Tag: youth

Friday’s Theme Music

The wheel keeps on turning, and the day is Friday again. February 11, 2022. It’s another stunner of a sunny day out there, already up to 55 degrees F, according to my office weather station. The earth turned us into the sun at 7:13 this morning and will turn us away at 5:38 PM. They tell us it’ll hit 76 in the valley today, which would be a new record. Maybe, but my part of the valley didn’t see the 75 they claimed yesterday. We’re now into a historic stretch of dry weather, a sad promise that the drought will probably continue and deepen this year.

I have a strange one in the morning mental music stream: “The William Tell Overture”. I’m speculating that it’s because of the horses in a dream I had. Though they were tiny horses — smaller than a cat — they triggered a memory of “The Lone Ranger”. That was a television show that played on Saturday mornings in my youth, alongside “Sky King”, “Looney Tunes” (featuring Bugs Bunny and the gang), “Mighty Mouse”, “Tom and Jerry”, “Deputy Dawg”, and “Top Cat”. What glorious morning television! Then, eat fast, dress fast, and bang, out the door, often on my bike, unless the snow was too deep. In every season except winter, my baseball mitt hung on my handlebar, so I was ready and available for any pickup baseball or softball game that I came across.

“The William Tell Overture” is associated with “The Lone Ranger” because it was used as the theme music. A teacher took note of this and used it as a teaching moment, introducing us to classical music. From “The William Tell Overture”, we ended up exploring “In the Hall of the Mountain King”, “Peter and the Wolf”, and many others. She’s the same teacher who prodded me into reading more and expanding my reading interests. I owe her a huge debt.

So, let’s return to those thrilling days of yesteryear. It’s a rousing, heroic melody, ideal for your weekend beginning, weekend, whatever. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, when needed, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Here’s the music. Hi-Yo, Silver, I’m galloping off for some coffee. Cheers

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Monday’s Theme Music

Yep, turn the page. Start a new leaf. Begin anew, again. November is upon us, a continuation of the autumn months for those of us above the equator. We’re like a ship sailing toward winter. Clouds grow darker and heavier. Sunshine thins and fades, surrendering us to increasingly cold air. We hover around warm spots, watching the horizons for signs of snow, awaiting the next phase.

Or we shrug and press on. Or gather winter sports equipment, put on warmer coats, and head for the hills. Who cares what season it is? Well, we care, but each season brings it personality in. We can usually find things to love and admire in each season. The cats, though, are definitive summer folk. They’re already going out only to dart back in with complaints. “Where is the sun? Turn off the wind. Make it warmer.” So they go until they find a faintly suitable place and curl up, gradually replacing their mutterings with snores.

Today is Monday, November 1, 2021, the first Monday in November. So, we’ll have five Mondays in this month, along with five Tuesdays. The sunshine shifted into the valley with meager offerings at 7:44 AM. The sun will fade away at 6:05 PM. Temperatures will stay chilly with rainfall and winds contributing, giving us a high of 56 degrees F. But the air is clear and absent any signs of wildfire smoke.

For reasons that aren’t in focus for me, a 1973 Marvin Gaye song is playing in the morning mental music stream. Yes, Marvin is singing, “Let’s Get It On”, a smooth, lovely song, evocative of hopeful young love and sex. Hearing the song conjures scenes of dark houses with slow dancing, making out on furniture, quiet pairings of couples who sneak away for some privacy. All this goes with the Halloween period because growing up in the western Pennsylvania area as a teen, that early darkness in alignment with parents’ work hours afforded some unique opportunities to visit with friends in their houses. We were usually outside in the summer and spring, see, while winter brought freezing air and heavy snow that made such visiting difficult. Also, reaching into November, you were a month, almost two, into the new school year. Got to reacquaint yourself you hadn’t seen for a while, rekindling affection and interest. I guess I untied the knot about why the song is hovering around my mind this morning.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Here’s the music, there’s my coffee, and here we go, galloping on into November. Onward, he cried from the rear. Let’s go. Cheers

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The New Clothing Dream

A friend and I were staying with a gay couple. I seemed to be in my early twenties. The couple lived in a city apartment a few floors up. A big city, the place was busy and noisy. I was there to get rid of my old clothing, and then I was taking a trip to get new clothing. We were flying out for that purpose the next day. Meanwhile, my buddy wanted us to go out on the town before leaving. Parallel to this, our hosts were throwing a party (unrelated to our visit). They’d also received a new table and were putting it together.

As I’d chosen to get rid of my old clothes except what I was wearing and what I was traveling in the next day, I decided to find something to wear from the clothes I was getting rid of to wear out on the town. It should be something festive. I found an old pale yellow shirt with a red parrot embroidered on the left chest, a shirt I haven’t owned in over thirty years.

I paused while dressing to watch them trying to put the new table together. It wasn’t going well. They thought parts were missing and were calling the manufacturer for help. I thought that I would be doing it differently, as they seemed disorganized, but I believed part of the issue was that they already had too many people involved, so I remained uninvolved.

My friend was urging me to hurry up. It was night, and the night was calling him. He was wearing jeans and a maroon puffy jacket. I was only in a shirt. “Is it cold out? Do I need a jacket?” Without awaiting an answer, I went into my old clothes for a jacket. I pulled it on, but then decided it was too heavy and replaced with a lighter jacket, an old black “Members Only” jacket I used to have. I then worried, maybe I should change shirts because the parrot was no longer seen. But I left it at that. He and I scampered down the steps and into the brightly-lit night to have fun.

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A War Games Dream

I dreamed I was playing war games. Not the kind where troops are loaded into aircraft and dropped somewhere while aircraft fly sorties and ships maneuver, such as the ones I did as an adult in the military. No, this was the board games type where famous battles are played out to see how you fare compare to the real deal, on boards pre-home computers. I used to play these all the time. I’d started with Battleship, progressed to Risk, Axis & Allies, and then got into more complex games. I’d even gone so far as to invent my own.

In this dream, I was a teenager. Like a movie, I was watching me. Walking around outside, I found small hills shaped like mountains and forests that rose to my thighs. Pieces about two feet tall were all around. Each was shaped as a tank to represent armor units, infantry, jets, destroyers, aircraft carriers, submarines, etc.

I realized I was on a huge board game. I wasn’t sure if I was a player, so I walked around, regarding the different pieces. They were very cool to me. The first pieces encountered were of WW II in Europe and north Africa, I discovered pieces from the American Civil War in one section, then found the Napoleonic Wars.

Someone told me it was my turn. I asked questions about what was going on, like, which side am I on, and what I was supposed to be doing. As the other explained it, I realized it was my father as he was when I was young. I was just grappling with pieces to make my first move when the dream ended.

Awakening, I chuckled about the war the subconscious neurons like to play as they engage in their own games.

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A Dream of Angst and Symbolism

Dream hits keep coming. In another busy night, one stood out.

I was welcomed into a luxury hotel, room 506. There, I found wonderful devices. Connected to my brain, they enabled to accomplish things with simple thought. Think the words and they’re typed. Imagine a food and it’s there. Ponder a drink and it’s at hand.

Wow, of course, right. I was giddy with amazement. Enjoying myself, I went off. Dream time zipped by. I found myself lost. Struggling to find my way back to my hotel and room, I ended up down on an airport tarmac looking for a way in. A woman gave me a white cap. Realizing everyone was wearing one, I put it on so I blended in. Then, trying to sneak into the building past the others (I was casual about it), another woman with a loud voice accosted me, demanding that I write three things on my cap. That confused the hell out of me. (Love that expression: look, no more hell in me! It’s a temporary state, though.) I asked, “Why should I write that on my cap?”

She snipped, “Because you’re part of my security team.”

Removing the cap with a smirk, I answered, “No, I’m not.”

I just walked past her after that. Suddenly back in the hotel, I asked the staff, “Where’s my room?” They replied, “Who are you?”

Although it irritated me, I gave them my name. Then I asked, “What room am I in?” They told me that I should know my room number. Irritation growing because they weren’t helping me and I couldn’t remember my room number, I began guessing. I recall something about two. “Two something, two something. Two oh five. Two oh six.” Then it hit me, no, no, it’d been eleven. One and one was two. I’d reached that by adding the numbers together. Right, five oh six.

Knowing the room number and suddenly the key, a card, was in my hand. I rushed to my room. Shock and dismay quickly displaced my happiness and satisfaction. The room had been trashed. All my neat stuff was damaged and broken. Walking around, I demanded, “What happened? Who did this?” As answers didn’t come, I thought, I must fix these, and began picking up the pieces.

That’s when this dream ended. Yes, this one was weighted with all manner of symbolism and angst. Still fun, you know?

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