dresses. It was a coastal town. I went down the coast to a shabby house where a grubby boy was standing by the fence. "I need to see your mother," I said. The boy set up a sort of laundry-line transport, a long, frayed string would pull me to the house. The string was thin and soft under my hands and I thought it might break but I didn't care. I went through the quiet, sunny pine trees to the house. "Someone told me she'd dyed her hair." I knew this meant the widowed mother of all the children was desperate.

In the kitchen of the house, an older, homely woman with dyed black hair was cooking. There was a little girl with her. It was actually hard to tell how old she was. I knew that the woman was planning to sell or give away the girl because it was too dangerous to stay here. Other children kept walking through the kitchen, getting something ready.

An older boy, teenaged or in his twenties, caught my attention. He seemed confident even though there was a disaster coming. He wore a black vest and there was a tattoo on his shoulder of three rats. I went to him and asked him about it. He stood in the hallway right by the back door, almost out of it. He was leaving on a mission, but he stayed to tell me. "Our house is full of rats and bees. We tell a story about taking a bee's stinger and stinging three rats. The first two kept running and fighting until they burned off the poison, but the third one hurt so much he just wanted to lie down. That's what made him die." I knew he was telling me that we could leave and survive. By now I was myself, and I kissed him and licked his tattoo. We went outside.

It was a beautiful garden party. My friends were there and gave me a crazy pair of red sunglasses. I knew we would be safe.

Field work spider; the post-apocalyptic beach community; soft

I woke up in a bed at my field work, disoriented. I knew I wasn't supposed to be working there that day, and I hadn't known they had a bed there. Then the people who had interviewed me for next year's work came in and were being shown around. I was embarrassed but also kind of annoyed, since I wasn't even supposed to be there and just trying to sleep. Then I noticed a big cockroach on the shoulder of a colleague. I went over to surruptitiously wipe it off him, but it kept sort of sliding out of the way and then rising up and I saw it was a spider hanging from a thread. The closer I got, the bigger I realized it was. I got close and then realized I couldn't get away fast enough if it decided to drop on my head.

Then I was part of a post-apocalyptic beach community. There were some apartment buildings nearby, super-crowded. I got an allotment for one and had to squeeze myself through a small door to get in.

Then I was in a fancy restaurant with a childhood friend and the waiter was trying to bully me into some dessert I didn't want and part of the service was that he was cutting my hair.

On my way out of town, I noticed two very big, soft birds sitting on fenceposts. I went over and gave them both a squeeze, knowing they were too scared to try to fly away. They were delightfully soft.

Investigation

I was staying at a farm house. Someone had found the shoe of the woman who had lived there, or some other sign that she had disappeared and something bad had happened to her. I finally looked up and she was suspended in the air, dead, like she was hung but just floating. One of the scariest moments of a dream I've ever had.

Then I was part of the investigation into her murder. All the police or specialists were super smart, super nerdy women, dressed in neon graphic tee shirts or big dorky sneakers, with jewelry made of little plastic toys. I had to join them because I had found the body, and I wasn't sure if I should tell them I'd dreamed her death before it happened.

We went back to the farm house to look for clues, and I opened a door with a photo taped to it and it pushed me back into the memory of when it was taken--a blond guy and I had fallen in love and made out in the bathroom, then he went to a local salon and started getting his hair dyed brown. I decided not to wait for him and started walking home, and realized I was only wearing a towel and started running. A man in the park stopped to offer help, but I knew I couldn't slow down or stop. I vaulted over chain-link fences and ended up back in my apartment, where the investigation was still happening. No one had noticed I was gone.

Ramshackle home visit; Book Party

Walking through a small town. I'm talking on the phone with my mother (not my real mother), who is scolding me for not visiting more, when I see her on the front porch of our house. She sees me at the same time and laughs and hangs up. The house is very ramshackle and there's a bunch of junk on the porch. My mother is a bearded lady and holds up a bearded lady doll. A small dog is there and I go to pet it, but my mother sadly tells me he's sick and no longer wants to be touched.

I have a boyfriend or someone visiting and I give him the tour. Behind the house is a pond. We slip in. There are just a few feet of slimy weeds and then a sandy bottom. We stay in for a long time and talk politics with the old men (they must be my relatives) who are hanging around.

When I go to get out, I drift to the right a little bit. The water gets murkier and scarier at the bottom and I see a huge aligator. I manage to turn myself around and climb out of the water.

I'm at a book party event for a friend. He had been worried no one would come but I see a lot of our friends. There's also a woman who leaves at the same time as me and we walk back to work. We turn out to work in the same building. We linger in the lobby a minute and she asks why I left my job and why I'm coming back now. I explain I'd had to go by earlier in the day. I turn and see my boss behind me.

Something about a monkey tattoo or a board game at the book party?

Some old friends are visiting who have lost their baby. For a minute in the dream I'm confused and think it's my niece who's dead. Terribly sad.

Epic Search for Dinner; Blow Up Cover Up

Walking around a small city late at night with my college friends J and R. We met up with a friend, a schlubby guy, and took him to a hotel of ill repute. We could see into other people's dorm rooms from there. We decided we were hungry and went on an epic search for dinner. R found a place on her phone but I said it was too expensive, everyone else said tough luck. I was driving, but it turned out we didn't have a car but had to walk fast in poorly marked lanes.

We saw an Aztec themed restaurant on the way and I talked everyone into going. They had a huge buffet and I was excited. I stood in line with a nice chatty young German guy and talked about my book. After a minute I realized I had no idea where the clean plates were.

I went through the restaurant searching for plates with no luck. Through the door I saw that there was a building about to be blown up. I rushed over and saw that on the television there was a false report. It was a big corporate conspiracy. I had a little camera and took pictures. Sliding the camera down from my eye, I saw my lens was filtering out the true image.

I got into a fight with two tourists in the entrance of the doomed building.

Much cooler

I was in the hospital. At first I couldn't figure out why, but then I realized it was because I was too skinny. They told me my brother was in too. I had brought a suitcase and wanted to put on socks, but they told me I couldn't have anything with tight elastic and brought me these ridiculous booties. The doctor asked if I had a good relationship with my mother and I said that I did, and I had brought a photo album to prove it. I told him we'd been to Scotland together and it was amazing. The pictures were supposedly of Hadrian's wall, but instead of stones it was made of weird bones and skulls and carved spiders. I thought, "This is much cooler than I remember it."

Museum robbery

A beautiful museum like place. I was going to rob it? I was there with other people. There was a book of fairy tales and the cover had a picture of a dark haired woman in a long silky patterned robe. The museum also had the robe, folded up, and someone urged me to put it on. I did and it weighed a lot. There were also fancy deep handbags that people were taking and folding and putting on their heads like hats.

Roller coasters? I had been talking about Coney Island right before going to bed.

The Killer Was...; Flirt Party

A mystery that I was both watching and in. It was a group of British intellectuals and bureaucrats trying to solve a series of murders. My friend and I hastily wrote down who we thought was the killer. We looked at clues like letters the killer had left behind, but I chose my candidate based on who would be most surprising in a movie. It was Emma Thompson, the hard-nosed boss of the team.

At a stylized old-timey college party. It was like a musical. The song was celebrating a girl who was a flirt and had dozens of boyfriends. At the party, she danced through the rooms of handsome boys and crazy, crazy plates of foods--tiny lobsters, roasted pigs, trays of sliced poundcake. I was her roommate and thought it was awesome that she had so many boyfriends. I was in the room with her, eating cake. I could actually taste it in the dream. We were supposed to be mentoring this sort of ingenue girl. We went to our room which had a confusing series of triple decker bunk beds, way more than we needed for everyone.

Same Forest?; Water Hazards; Whale Bite

Taking a hike through the woods. I wandered off the path. It's weird, it was a lot like the woods of Virginia or Rhode Island, but I feel like I dreamt this forest specifically before. My feet were sinking down in sand.

In a big, disintegrating house. I was with my "brother" although he was a teenage black guy, and his girlfriend, who was a famous actress or singer. We had piled furniture up onto bunkbeds and were trying to get out, but the halls were flooding. I helped the girlfriend cross a scary deep hallway of water.

In a grand room. The whole plan was to turn it into a water park. I didn't trust the people running the plan. Corrupt or really evil? I went around to the people I thought were the ringleaders and tried to intimidate them.

Then I took a swim in the giant pool and it was great. It was full of fish and seals and little whales. But then the killer whale came up and bit down on both my arms. I could feel its teeth denting the skin. I got out of the water for help and walked around with the whale still attached to my arms. It was funny, although I knew I should be really panicked. I went up to the front desk where the harrassed manager of the water park was trying to deal with some VIP customers and I tried to get her to pay attention to me. It was like I was in a comedy but trying to act distressed.

Needles; Summar Island

I was staying at a friend's house. He was saying his arm hurt and out of the corner of my eye I could see something sticking out of it. I looked over and saw the whole arm was full of syringes, like they were pushed all the way through the arm.

Something about a second hand clothing store?

Watching a movie? Reading a book? There was a beautifully drawn comic book about a family in the end of the world scenario. It was done in dark watercolors. They were on a huge red rock somewhere southwest, and for the summer they'd be safe from marauding etc. The issue of the comic book was called "Summer Island".

Then I was in it--I was a young daughter of the family and I realized one of our neighbors had turned on us. I was talking on the phone with my mother, sounding cheerful but telling her in code we couldn't trust the neighbor. He took me to a festival, and there was like a waxwork museum where the figures were coming to life and attacking. I fought them.

Short on film; Gaslight; Boat; dessert

I was a bad student in school. I was making a film and I had to make it a certain length. I was running the film strip outside of the classroom. I was there with a bad influence friend. There was a guy who had a crush on her but when he asked her out, we zoomed in on his bad complection. I was helping another boy go undercover. Who would believe there would be two new guys named Edward, though?

There was also a main room where we were trying to play a cruel practical joke on some guy. He was actually a cute guy that I had a crush on. We were gaslighting him in some way, moving toys to seats in an auditorium to make him think they'd moved on his own.

There was also a story of people on an adventure that we were telling/watching/part of. A huge magical boat/van was about to set out. It tried to merge with traffic. It pulled over just a little ways up and the people in it called me over the mediate. W. was part of the crew and some people objected to his laugh (there's nothing wrong with his laugh).

Switch to my front yard in Virginia. It was so green and lush. We were making a huge dessert, carefully dripping chocolate on a structure of darker chocolate slabs.

Camp Hate; Snow Explosion; That Chipper Bastard

I was at some sort of summer camp or something with lots of girls. The girl who was my roommate secretly hated me so I not so secretly hated her back.

It was in a house like my grandmothers with tons of weird little rooms. I finally figured out there was an extra bathroom. I looked in and saw that it even had a full bath, but when I went in I saw the huge tub had actually had the bottom cut out and filled in with a garden.

Up on a mountain overlooking the building with the camp. It was covered with snow, and it felt like I was with someone and we were wandering around for a long time, desperate to get back. Finally, we set off some sort of explosion to bring people to us. I flew up in the air and down incredibly slowly, like I'd figured out a way to slow down time so I wouldn't crash and hurt myself. I landed in the soft snow and saw I was saved.

There was some obnoxious camp counselor type who was trying to be everybody's pal. He asked if I had any questions about a bunch of stuff but I just wanted him to fix my computer. I was really rude to him, and as I stalked off, I thought to myself that I wouldn't have been as rude if he hadn't been as chipper.

Sorting 3D glasses; King Herring; elderly cat

Back at work again. I was sorting a stack of photographs and pulling what looked like 3D glasses out of the stack.

On my way to a vacation spot. I was going over the water--in a boat--swimming?--and then a giant serpent thing leapt out of the water and rocketed up. It was huge and kind of flattened. I think it was a King Herring but later when I was describing it some people thought it was like a later life stage for a boa. I should have been terrified but instead it was really cool.

Someone's elderly cat? I was trying to play with it and it hissed and ran away.

Climb the vine

Another one of those dreams where I was sort of watching/participating. There was a young woman who was an actress or a prostitute. She eventually fell in with a wealthy Japanese business man on a train, and at first he was nice to her, but then pretended not to speak any English and she explained she could speak a little Chinese but no Japanese and he sort of shunned her but pointed out a first class train seat she could take.

There was a switch to a huge tree or vine. There was a main guy about to go on a quest. He had planted the tree to make his mother better, and she was, but she said he was sick now. Two men (but I was one of them) scrambled up the tree. It was enormously tall, and on the other side, there was a big shimmering amusement park. I could almost reach a weird sort of scaled ferris wheel--it was like a giant snake skeleton, but made of silver metal, and rippling. Instead, the scene shifted to a show on the ground. I could only see little bits at a time, like a movie camera just zooming in. There were two beautiful dancers, and it slowly became clear that one of them (point of view switching so I was her) had a lobster claw for a hand. A circus barker was setting her up on a date with one of the explorers.

Something about M suggesting glasses to me?

Work; Rom-Com pierogi; Art& pirates

I dreamt I was back at work. There were lots of new little cubicles to work in which I had never noticed before. I got in very early and did some slightly sneaky task but I was setting up the computer right when K got in. I went to a small conference room and we decided to watch a movie.

I was in the movie. It started out as a romantic comedy about two friends who have made a pact to have a baby. It takes place in a darkly lit bar that sets out free food. I was one of the characters, and I was mostly interested in tracking down the different types of pierogi. There was one in a spicy szechuan type sauce, deep fried ones with cheese, bland boiled ones with tomato sauce, all set out in awkward vessels, like a big deep Chinese vase, served with chopsticks, or in a steam tray that kept moving. At the end of that section, the guy of the couple is setting up a fake baby shower page and laughing.

The second half of the movie was on a voyage. The kid is now about seven, a precocious homeschooled boy named Sloane who keeps pointing out that Sloane could also be a girl's name. It was very beautiful. We were on a river, then we went to an art exhibit. Everything was in reds and browns, and there were modern sculptures made with packets of mint chewing gum, which I could smell.

We lay out on a promonade by the river. Suddenly a woman who had been one of our party and a bunch of her followers showed up, coming up out of the brick promenade as if it were water. They were pirates! I got up to fight her. She had a long kitchen knif that I wrestled from her, and she smiled and pulled out her sword. We fought and I won.

I thought I was oooout!

Dreamed I had to go back to work. The offices were unrealistic, but everything else was horribly true to life. I had to try to schedule a meeting with out suitemate, who started crying.

Went into a high fashion store and tried on shoes. There were only left feet on display, and I wanted to see if I could walk in a pair of enormously high bottle green velvet high heels. I settled on a very beaten up pair of black lace up boots.

Old college friend D was playing a concert. He played a violin with two bows and performed all kinds of tricks with it. Eventually he stretched out the violin so he could bounce on the strings. Someone in the hippy audience started calling him a douchebag and I went back to her and whispered kindly, "Maybe you're being the douchebag."

I fell back asleep after having anxious thoughts about needing to print something out. I dreamt I was in a copy center, but the basement had been converted into a theater. The play had started and I thought it was pretty good, and then I saw actors in red and yellow motorcycle outfits with huge, pointy-snouted helmets, and I laughed because I realized it was a show I'd read a good review about. The helmets were supposed to represent mouse snouts and there was some Kraftwerk/Autobahn inspired musical number, and all the children in the audience were called up to race around. I got confused, thinking they were going off track, but it didn't seem to matter.

The dream switched suddenly and I was walking through neighborhoods with my childhood friend M and our buddy W. I had accomplished my printing chore. Suddenly I realized I had no idea how I had gotten there and I said, "Hey, I don't think this is real." I grabbed on a wooden piece of a porch and felt the texture of it, but I still was sure I was asleep. But I couldn't seem to wake myself up or change anything, so I kept going and forgot I was asleep.

We came to an outdoor party of women doing crafts. We got to talking with them and the hostess got a cloth pouch for me and began filling it with buttons, saying she was never going to use them. They were very pretty, pink and orange with metal filagree designs on them.

Conquering story; Beagle Box

I was on something like a college campus, being taken on a tour. There was a story about how some prince conquered some land and it wasn't clear if I was hearing the story or telling it, but eventually I was in it. The views were great--I was above the landscape, and it was like for different sections being told there was a different director or artist. There were gardens and lots of marble statues, mostly of defeated generals. Finally, in a long open hallway, there was a wizard character. A bird flew onto his shoulder and it became his story. It turned into an illustration or cartoon where there was no background, just the prince's frightened face as he was dragged along by a ferocious peacock. The feathers dragged all over the view.

I was with an old man who was walking outside. He looked like Steve Martin. We came across a bunch of distressed dogs. They were maybe being put into a kennel or having to travel. He picked up one dog and said, "Now you get to go in a beagle box!" and showed the dog how he could hang upside down from the wires on the crate by his claws.

The dogs owner was a hippy young man who took the dog away and berated the old man. The boy and the dog clung to each other, wailing.

tiny rooms; roaches; choose your own

I was trying to figure out my living arrangements. I was back at school but it wasn't clear if I was in off campus housing or one of the dorms. It was a big house, falling apart. My choice of rooms were both tiny, and it wasn't clear who would be sharing them. There was another woman, who I was friends with, and also Ben and the members of a band we both know. The house seemed to be attached to a swank hotel. The woman and I walked through the hotel. I mentioned they'd had some problems before with cockroaches and then I saw one on its back, dying, and then I saw a bunch of baby roaches coming out of a crack.

One of the rooms had an open fronted bookshelf that some of the band members converted into a dollhouse. I tried to help put the furniture and tiny books in place on the shelves, but I could only come at it sideways, not from the front. My fingers had trouble with the tiny books, although I was charmed.

There was a sort of choose your own adventure show on television, but promoted with drink bottles. You had to look back at your bottle to find words on the rim that would give you the next choice. Then I was in the show. I thought I had opted to stay on an island, but then it seemed like my luggage was getting stowed on a boat to go away.

There was a dinner party going on. My father and stepmother, I think? There was a huge posh living room, then a big table, and we were supposed to pass around big sheets of paper to fill in an anecdote for some parlor game.

Tiny; tasting wine

I was helping someone move, or I was moving. There weren't too many heavy boxes, although I could hear china or something clang when I was moving a box. We got to the new home and were congratulating ourselves on how easy it had been. I started opening boxes and found that everything was tiny dollhouse furnishing. There was a plate with little tiny lobsters in aspic, and a pair of wire rimmed glasses the size of a tic tac. There was a glass top table, and when I put the glasses on there, they slowly melted into the table. I could still feel the edge of the wire if I picked at it with a fingernail.

A fancy picnic. Someone had brought an expensive wine. We all had a glass. I could taste it in my dream and it was really nice. Someone put an ice cube in their glass and the person who had supplied the wine was annoyed.