Perpetual Smile

I dreamed a bunch of weird shit the night before last (and didn’t write about it until now because THE NOVEL is taking all of my writing time). I know normally dream posts are annoying, but seriously? They were so funny and weird that I think you’ll appreciate them.

In the first dream, I was getting married. I blame Jess and Sarah, because they were talking about wedding dresses on Twitter the other night. Anyway, in the dream, I wore this impossibly weird dress. It was made out of doily fabric that looked papier mached, and I have no idea how I got it on. The wedding was inside some house, and everything was ready. I walked down the aisle, and at the end, instead of Michael, was this chick.

She was pretty, I guess; the wedding veil didn’t really let me see her face. She wore the same kind of dress I wore, only quite a few sizes larger. I had no idea who she was.

We said our vows, and then everyone came to congratulate us. “Thank you,” I said. “I’m so happy. But I wish I’d married Michael.” Then people started getting ready for the honeymoon and saying that we should get ready. All I could think of was, I have to have sex with her? I don’t know her!

Just as I started to panic over that, the dream changed and I was in a kitchen with Sandy. We had to go to the hospital to go visit someone, so she and I left and started walking all over downtown. Except downtown was different, and we got lost. And chased by boys on bicycles. Who weren’t actually chasing us, you see. We ended up in an alley with these new, still drying concrete steps a few feet above our heads. Sandy jumped up to get to them, and since I’m a scaredy cat and don’t like to climb, I just stared anxiously up at her.

“Come on,” she said, and disappeared. I had no idea where she went. I grabbed a chunk of the wet concrete and the pieces of her journal from high school that she’d found, and went back to the house.

Her kids and a bunch of other kids were there, waiting for me, so I started rounding them up and brought them to a part of the house where they could play. There was this really small baby who could walk and talk, and then Sandy magically showed up.

“I went to the hospital,” she said when I asked her where she had gone.

Then suddenly I was standing outside of the house I’d gotten married in, wearing a normal dress and standing next to Mike, who wore a tuxedo.

“Your limo’s here,” someone said. “Enjoy your honeymoon!”

We got into the limo and rode off to our honeymoon, whatever that was.

And then I woke up* because I really had to pee.

I don’t know what happened to my new wife. I’m kind of worried that she might come after me for the whole $10 I’ve got to myself.

So today was an interesting day, to say the least. It started off with me waking up at 10:45 and realizing that my alarm had never gone off. (I was supposed to be in work for 9.) I looked at my phone and it wouldn’t do anything. I tried to turn it on (because I thought it might have shut off, thought that maybe the battery had magically died), but nothing happened. The odd thing was, the phone had had a good enough charge when I’d gone to bed. The even odder thing was, I had dreamed about something weird going on with my phone’s battery. I dreamed that the battery charged instantly when I plugged it in, rather than taking an hour or so. CREEPY.

I love music, because you can express anything in it. The new Blue October album fucking rocks! “The End” pretty much describes how I felt when a guy I once thought I loved cheated on me.

Anyway. ADHD, anyone?

I got dressed in seconds — amazing for me, I promise you! — and ran downstairs. I asked my dad if he was having any problems with his phone. In my half-awake state, I thought we were under electronic attack, ha ha ha! Dad tried plugging my phone in to see if it just needed to be charged, but when he plugged it in all we got was a giant battery on the screen with a lightening bolt through it.

Mean, mean battery.

I went to work, Dad brought my phone back to Best Buy, and then he met me after work to give me my babyBlackBerry and the brand new battery. After my second job and dinner, I went to Toys R Us and bought a Timex alarm clock. My old alarm clock stopped letting me set the alarm a couple of weeks ago, so I’d been using my phone instead of forking over the cash for a new alarm clock.

I guess that’s what I get.

In the dream, I knew that if the aliens caught my scent, they would know I was human.

My home was suddenly my prison. I crept in the shadows, hiding in the bedroom closet among an old vacuum cleaner and stale clothing. I didn’t know what was worse: being trapped in the closet until I starved to death or being discovered. I crouched there, waiting, sleeping intermittently and waking up in cold sweat time after time. Soon, the vacuum cleaner poking me in the back became the most comfortable thing.

When the closet door opened, I froze. I waited to see their strange probing faces. I waited to hear the dogs barking. Nothing, except for the light. I could smell food, and my stomach clenched.

I knew it was a she instantly, even though it was completely featureless. She vaguely resembled a human, but had no substance, no form. The color that came to mind was tan, but I saw no pigment, no skin. She caressed my face with no hands and called me a doll with no voice.

“Mama, feed me,” I said, terrified that she would catch my scent. I envisioned a Baby Alive doll, with its fake food and fake poop. I imagined my arms and legs becoming hard plastic. I kept my body as stiff as possible.

She said I would be a fun toy for her daughter, and then closed the door. I exhaled a sigh.

This went on for days, weeks, how long I don’t know. Every so often she would open the closet and play with me for a few minutes. I never met her daughter. I began to suspect that she knew what I was, but I couldn’t figure out why she wouldn’t call the others.

Some days I got to leave the closet and eat whatever I could find. They seemed to like our food, and they also seemed to be around every corner. It was nearly impossible to avoid them, but it was easy to hide from them. They didn’t bother looking under tables or beds. They didn’t have the paranoia that so many humans are afflicted with.

I made it to the front hall one day. I knew all of the doors were locked from the inside, so they wouldn’t be able to get in from outside. I could hear the dogs though; our dogs had become their servants. I knew this because no dog had listened to me since I had become a prisoner in my own house.

I closed the door behind me and stood for a moment in the hall. I could smell pine and sunshine. I reveled in the light that bathed the hardwood floors. I stretched and spun, all the while listening. Had they discovered this part of the house yet? Could I make it down the three flights of stairs and escape?

I began to tiptoe down the stairs, then stopped when I saw toys on the landing. Three small digital pets on keychains with brightly colored cases waited for their new masters to come and play. I looked around. There were several cardboard and foam boxes, and some scissors. I got to work.

When I was done, I had blocked off the dogs and barricaded myself in. No one could get in now, but how could I get out?

I ran through the grass, keeping low to the ground. The sky was cold and gray above me. I stopped and lay on my belly, waiting. Against their advice, I had joined the rally of would-be soldiers. It was the only way that I could find my sister.

I had wanted this freedom badly during the days I had spent in the closet. Now, I wasn’t so sure.

The black night sky presses down on us, erases the trees and other forest foliage that would normally be comforting. We sit around a fire that should light up the clearing but offers no warmth or light tonight. I can barely make out the others’ faces, blurred and featureless. The only one clear to me is the brunette squatting five or so feet from me, but even his face is hard to make out. I just know he has dark hair. I also know that he is my boyfriend. Read the rest of this entry »

Nothing about today is good. My back pain is back; I spent last night tossing and turning because not only was it in my lower back but also in my front hips. I also had a bad dream, so all in all it made for a pretty sleepless night. I dreamed I was some blond runaway and my runaway, brunette and abusive boyfriend got me knocked up. He beat me up so bad that I had a miscarriage. The dream flickered to me lying on a hospital table to me in some house where everyone was dead and I had a gun to defend myself from — I’m assuming — my abusive dream boyfriend. Talk about a vivid — and somewhat depressing — mind. I don’t dream that vividly very often, but when I do they’re usually really crazy.

Maybe I’m having more issues with what happened to me than I initially thought.

I went to the chiropractor this afternoon and then to Wal-Mart. I got some stuff to make cards with for the Letters of Love Greeting Card Challenge and stuff for my crafts class on Monday. I also got some sugar cookie mix, which was a pick-me-up — at the time.

Then I got home, and all hell broke loose. Mike and I got into a fight, Lauren and I got into a fight, and now I have no energy to get anything done that I need to get done. I have piles upon piles of things to do, and it’s so overwhelming that I don’t want to do any of it. I hung out with Nikki last night and although it was a nice break it’s just another reminder that I hardly ever get to just relax. Even when I’m hanging out with my friends or Mike, my mind is constantly racing, thinking of all the things I need to get done. I can’t relax, because I’m too busy being preoccupied with what I think I should be doing instead of having fun.

To top it off, my McAfee subscription is expired. I probably shouldn’t be online right now.

Okay, so I know I promised to do an I am.. post soon — and I do want to do one, specifically about how impulsive I am — but there are about a zillion things zipping through my head right now. So.

Breaking Dawn is freaking awesome so far. The more I read, the more Stephenie Meyer is becoming one of my favorite authors — possibly an all-time favorite. (I should probably read Host before I say that, but whatever.) Wherever she ends up on my list of favs, I hope she never stops writing. She truly is gifted. That being said, I really want to start concentrating on some writing. I have a zillion projects I want to start and a zillion projects I need to finish. I wish there was some way I could discipline myself a little more. It’s just hard to ignore the new ideas until I finish the old. (See? Toldja I was impulsive.) I’m hoping that taking that creative writing course this semester may help me balance a little better. Obviously I (probably) can’t use old work for the assignments, so I can (probably) humor my new ideas in class and work on finishing the older stuff in my free time. Hopefully. I really need to rethink my time management skills. Makes me wonder how teachers could have ever put that “uses time well” comment on any of my report cards.

Speaking of time management, I need to finish the websites I’ve been working on. I need to get my business site looking a little more professional, and lettersoflove.net needs to be finished like, yesterday, so that I can add it to lists. I’ll probably feel less guilty about pursuing side projects, and with my business’s website finished I can probably get some actual work. (My trip to Indianapolis is so not gonna pay for itself.)

Back to Breaking Dawn. I’ve been having really vivid dreams lately. I dreamed last night that I was Bella and Mike was Edward. Heh. I was even dressed in clothes I wouldn’t normally wear. It was cool being a vampire. The dream was just getting good and then I woke up — for the zillionth time. I slept really poorly last night. I’m not sure why. At about 4, 4:30 this morning the garbage truck came by. When the hell did those things get so loud? It sounded like the most annoying ringtone ever going off. I see no reason for them to be so loud, especially when they’re collecting garbage at the ass-crack of dawn. I would love to shoot the moron who designed the newer garbage trucks, for his total ignorance.

Where the hell was I going with this post? Yikes. I don’t know if it’s the lack of sleep, but I totally can’t function today.

Oh. Yeah. I accidentally dropped my phone into a cup of water last night. Heh. My eyes bugged out and I said, “oh, oh” over and over. My aunt Rikki ran over and dropped the phone into a brown paper bag, sent me upstairs to blowdry it out, and the phone works fine now. She’s a genius. I swear.

Sorry this post is so all over the damn place. When I composed today’s post in my head last night — hoping that it might help me fall back asleep — it sounded a lot more together than this. I promise something rational later!

I haven’t been sleeping well the last couple of nights.

I had a dream last night that I had to stop and get gas. I stopped at one station and didn’t like their prices so I moved on to a Sunoco. Noticing that the price was steadily dropping down, I decided to wait for it to go a little lower. Finally, it dropped to 88¢ and I put $10 into my car.

Yeah, I really was dreaming.

I had the weirdest dream. I was working in a grocery store, and there was this section of carts in the back of the store. In one of the carts–aisle 9, row 11 to be exact, hahaha–were this little blond boy and brunette girl. They were no older than three and, like you always do in dreams, I knew they had been left there. So I went to who I’m guessing was my boss in the dream and reported them. He said he would call DCF or whatever and I said I would take care of them in the meantime.

I headed to the back of the store again and ran into two old friends from high school. We’ll call them Greg and Tom. I jumped up on Greg and almost knocked him over. “You’re an asshole,” he said, laughing. I also gave Tom a hug, which is weird because in real life I can’t stand him. We started playing with those Nerf dart guns and tackling each other, hahaha. I told them I was looking for the kids and we made our way back to the carts, but the kids were gone. And of course, that’s where I woke up.

I don’t know why in hell I would dream about Greg and Tom. I haven’t seen either of them in probably a year, and Tom terrifies me. I also have no idea why I was working in a grocery store and why I didn’t get fired for playing Nerf gunslingers. Still, I occasionally miss Greg and sometimes wish Tom weren’t such a dickhead–er, I wish he hadn’t beat up my friend “Marissa” when they dated.