Tag: people

The Sci-Fi Dream

Yeah, another dream post. I’ve been avoiding them, but…well, here I am.

We were in a dark, dark future. It seemed like most of the light was sucked out of the world, but that may have been because we were confined to a small, claustrophobic keep. Blue dominated. It seemed like everything that was lit was indigo blue – clothes, walls, and machinery. There weren’t many of us, we didn’t have much food, and we were dying.

We were trying to solve multiple huge problems to stay alive. To do that, we’d learned how to look into the past. To solve the future problems, we discovered that, while seeing into the past, we could move people into the future, where we were. That was helpful. We then tried moving objects, like food, medicine, equipment, and machinery into the future. They couldn’t be moved. Whenever we tried moving anything but people into the future, it turned to blue and black dust.

We were puzzled; why could we move people, but not food and other things? Why just people? The question was never answered.

***

In an aside, I then dreamed that I was making my bed. When I untangled the sheets and covers and began straightening them, I heard jingling. I pulled back the corner of the sheets and found a pile of silver coins.

 

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Maybe

Maybe she’s sick or blind,

so, she don’t look this way, or,

maybe she’s afraid or worried,

so, she don’t look this way.

Maybe she’s unfriendly, stuck-up, or conceited,

cuz she don’t look this way,

or too insecure,

because she don’t look this way.

Could be that she’s dead,

’cause she don’t look this way

or maybe I’m invisible,

because she don’t look this way,

or I’m old, sick, or dying,

because she won’t look this way.

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The Question

A man passed, and he thought with horror, that guy smells like he shit his pants.

She passed in a green skirt and bright, flowery sweater. The man grimaced as acrid body odor assaulted his nose, and then another went by — he didn’t see her — in the other direction, filling the air with stale cigarette smoke that could’ve been Pall Malls.

An anonymous person passed in a haze of sour milk. Another clumped past with big, heavy red boots and large, swinging red purse, leaving moth balls’ ammonia scents wafting behind her. Her smell battled a urine fragrance as a sagging-faced gray man passed, then the skunk of marijuana from a lithe and young dark-haired man drifted through in the opposite direction.

Then he trudged by with a dirty hair smell from his hooded green coat.

Standing to leave, the man wondered, what do people smell when I go by?

 

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The Thinking

The cat had gone out during the night, but it was necessary to lock the petdoor behind him because the raccoons had figured out how to use it, and weren’t shy about coming into the house.

Now that the sun was shining, it was time to eat, and the big black cat wanted in. Removing the petdoor, the man lifted the flap and said, “Come on in, big guy.”

Responding with a light meow, the big cat put its front paws in and luxuriated in an extended stretch. As he ended the stretch, he began moving through the opening and into the house when he stopped. Staring, he emitted a disapproving meow.

The man looked back. Another of his cats was a few feet back in the room. The two had never gotten along. While they no longer fought with tooth and claw, they avoided one another’s presence and vocalized their dislike. In short, the black cat was not coming into the house with that other one in the room.

“Fine,” the man said with exasperation, releasing the pet door flap. “You can come in on your own, you stupid cat.”

It was so maddening that the two cats behaved these way, even after three years of living in the same house. He didn’t know what he was going to do about it.

In the meantime, he’d go check the mail. Glancing out the window, he saw a neighbor heading for the mail boxes.

He groaned. Peggy. He could not stand her. Her political views were…well, they were seriously crazy. Checking the time, he decided, he’d just sit down and wait until the other one went away.

Sighing as he sat, he thought, the world sure had become a complicated place.

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In the Bar

I await my turn. I am polite. Patient looking. Outside. Inside my fortress of solitude, where everything is secret, I rant at the slowness. Prozac people in a Prozac ballet, taking orders, accepting money and plastic, making drinks and change, handing out libation. It’s a thick crowd, hungering for libation, awaiting our turns under a televised baseball game.

The man beside me on the stool looks at me and frowns. I smile at him but decide not to speak. He’s drinking a beer. Looks like beer in the glass, anyway.

He says, “It must be hard to a woman. Learn to walk in heels. Find bras that fit you. Have guys stare at you.”

I’m dumbfounded into silence.

He says, “Fitting a bra is difficult. Men don’t need to learn how clothes fit them, not like bras. Men don’t wear bras.”

I’m about to counter him but I don’t want to speak. Speaking will encourage him.

He says, “I guess some men do, men who are going through a transgender thing, becoming a woman, I guess they need to learn how to walk in heels and fit a bra, if they get boobs. I suppose they get boobs. That’s part of being a woman, right? They also need to wear pantyhose, I guess, which I think is revolting, encasing yourself, like you’re a sausage. Remember that Seinfeld episode when George’s father and Kramer create the mansiere? Man, that was funny.”

He takes a drink of his beer. The bartender looks at me and raises his chin and his eyebrows, expressing to me without words, you’re next, what do you want?

I order a beer. IPA.

The man beside me says, “What was I saying?”

0

Conversing

You ever feel like you’re talking to someone who is having half of the conversation in their head, not saying the words but believing they had?

It can be confusing and exhausting.

0

The Story Left Behind

I’d been watching him because of his motionless manner of waiting. Dressed in jeans and a long sleeved gingham shirt, he stood straight, feet apart, clutching his box. Others fiddled, fidgeted, looked around, and shifted. Some checked phones. Besides that, the other eight people in the post office line were women. He and I were the only men.

He looked about my age, and had short grey hair, but I didn’t know him. Equal parts of bewilderment and resignation seemed poured into the man.

“Next,” the clerk said.

The man walked up to the counter and put his large box onto it. The box didn’t seem to weigh much.  As the clerk slid the box onto the scale, the man said in a loud voice, “There are eleven items in this box. Nine of them are glass bottles or jars. There are jams and jellies, pancake syrup, blueberry infused balsamic vinegar, and olive oil. All of those can break. I think the only things that can’t break are the Branson Chocolates and the pancake mix. It’s a thank you gift for my brother. We stayed at his house last week. My wife picked everything out. She said he’d like them. I guess I believe her.”

The postal clerk said, “Is there any alcohol, flammable materials, lithium batteries, or hazardous materials?”

“No.”

“Do you want it insured?”

“Yes, I was told to insure it and get a tracking number.”

“How much do you want to insure it for?”

“Fifty dollars.”

The clerk pressed buttons and applied labels. “Thirty-one ninety-five.”

The man paid.

“Have a good weekend,” the men said to each other as the postal clerk handed the other a receipt.

Nodding, the man folded the receipt, slipped it into a pocket, and walked out with equal parts of bewilderment and resignation, leaving me to wonder about the story he was leaving behind.

0

Observed

Perhaps wrongly, I’m irritated when someone becomes angry with me for not telling them something that I observed about them after someone else tells them about it, because I infer from their accusation that they tell me everything that they observe about me, and I don’t think they do.

0

Kindnesses

I suppose I’m not the only one with people in my life who remember every fault, often magnifying them, and hold them against you, and forget the kindnesses you did for them.

The kindnesses were in the past, and this is now, but their anger and resentment is eternal.

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