Sunday’s Theme Music
It’s a gorgeous Sunday out there, pure blue sky and sunshine, the sort of day, in my working past, when we would leap up and say, “It’s a gorgeous day. Where should we go? What shall we do?” But today, we’re on our computers, in our books, in our chairs, in our office, reading, eating, communicating, writing.
The sun burst over the mountains at 7:19 AM and we’ll lose the sunshine at 5:32 late this afternoon. It only dropped to 38 degrees F last night and quickly reach fifty today, promising to, um, 70 degrees F. What? Can the weather service be right? Is this really mid-winter in Ashland, Oregon? Well, the record high, in 1992, was 72.
Today’s song trickled in as I thought about the landslide dream this morning. “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac was written by Stevie Nicks and released in 1975. Although covered well by The Smashing Pumpkins and the Dixie Chicks, I have connections to that original song. In ’75, I was nineteen, married, serving in the military without my wife in the Philippines. So when you’re sitting in your room after work at night, getting your uniform ready for work the next day, sipping some alcohol, listening to music, connections are created.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and get the vax and booster when you can. Time for a coffee break. Cheers
The Landslide Dream
It began with me as a teenager visiting in a small town. I was going from house to house, slipping between hedges, visiting friends. All the friends happened to be elderly women. One was my great-grandmother. The town was lifted out of the fifties, with small houses, typically white, single levels, with shutters, and tidy yards lined with flowers. I always entered the houses through the back, kitchen door, because that’s where I knew the people would be. And I was always right. They were in their tiny kitchens — smaller than the bathrooms in my house — busy cooking, moving around a small table with four chairs. All greeted with smiles and laughter and offered eagerly accepted food, mostly cookies and donuts.
After, though, I left, and found myself wandering in old homes where no one lived any longer. The further that I went, the less there were of the houses. First absent were the flowers and lawns, and then the walks and the windows. Inside, I found empty, dusty rooms.
I was a little older now, perhaps in my twenties. Soon the houses lost their roofs and doors, their siding. I was out where the hills rose, then found myself in a quarry. A house or building, maybe part of a mining operation, had been erected to one side. Little remained of it except an oddly stout brown wall.
I went through the quarry, clambering over boulders and rocks, scaling short cliffs. I became aware that two children had entered the quarry. They were about eight, blond and fair. One was taller than the other by two or three inches.
I watched them for a moment. They had as much right to be there as me, so I continued my exploring. As I climbed a sheer wall, picking handholds on the sandstone and flint outcrops, dirt and rocks fell over me. I threw myself back and away just in time to avoid a huge granite boulder. I didn’t know where it’d come from; its size astonished and scared me. As I recovered from jumping back and away, I saw a large slab of the wall break free and fall.
Scrambling backward took me to safety. As dust rose, I thought of the children. I saw them about forty feet away. They’d climbed as I had and had reached a ledge. I shouted at them that it wasn’t safe, that we need to leave. Rocks tumbled around them. From my vantage, I saw larger, heavier rocks breaking free above them and called out a warning.
The children slipped into a small crevice about twenty feet above the quarry floor. Rocks fell without striking them. Yellow dust thickened as gravel slid down the cliff. The children were coughing. With more rocks falling around me, I made my way over rocks and stones across the quarry to help the children.
Their rock wall moved in, like it was taking a breath, carrying them in with them. The children disappeared from sight. Dodging rocks, waving away dust, I hurried to find and help the children. A rock taller than them pushed them out of the crevice. As they moved aside, it teetered for a moment before rolling down the cliff, jarring more rocks loose with its thunderous landing.
I was almost to the children. Realizing their danger, they were taking action to get down. I reached them in time to help them to the quarry floor. The walls on three sides were spasming and then stilling. I feared something more catastrophic was about to happen and raced with the children to get out. When we reached the point where we’d entered, we discovered our way blocked by collapsed rocks.
The children were panicking. So was I. Frantic to do something, I saw the brown wall. Crossing to it, I jumped up and caught the top of it. Very carefully, I tilted it backwards into the quarry. I found a huge off-white strap, inches thick and about four inches wide, which reminded me of a fire hose, that I used to help me leverage the wall back toward us.
When the wall was low enough, I directed the children over it. They climbed onto it and slid down the other side. Once they were safe, I precariously balanced the wall. More quarry fell in behind me. As it did, I used the white strap to cautiously climb up and over the wall to safety. When I was done, I pulled the brown wall back up into place and regarded it before moving on.
Flooftidian
Flooftidian (floofinition) – Commonplace, every day, or ordinary activities involving an animal.
In use: “The flooftidian in homes with pets includes feeding them several times a day and playing with them several times a day, along with napping and grooming.”
Contact 2
Continued from Contact
Britt (not his real name) had never planned to be Human. Nor had he expected to be on Earth. On his eighth life, he’d been cruising toward his ninth. Omnipotence would be his, was almost within reach of his yearning fingers but then –
Well, then.
Then.
He’d secured every thought and emotion – and there was a huge spectrum of these – around ‘then’ under a mountain, sealed it in a mental tunnel, blocked its access. Because –
Well. Then.
Once he’d learned of his fate, he researched what he could about the planet and human civilizations. He learned: his people hadn’t visited in over two thousand Terran years, thirty-five hundreds of their own years. Still, some items were left behind. He acquired maps and entry codes, found and fixed the vehicle pushing through the processes of activating and testing the systems and flying the thing. Three years, he’d taken, manufacturing new parts, testing everything, adjusting to his body and their limited senses, cursing the optimists who’d informed him that, although they’d never been Human, being Human on Earth was apparently much like it was enduring in your seventh life.
Ha. They were wrong.
Being Human was worse.
© 2022 Michael Seidel
Three Dream Vignettes
I experienced three highly detailed, vivid dreams last night, all in a row, flowing from one to the other. First up.
I’m in a car driving in a city in the late afternoon to early evening. I’ve come up to a large and busy intersection. The light is red. I have friends in other cars. We’re all going somewhere. My wife is with me in the car.
I think the light is green and go forward. In a flash, like it’s a film being shown, I see cutaways to friends in other cars saying, “Why is Michael going? The light is red. He shouldn’t be going.” They blow their horns.
I’m driving through the intersection. My wife shouts, “What are you doing? The light is red.”
I’m looking up through the windshield. The light is red, but I thought it was a green light. I’m certain that I saw one.
The traffic turning left against us is light. The drivers of those cars are aware that I’m not doing something right. They give me space and distance. No one is hurt except me and my pride. What is wrong with me?
I pull over to the curb. I’m alone in the car. I’m trying to understand why I thought there was a green light. I look up in time to see a young driver execute in the other direction. He’s driving a mid-sixties Pontiac GTO. Classic muscle car. It’s in impressive condition, with a well-maintained, shiny body. As I watch, this young white guy, maybe seventeen years old, does a U turn and hits the side of my car.
I can’t believe this. He’s pulled over. I get out of my car and look at the damage. My car is silver. The damage is light, toward the rear quarter panel. I approach him, and tell him, “You know the drill. License, registration, insurance.” He’s crying because he just got his license. He knows he’ll face trouble. I feel sympathy for him.
My wife comes up. I ask for the camera. She starts making demands about how this will be handled, wanting me to make promises. We get into an argument. She won’t give me the camera. Irritated, I find my computer to take pictures. I know I can, but, the computer is missing its two AA batteries needed for the camera aspect. But, I have batteries in another part of the computer, use those and take the photos needed.
Number two.
I’m talking to a friend and mentioned something about the Chevy El Camino. I ask him if he knows what they are and how they look. He’s not familiar with it, so I tell him I’ll draw a picture of one. For whatever reason, I’m referring to the fourth-generation design from the early to mid 1970s. I’m explaining the design details as I draw it, talking about the front grill, and how it went from a single headlight to a double-stacked headlight on either side. I realize that I’m drawing on top of another drawing someone has done. I’m astonished. How did I not see that?
I don’t want to draw on another’s drawing. It’s a landscape, sort of a primitive style executed in charcoal. I admire it, erase my drawing, and find another piece of paper. I think it’s blank but as I begin drawing again, I see that there is a drawing on it.
I’m amazed. Why can’t I see those drawings before I begin drawing?
Number three.
We’ve arrived at a huge factory. Besides the factory, it has a large administrative/office section. I’m with a party of friends, all male. I think there are twenty of us. None of them are people known from RL but I know all of them in the dream.
A young brunette woman with a ponytail is showing us around the building. When we walk into one part, we men all start laughing. A tall space, it’s divided into sections and cubicles and is stacked from floor to ceiling with mechanical equipment and electronic gear. I exclaim, “This is exactly the kind of place that I used to work in.” The other men are saying the same thing. We’re all laughing and agreeing, it’s just like where we used to work. We just walk around, talking about the environment. I follow the path, remembering where my cubicle would have been located. In RL, I never worked in a place like this, but in the dream, I turn a corner, and there is my old workstation. Pointing it out to the rest, I laugh. When they see my station, they go off and start finding their own old workstations. How is this possible, we wonder, because we all worked in different places?
Saturday’s Theme Music
Night drew back its filmy, star-studded sheet, slowly revealing day. The time was 7:20 AM and the day was Saturday, February 5, 2022. Night had waited eons for this encounter, surmounting fears and doubts to finally look at day. He’d been chasing her for centuries. She didn’t know why. Their movement had evolved into obsession. She wanted to know who it was chasing her. Ironic, but she had originally been the chaser, pursuing another on the other end. He’d been fleeting and fast, always just ahead, beyond the horizon. This one, though, was coming toward. If she could just wait and see…
But the forces that kept her moving, moved her on again.
Our low was 30 degrees F when night attempted to find who chased her. No clouds mar the sky blue crowning the valley. It’ll be 60 here in the dead of winter, twelve degrees above our average high, before night comes around after the sunsets at 5:31 PM.
I have a song from 1966 by The Outsiders, “Time Won’t Let Me”, blasting in the morning mental music stream. Yeah, it’s an oldie but so am I. Listen to that driving rhythm, though, that brass, that rising tension and soft counter-tension. Ah, classic rock.
Why this song today? Don’t know. Maybe it’s something I ate or drank. Perhaps a dream inspired it. Could be modern frustration or nostalgia that called it up. The neurons that could shed light have gone AWOL. Maybe they’re pranking me. I can imagine those neurons giggling and snickering, calling up a song and then scattering, laughing at the mischief they’ve done. Oh, those cheeky neurons!
But, as with any song that’s stuck, it must be shared to get it out of my head, so here it is. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get yer vaxxes and boosts when you can. Coffee is in hand. I know what I’m gonna do. Cheers
Friday Fab Felines
I found these laugh worthy. Hope you do, too. Especially mood poisoning. Cheers
I think it’s time to pay some attention to our favorite 4- legged friends. (Fab Felines).
The Can Opener still needs time. It’s a good thing Sushi and I are in control! We’ll get her back soon. Thanks for checking in on us!
