Located in a large office, I was busy. Although modern and plush, with room for dozens, only one other was in the office with me. We were calling into a help line. My purpose, though, was to find an assignment for someone who I could help.

I struggled with the line. Static garbled messages. I wasn’t certain if I’d reached a live voice or a recording. They couldn’t understand me, either.

After several times of calling, not frustrated, but amused and determined, I decided to go down to dispatch to talk to them in person.

Dispatch was busy and chaotic. Obviously, something had gone awry with the system. Others, thinking like me (or me, thinking like them), went down to dispatch to get assignments (and, from eavesdropping, to provide feedback and updates). Several dispatchers were busy at work behind a dark counter. Not knowing where the line began and end, or where people queued, I marched back and forth, mocking the system. That annoyed the dispatchers, who asked me to stop doing that because it distracted them. Though I found it all funny, they didn’t.

A food bar offered choices of snacks from sandwiches and salads to pizzas, hot dogs, donuts and bagels, along with coffee and tea. I checked it out but passed.

At last, with many gone, the lines finally in order, I approached the counter and was given an assignment. Pleased with that, I went off to the phones to contact the one I was supposed to help.

The dream ended.