Tag: fair

The Disasters Dream

Sunshine blazed down from a cloudless blue sky. I was arriving at a busy site ensconced in a valley’s flat green floor, either a fair or festival, I realized. Laughing and happy folks were everywhere. Waving to me, my wife and her sister called me over to their group, introducing me to others and then explaining in turns, “This is the Father Festival. You’ve never been to one? It’s put on every year. Free food, games, and prizes. There’s music and dancing later. Have a drink.”

Taking this in, I looked around and saw fathers of childhood friends and male teachers circulating, instructing, ordering. No, I’d never heard of this, but I participated.

Then, dream shift. The festival was nearing its end. A mountain hid the sun. Though the sky seemed clear, it was much suddenly much colder as shadows cloaked us and the light faded.

I’d been traveling and decided I wanted to change clothes. A group of us found a motel and got rooms. Entering one, I asked the others to leave the room so I could wash up and change. Talking and laughing forced me to raise my voice. “Will you all get out so I can change?” Laughing, mocking me, they finally acquiesced.

I found my long-sleeved blue shirt. That’s the one I wanted to wear. Just as I stepped toward the bathroom, the building shook. In another second, people yelled in shrill voices, “Earthquake.” Sirens rose.

A man broke into the room. “There’s a tsunami warning. We need to leave and get up the mountain.”

Dressing in my blue shirt as I left the room, I joined my wife, her sister, and a small group of people. “Come on, we need to go,” I said. “This way. We’re going up the mountain.”

We fell in with a queue of people also trying to get up the mountain. Peering ahead, I saw fire up on the mountain’s upper side. Pulling my group aside, I said, “It’s on fire up there. Come on. Follow me. This way. Don’t tell the others yet. There’s going to be a panic, and then getting away will be a problem.”

I led the rest along a narrow mountainside path that was going up. I heard them yelling behind us as they discovered the fire. People were re-directed to follow me.

Stinging black smoke descended down on us. Bending low, covering my mouth and nose with a mask, I told everyone else to do the same. We hurried on along the path.

Then I came up short as I rounded a curve. The quake had opened a wide and deep crevice, and our path was gone, along with a chunk of mountainside. There was nowhere to go but back, but back wasn’t safe because the fire was engulfing where we’d been.

Dream end.

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The Bike Dream

Young again, my wife and I were visiting a town. Resplendent with cobblestones and old stone buildings, but in a warm environment by a large body of water, it seemed like this we were somewhere in southern Europe by the Mediterranean. A fair or festival was getting underway. Entertainment and food booths had been set up. It was briskly busy, in a pleasant way, with people enjoying themselves and one another but not so many people that moving around was difficult.

I went into a business, to a counter to make reservations for three couples. Entering, I had to follow a path prescribed by a red velvet rope, as used in theaters, and go through several checkpoints. I was a little confused about what I was doing and why, calling out to clarify and confirm it with my wife. But, yes, I was reserving three hotel rooms for six people. While this was going on, people were asking me to watch out for something I was carrying on my back. I never saw this thing in the dream but knew it was a large piece of art. The man behind the counter warned me (but in a friendly way) to watch that I didn’t break anything as I moved around, as they had glasswork hanging from the ceiling. There was much joking about all of this.

Back outside, my wife mentioned that friends said they’d been successful just getting two and a half rooms. That made no sense to me, so I asked her to repeat it. We went through this three times. As this happened, we were holding hands and walking up a hill on a cobblestone street. A man with a red bike joined us. A stranger, he was somewhat famous, and very good looking, with fine, Latina features. His English was accented but he spoke it well. He was walking his bicycle up the hill as he spoke with us, but then got on it and rode straight up the hill. As the hill was steadily steeper, his riding was impressive, especially when he did a wheelie and went up half the hill on only his back wheel. As he reached the top, my wife and I turned around to walk back down. We were talking and sightseeing while all this was transpiring.

The guy with the bike dismounted from it as he reached us and started walking his bike again, but he didn’t speak with us. He veered off, staying in parallel, and then released his bike. To our amazement, the bike stayed upright and wheeled ahead, but stayed with the guy, like the bike was a well-trained pet. His bike was red before but now it was black, puzzling me. Had I seen it wrong before, or did he change bikes?

Then, though, the man started slowing down to look at things. As he did, the bike sped up. I pointed this out to my wife; the man was paying no attention to his bike. We watched in astonishment as it went straight down the hill, crossed the busy street, and then stopped and stood still and upright in the sunshine.

Dream end.

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The Survey Dream

I found myself out with a crowd of people on a sunny day at a county fair. Rides were going on as music played. People were laughing, eating, and drinking. My wife and friends were with me. As we perused the fairgrounds, a man accosted us. “Would we be willing to participate in a survey? It’s twenty-five questions long. We’ll go over results later. You’ll be rewarded with tokens for rides, a free dinner, and drinks in another part of the fair later in the day.” Well, young and interested in free food and drinks and ride tokens, we agreed. A large group of us were given the surveys to complete and pencils. The survey form was a narrow piece of paper which turned out to be a small booklet. As my wife and I worked on it, we rode the Ferris Wheel. Multi-tasking at its finest, right?

The ride stopped at the top. I was writing an essay in answer to one question when I dropped my survey. This upset me because I was almost done. I could see exactly where it was on the ground. I also saw the man who’d given us the survey. Calling to him, I explained that I had dropped my survey and pointed out where it was. Could he get it for me?

No problem. He made his way through the crowd and around the rides to where I pointed. By the time he reached it, too much paper had accumulated there for him to find it. No problem. We finished our ride. When we reached the ground, I asked him and requested another survey. Well, he shouldn’t…but he did. I began working feverishly on finishing it in time.

Meanwhile, we’d moved toward the place where we would go over the results and get our free meal and drinks. The meal was a barbecue and I could smell it while the site was like an old television western set with picnic tables in a corral alongside a bunk house

Damn if I didn’t again lose my survey. This time, the wind took it into the corral. A split rail fence kept me from going after it immediately as the wind pushed it across dusty grounds. The survey man was with me when it happened. Laughing, I explained what’d happened and requested another survey. He was against this. Although he appreciated my enthusiasm, he was concerned that my answers would no longer be in the spirit of the survey because I was answering them so many times. I disagreed with his observation. That’s where the dream ended.

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