Category: cars

A Dream Snippet

I’ve been having many dreams each night. A short source yield three to six dreams a night, so I’m average. Maybe it seems like more because they’re vivid and intense, and I remember a lot of them — or so it seems. Remembering dreams always brings a challenge. Trying to remember them usually causes me to remember more of them, but then I get into this cycle of dreaming more, remembering more, dreaming more, until it seems like I’m taking a lot of conscious time thinking about the dreams. As with everything, a balance must be found and maintained.

I’m just going to highlight a series of scenes from one dream last night. Friends and I had gone to a club. I wasn’t in the military but many military peers were in the dream. They weren’t in the military any longer, either.

We were talking about DJs when we arrived. I’d heard one on the way while in my car, and thought he was great. I learned that he was going to be at the club. That excited me. I wanted to meet and speak with him, if I could. It was late in the afternoon/early in the evening. The club had only opened a short while before. Staff was still setting up. My friends and I were some of the first customers. As we walked about looking for a table, I heard the DJ’s voice. Saying, “Hey, that’s him,” I went to find him.

He and I almost ran into one another, earning me a resentful look from him. I apologized to him but he blew me off. Well, okay. Shrugging that away, I returned to my friends, who had now selected a table. A waitress came around with typewritten menus. Although there were many pages, there wasn’t much on them as offering, one or two items per page, and nothing that called to me. I thought I’d just order an appetizer and a beer.

Asking about what beer was available, I discovered that a young Penny Marshall was my server. My question about what beer was available seemed to upset her. As I preferred dark beers, I asked her what darks were available. Looking sour, she responded, “I’ll check.” Then she turned to take others’ orders.

She suddenly reverted her attention to me. “We have some new Sam Adams in.”

“Oh, okay, I’ll take a Sam Adams Octoberfest, if you have that.”

Penny looked upset again. Her companion — a young Cindy Williams — said to Penny soto voce, “It’s okay, it’s okay.” I was like, WTH? Why is Penny so upset? My friends and I joked about it after she left the table.

Some conversations took place about different topics. Then I was watching some people. Some were previous military I worked with. They were out now. Some were belligerent toward one another. Turning to comment to my friends, I discovered that I was alone at the table. There was silverware, and my beer, but there were gone.

Picking up the silverware and beer, I walked around. Finding that they moved to another table angered me. I tossed the silverware onto the table. It slide across and fell on the floor. That caught their attention. I then put my beer down and set six dollars on the table to pay for it. They were asking, “Something wrong?”

I replied, “Yeah, thanks for telling me you were moving. I appreciate it. I turned around and you were all gone. How did you expect that to make me feel?”

They were sort of chuckling and stammering apologies about pulling a bad prank, but I walked out, deciding that I didn’t need friends like them.

Outside, I entered my car. It was a cool, sunny evening, still early, Putting the top down, I took a drive, enjoying myself as the air flowed over me.

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A Vindication Dream

Had another night of uplifting and validating dreams. One stood out for me.

I was in Germany. To begin, I was racing down to get somewhere in my old white BMW 2002, but was forced to slow down abruptly, which I did. A divided road in a modern business area, it seemed strikingly familiar. After parking, I went in and found a friend, Jim. We were there to take classes. Not many people were in class, both men and women, of my age. Held outside, it was being taught in English. I don’t know the subject. Sessions flashed by, and then it was time for lunch. Jim and I walked down to a place together, following a general stream of people going as we did, just chatting along the way. Reaching a place we thought a restaurant, we entered and ascended different levels. At first, I searched for food. Then I needed a water closet. I thought I found one on the top floor, but when I opened it and entered, I found three children occupying it.

Backing out and away, I discovered that I didn’t know where Jim was, so I headed back to the class location. Few were around, but I encountered a pieced of masonry falling off a wall. As I tried to put it back, others told me, no, they want that removed because they’re replacing it. I didn’t think that would work because the wall beneath it was crumbling, but I figured the workmen and masons would know what they were doing.

Having time to kill, I found a place to nap on a heavy brown blanket in a low shelter where others were sitting. When I awoke, I discovered a man and a girl pantomiming around me. I guessed that I was on their blanket. The girl was upset that I was in her space, but the man was gesturing, ‘what could I do?’ Getting the message, I moved away.

Class was re-commencing anyway. We were directed to stand in a squad ranked by our height. I didn’t hear the directions being given but others helped me. A woman to my right called for our attention. We were to sing and harmonize. She spoke some words. A woman to my right in class sang them in a clear, high voice. I chose to counter it with a flat bass. We repeated that twice, and then the female director told us all to step. She had the woman and I repeat what we’d done. We did. The director announced, “Perfect. That’s exactly what we’re looking for. Stay right there.” Then she went off.

I felt flattered and vindicated, but also embarrassed as everyone started talking to me about what I was doing. I replied, I just did what I felt was right.

The dream ended.

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Another Validating Dream

Validating dreams are the best. I’ll provide a synopsis of this one without great detail.

A sharply clear dream, I was (again) a young fellow in the military, taking over a command post. Several people in the dream were people who worked for me. They had multiple problems. I found them immediately, and installed fixes. My spirit throughout this was optimistic and upbeat, a hundred on a hundred point scale. The dream’s only oddity was that the command post vehicle was a circa 1960 Volkswagen Beetle. Low, dark shale, it lacked bumpers but ran fine. One of my first observances was that the CP was lacking parking blocks. I acquired them. They were fixed in place on the ground but the VW was too low, and its chassis would drag over the blocks. Yeah, there wasn’t much connection with reality there. That’s where it all ended.

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A Packed Dream

I sorted out all the elements as a catalyst to remembering this convoluted nocturnal offering.

  1. Racing cars from the late 1960s and early 1970s.
  2. The mother of a childhood friend in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
  3. The television show Glee.
  4. My sports car that I drove in the 1990s.
  5. Co-workers from the early 2000s.
  6. A book store and change.
  7. The Vietnam war and the Huey gunship.
  8. Walking and driving.
  9. An embarrassing bathroom incident featuring an elderly Robert Duvall doppelganger.
  10. Sending a coded message.

It was a lot to take in. I dreamed this between 6 AM and 7:45, times that I was awoken to let Youngblood (Papi) out and in again. I was the same age, in my forties, throughout the dream.

Let’s begin the madness.

Started in traffic. I was in my black 1993 RX-7 R1. Highway was a undulating, rolling affair of six lanes filled with cars. It could have been El Camino Real along the Peninsula.

I saw bright cars up ahead. After some seconds of watching them accelerate and race through traffic, I decided that those were race cars. Downshifting, I accelerated to catch them, then I passed one; it was a 1966 Ford GT. Catching up with others, I saw a trio of Ford GT40s, then several Porsche 908s, a couple Ferraris, Porsche 917s in Gulf colors, and finally, Mark Donahue’s fabled Sunoco blue Porsche 917/30. Flabbergasted, I speculated, why are all these vintage race cars racing in traffic on a public road? Before I could fully catch them, a traffic light stopped me.

I was no longer in my car, but standing with a crowd of people, waiting for the light to change. It was a sunny day. When the light changed, we started walking forward. We were going up a large hill, paved, six lanes wide (three in each direction). A woman beside me said, “How do they expect us to walk up these hills when we’re not warned about them?” I thought that an odd complaint. Looking back, I realized I was having no problem with the hill, but everyone else was, and all were lagging far behind. Shrugging that off, I kept going.

Almost at the hill top, I turned into my destination, a shopping center. There was a book store that I wanted to visit. Entering, I hurried upstairs and then turned in what I remembered as the way. But it was changed; packed with books and bookshelves, tables and chairs, there were so many people and books that it was hard walking through. I gingerly managed to get through, then turned another corner, and found myself in a deadend.

I heard my name being called. As I wondered why anyone would be calling my name, I looked down and realized that my name was written on the tee shirt I wore. A young woman caught up with me. I recognized her as a co-worker from a company I worked at in the 2000s in Palo Alto.

She was asking me for information about a book. She knew some of the people I used to work with flew Huey Gunships in Vietnam. That baffled me; she didn’t work with any of those people. Also, those people were too young to have flown Hueys in Vietnam. A third man (black) came up, trying also to get through the book store. The three of us decided that there was only one door to take, so we would take it to reach the book store section that we wanted.

As we were about to leave, a black man hailed us. Identifying himself as the store manager, he told us that we couldn’t enter until people had left, because the store was too crowded. While we were talking to him, I looked out the window. Realizing where I was, I decided I would leave the store and approach the part I wanted from the outside. I took off to do so.

Now I was in a bathroom. I needed a bowel movement, so I copped a squat. People were watching me. One resembled an elderly Robert Duvall. Staring at me, he said, “Are you really going to do that here?” Thinking I was on a toilet, I replied, “Sure, why not?”

Then I realized that I was peeing on the floor. As I tried addressing that, I discovered that I was shitting in a urinal.

No, no, no! I was hugely embarrassed and recognized that I made an enormous mess. Well, hopping off the urinal, I found some paper towels and starting cleaning. Robert Duvall mocked me. “You’re going to clean this whole thing?” “Yes,” I answered.

My friends began helping me. As I cleaned piss off the upper walls, I realized that there was no way that I’d made all of this mess. Robert Duvall said the same. But I decided to keep cleaning until it was all clean, which I did with friends’ help. Robert Duvall grudgingly congratulated me on doing the right thing. I felt happy about that. Then my friends and I left.

I was out in a busy, busy place. I realized that a high-ranking military officer was coming here, but it wasn’t safe for him. I had a code that I could use to warn him off, but how would I get the code to him? It had to be surreptitious due to the situation.

I saw that some others were on a Zoom call. He was on that Zoom call, too, on the other end! I could write the code on a card or piece of paper and hold it up. As I worked, putting that all together, I did another assessment. Deciding that the threat had passed and the warning overcome by events, I left.

I was at my friend’s house in Penn Hills, PA. He wasn’t there, but his father was. He was coming down the steps as I was going up. I needed to wash my car. I crept into the house, a little concerned that I didn’t belong there, that I was invading someone’s private space. Upstairs, I found a bucket and soap and started filling the bucket with water at the sink. My friend’s mother (Lois) entered. The kitchen was messy, and another person was in there. I apologized for being there, stammering my way through that. She shrugged. “That’s okay. We’re making smoothies.” She held up two large glasses. Then she talked to the other person, asking him if they’d DVR’d Glee.

That threw me off. Lois had died in the eighties (cancer). Glee didn’t exist when she was alive. Neither did DVRs.

Leaving, I returned to my car (still my black RX-7), and then left to reach the bookstore.

Yeah, the end.

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Family Lore

I woke up thinking about Mom and being snowed in. I’d already sent her a quick, kidding message about having enough food on hand. It’s an ongoing joke that Mom always has a great deal of food on hand — especially desserts and treats. Besides, my three sisters and four adult grandchildren live in the area. They’re always checking in on her to ensure she has food. Mom’s boyfriend lives with her. His family also checks in on them. Food won’t be an issue.

Mom enjoys telling stories, and being snowed in reminded me of one. A retired nurse, she was a recurring baby-sitter for my grandniece, Amy. Once, when Amy was six (she’s graduating from college next year), Mom was driving her through a slippery Pittsburgh snowstorm on one of the back roads around Penn Hills and Monroeville. As the car began spinning and swerving, Amy shouted, “Grandma, don’t kill us!”

The car ended up off road, but a young man witnessed it and got her out in short order. However, the sentence, “Grandma, don’t kill us!” is enshrined in family lore.

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An Exasperating Mask & Car Dream

Last night’s dreams wove and forth, like a fabric was being made, for large parts. Elements included a new, expensive sports car, someone misconstruing what was going on, and a first for me: wearing masks.

I dream about having new and expensive, exotic sports cars often. In this instance, the car was glossy black. Too precious to have anything like a roof, it featured two separate little seating positions with their own windshields.

While I was taking possession of that, driving around, admiring it and being admired, a parallel story went on. I lived in a fancy, wealthy neighborhood. One neighbor was a woman who was the classic helicopter mother. Doing everything with her two sons, she constantly hovered around them.

Well, the boys admired my car. I let them sit in it. She thought I was trying to take her sons. Dream parts were spent in me trying to explain to her what was going on, and her trying to avoid me because I was after her sons. Truly exasperating for a dream experience.

Exasperation was a dream theme. Next, I’ve parked the car and have arrived at this large gathering of people. We’re outside. Some friends are there, but most are strangers. My friends were telling people that I’m a writer, and then described my writing in glowing statements. This embarrassed me. It reached a point that I wouldn’t answer my friends when they asked what I was working on, but turned my back on them.

They stayed with me, though. We were all now wearing masks as we walked around, and I was trying to social distance, and telling others to do the same. Young people often wouldn’t wear a mask or distance, mocking me when I called them out on it. One male teenager, a redhead, was particularly exasperating, stupidly smirking when I told him to put a mask on and step back. He then made it a point, like a joke, to try to sneak up on me. He finally went away.

We had to go up to another level. I took the stairs to that. Halfway up, I discovered arrows pointing in the opposite direction. Then I found the way blocked with tape. I realized that they apparently had set the stairs up to be one way, but they’d only done this from the top. And they’d made no apparent provisions for people who needed to go up instead of down.

Yes, exasperating. Milling among people, my friends still behind me, talking about my writing, I abruptly realized that I wasn’t wearing my mask. Horrified, I pulled it out and put it on. Then I glanced around, checking to see if anyone had noticed.

No one had noticed, and I continued milling. Then, again, my mask was off. How did this keep happening? I wondered. I didn’t remember taking it off. My mask was in my pocket again. I put it on with a warning to myself to be more vigilant.

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This Sunday

Sunday morning started with the usual Sunday morning white man with cat issues, which is replying to the demand, “Feed me, feed me, feed me, and get these other cats away from me,” in surround sound because I have three of them. They didn’t care that we’d fallen back an hour, clock-wise, here in ‘Merica. Their clocks weren’t affected.

Eventually, the beasts were fed, watered, and released back to the backyard wilds, freeing me to be me. I slid to the computer. That’s when the morning took an oomph turn. My mighty HP laptop wasn’t connecting to the net. Everything else in the household was connected; why was I selected for this cruel honor.

Something about the machine was off. Memories of being a younger person and working on my cars were awakened. I started car life with a 1965 Mercury Comet sedan. Forest green and automatic, a lively 289 V-8 was under the hood, as we said in those days. It was a stoutmobile. She’d run.

She was like my first girlfriend. I learned to do things, and did the standard stuff, from gapping and replacing plug and points (and all the wires) to brakes, muffler, and shocks, and all the fluids and fuses in between.

I think, because of that car, I’ve always since tried to fix things myself. Tried is a key verb in that sentence. (Is it a verb? I don’t know. I used to know these things.)

Details of what I did and the results will be avoided. No need to restore my stress levels by recalling those excoriating details. I worked on the computer for hours, returning it to connectivity. Doing so demanded a need to run recovery, a Microsoft Windows 10 process that’s not as nice as it sounds. Lots of personal files were removed (yeah, they said that wouldn’t happen, and they were wrong), along with apps and programs that I’d installed.

I had back ups of files, and MS does have some file recovery stuff. Eventually, though, I had almost everything. For some reason, I lacked the bible for the latest novel in progress. Don’t know what happened to that doc.

Reading old files slowed the process. Oh, there was The Soul Stone written years ago, never submitted nowhere. I read and enjoyed its first pages, along with Spider City, Everything Not Known, Everything in Black and White, and some stranger works, and the first draft of the self-published words, like the Lessons with Savanna series and Returnee. All still there, waiting for me to turn my attention back to them and do something more with them.

Not on this Sunday, though.

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Three out of Five Dreams

Three out of five dreams. It sounds like one of those old commercials about dentists and gum.

Of my five remembered dreams last night, two were intriguing but don’t pester my brain as the others do. The last one was downright depressing.

In the first of the three, I’d come to have a new Aston Martin roadster. Gorgeous car, ticketing out to a quarter million dollars. Deciding to keep it, I forged documents to show myself as the owner. Then I drove it around, showing it off.

People were admiring. I basked in it. Young friends asked for rides. I obliged, turning off traction control and shredding expensive tires with smoky burnouts.

Then…I started wondering, what’s going to happen? How will this end? They company will realize that the documents are forgeries. I thought, I need to get it back to them, and began crazy plotting to do that.

I assign this dream to the imposter syndrome surfacing yet again.

The second dream, brief, was amusing and sardonic.

I was in a large warehouse sort of building. Pale green, it was well-lit. Several others were with me. As we walked around and looked around — the dream provided no excuse for this setting — someone said, “What do all those buttons and switches do?”

And I, still looking up at the ceiling, answered, “Try them and see. That’s what I always do.”

Yeah, see? I always press my own buttons.

In the third dream to be discussed, I was leaving one overseas location to go home. I don’t think I was in the military…at first.

Ah, yes: confused identity. Still fall back on identifying myself in the military as who I am.

There was a gathering first…for someone else, another, who was younger. I supported that, giving gifts. I had a collection of things I wanted to keep together. Some many things were happening in parallel, all became a hasty rush. Going to leave — because it was time — someone gave me a pile of shredded docs and torn papers.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“That stuff you wanted to keep because it was important.”

I was incredulous, of course. “It’s all destroyed.”

“But it’s all there.”

They thought was a joke.

I tried shaking it off. Champagne was there.

“Let’s have champagne to celebrate my friend.” I picked up the bottle and unwrapped the cork, then popped it off. It discharged with tired energy, barely emitting a pop and shooting off about six feet. So dismaying.

Champagne foamed out. I stoppered it with my thumb. “We need glasses.” All started searching for something to pour the champagne in. No drinking glasses could be found. We improvised with paper cups that we made.

Then I was off to leave. You ever see the show, “Burn Notice”? Bruce Campbell plays Sam Axe in it; he sometimes employs a fake identity, Chuck Finley.

Well, here was Bruce as Sam, saying he was Chuck, accompanying me to the checkpoint.

I’m in an Air Force uniform now, last in light. An old guy is checking me through. You put your name onto a clipboard and sign it, then produce your document. He was looking for a form 126. I didn’t have my form 126. I searched and searched. I had it earlier; now it was gone.

“Then you can’t go in,” he said.

Sam Axe to the inspector, “Come on, buddy, can’t you cut him a break?”

The inspector just looked at him.

Sam tried again. “You know who he is?” He indicates me. “You don’t want to piss him off.”

I pulled out my wallet, the one purchased in the Philippines long ago. I still have it, it’s lovely, but I don’t use it. In the dream, it started falling apart in my hands. “My wallet,” I said. “I bought this in the Philippines when I was young.”

The inspector graced me with a sad headshake and walked away. Sam said, “Well, I tried.” He handed me clothes and walked off.

I was in my uniform. I would change now. I removed my Air Force trousers and put on the new trousers. They were about two feet too long and way too large at the waist. They also emitted a weird black dust.

Sighing, I removed them, intending to put my uniform back on. A tour group of women arrived, talking about books, as I was changing. “One woman said, “Sir, you need to leave. You’re in our way.”

Ouch. Dream end.

I half-awoke with dreams drifting through my head. Grey morning light dully lit the room. A cat could be heard puking in the other room.

Ouch.

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Mimi Update

Mimi is the neighbor’s beautiful little gray and white cat. She had a close call with a car the other day. Turned out, she’d been hit.

I wrote about her close call in Friday Fragments. I saw Mimi streak away and reported it to the neighbor. I’ve seen cats streak away from accidents only to succumb later.

Such was the case now. Mimi’s back end was injured. She dragged herself into the house and hid. My neighbors searched for her but couldn’t find her. Midnight that night, Mimi made a noise and she was found, along with the extents of her injuries. They rushed her to care.

Mimi could be saved. The price would be high. Her injuries were extensive, and the quality of life and her future would be very uncertain. Grieving at 2:30 AM, the people made the decision they thought best for themselves and their cat.

Coronavirus restrictions were broken as the vet allowed them to say good-bye.

It was the humane thing to do.

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Friday Fragments

  1. People tell me how skinny I’ve become. Interesting, because I weigh just seven pounds less than two years ago. What I’ve pieced together, based on history and what doctors told me, is that my prostrate gland had become severely enlarged. It blocked my bladder, eventually causing a medical emergency because I couldn’t void myself. My little old one- hundred ml bladder had eleven hundred ml of piss in it, according to the staff when I arrived that morning in the ER. According to my doc when he recounted it later, I was grossly distended. So, no, it wasn’t weight; I was full of piss. Once that was all relieved, and my prostate has shrunk some, my organs are no longer displaced, and no longer have an abdomen that sticks out like a car bumper.
  2. You can read about my 2019 troubles in Peckerville here.
  3. My prostate/bladder experience reaffirmed the need to not look at everyone through the same lenses. They may look overweight, but it could be something else completely.
  4. I’m also looking at my food differently. I used to consider sugars, fat, and content whenever I made a food selection. We’ve moved sharply toward organic and natural food in the past fifteen years. I was diagnosed with high blood pressure (hypertension) last year. I’m on meds for it. I now check sodium content in food and keep it down. I’m staggered by how much sodium is used in modern processed food. It’s eye opening, and not in a good way. The Trader Joe’s foods that I used to enjoy are completely unacceptable.
  5. Speaking of looking at things differently, the neighbor’s cat was almost done in by a car the other day, right before my eyes. Mimi, a gorgeous little grey and white kitty, was sitting on the curb across the street. A pedestrian was chatting with her. He later said, though, another cat was distracting Mimi. A car came rushing up the street. Mimi decided then to cross.
  6. Cats don’t view the world as we do. They have a harder time discerning a car forty feet away, traveling at a speed of thirty miles per hour, coming at them.
  7. The car brakes to a halt with a sharp screech of tires. Mimi appears safe. She streaks home. All are concerned. I knock on the neighbor’s door and tell her what happened and where Mimi went. I haven’t seen Mimi or neighbor since. It worries me, but I think if something bad happened, my neighbor would come and tell me. That’s how she is.
  8. We were out shopping Tuesday. Had to renew the car registration in Medford, so we thought we’d shop and gas up the car at the same time. All went well but I realized, I don’t really miss people during this pandemic/stay-at-home era. I miss my routines. Yes, I miss having beers with friends or going dancing, and traveling, but it’s not about missing the people as much as doing things other than what I’m doing. I’ve always known I’m not a social person. I don’t know how much of this to assign to what, personality wise. In other words, how much is due to my genetic makeup, and how much of it is a socialization thingy?
  9. We’re seriously processing moving out of state, probably heading east. Well, come on, we live in Oregon; we can’t go south to California. Going north to Washington has been addressed, but it doesn’t seem feasible.
  10. Looking at house photos online to fill in an idea of what housing would be like, I’m fascinated by the difference in home décor between the Pacific northwest, and Ohio/Pennsylvania, where we’re looking. We’ve always been aware of the differences in clothing fashion between different parts of the country. There are also usually differences attributable to age and economic straits. And, visiting family, yes, I’ve also noticed it when I visit their homes. So much viewing, I suppose, has driven the disparity more deeply into me.
  11. The other thing is about how housing styles have changed through the decades. Back in the forties, fifties, and sixties, (I don’t know about other decades, because I don’t see houses from other times), homes seemed to mostly form follow function. Small box houses. Little character is evidenced outside. The yards are large, the rooms are small, especially bathrooms.
  12. Later, though, the houses grow more and more about exterior style. While the boxes were efficient but less attractive, the newer houses become more inefficient in their interiors, with lots of wasted space or strange spaces. Yards are smaller, though all of the yards on the listings I check are larger than the yards out here. I have several friends who are retired or practicing architects. I’d love to talk to them about evolving house designs. One was on the forefront of tiny houses and sustainable living, so I really want to get her take.
  13. We have three firm rules for our new place, wherever we settle. One, no mortgages. Paying in cash limits our choices (we don’t want to sink all of our cash into a house, right?), but we don’t want a mortgage. Two, no HOAs. They’ve burned us twice; never again. I think they’re one of the more ridiculous modern contrivances. Three, we need a little space. We just don’t like living on top of other people. When we first move back, we will be renting, of course. We’ve done this before. Although we haven’t moved in fourteen years, I was in the military for twenty years, as was my father before me. I’ve moved a lot during my lifetime.
  14. I’m pretty convinced we need to move. Not looking forward to it, but… But years of smoky summers and droughts, water restrictions, and wildfires have worn us down. Sad, because Ashland, Oregon, and the region are beautiful and wonderful in multiple ways. The negatives, though, have just added up. Given the trends of the previous ten years and the forecasts and models, we only see it getting worse.

Have a good day. Wear your masks, please. Be safe. Cheers

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