Weird Dream Number 5839

Just another bizarre, wild and wacky dream in my world produced by, who-knows-where ....

I don't know if this was the beginning or if what stayed in mind from the dream just picked up at a random spot in the timeline.

I dreamed that I had made the South Salem High School baseball team. That uniforms were handed out just moments before the first pitch of the first game and for whatever reason, I was a few minutes behind the rest of the team, making it out to the field. I sat down on the bench next to some guy who immediately attempted to bully with a physical shove followed with spoken mind games. Refusing to move, I countered with responses that just led to a continuation and ramping up of his efforts. 

This went on for a minute or two before I awoke. 

This is at least the second that time this guy has appeared in my dreams. I've no idea where he comes from or why he's out to intimidate me. 

The only bullying in my life was when I was six or seven years old, by a neighborhood kid that was three years older. My teacher noticed something in my behavior, asked my mom about it and discovered the root of the problem. It turned out that the kid had also been a student of hers. She had a talk with him, (or his parents), and the issue was quickly resolved.

The SSHS angle? Who knows? I never attended school there. It was across town, and I rarely thought of or think about the place unless I happen to be driving by. As a twenty-something, I once attended three or four sessions of a community college assertiveness class there. But other than that ...... and many games of basketball played and refereed in the gym of the physically connected middle school, I have no association with the place. Oh and add a football game watched in a late autumn downpour .... possibly the coldest I've ever been.

So where does this dream stem from? Why has this total stranger of a bully popped up at least twice?

Then, after falling back to sleep, weird dream number 5840 followed .... Driving through a parking lot and a car suddenly appears and hits mine, popping the hood of the car and causing the radiator to burst, car to stop running and the walk home to the house where I grew up. 

That's the only thing in all this that makes any sense to me .... The house I grew up in.

Why? 

Wednesday Notes From the Edge

Just a few notes from the past few days, as I recall them, likely slanted more and more in my favor as time passes and memories blur .....

• 'This morning, The Gringo' (a co-worker) told me, "Thank you" . .... "You do what you do well." It was nice to hear, but I don't think he really knows what I do. Though I'll accept any thanks I can get.
• These days it seems, the only thing that matters to me is getting home. Wherever I've been, I just want to get home. And once I've decided to head for home, stopping anywhere along the way is not a consideration.
• Why is the thousand island, always pushed to the back of the dressing choices at the grocery store salad bar? Am I the only one who tops their salad with thousand?
• It's pretty much a 100% certainty that I'm a big walking mass of confusion and contradictions but if there's one thing I know beyond a doubt it's that there is no way in hell that I'm ever going to try sushi.
• Now I'm worried that I'm going to face eternal hellfire and damnation for grabbing two extra spoons at the grocery store deli.

Grouchy Old Geezer

Perhaps an evening when I should have just stayed home.

Venturing downtown, I found irritation at damn near everything.

Red lights. Street crossing lights taking their sweet time turning to go. 7:27pm and a Saturday night, thirty-minute parking spot, the ordinance still in effect until 8:00pm. People parking next to me. People on the sidewalks walking towards me, or rounding corners, stepping into my desired, and in my eyes and estimation, my rightful path. Closed record store. Closed bookstore. My reflection in a window. One-way streets. A setting sun that was way too bright and seemingly no matter which way I turned, in my eyes. 

For tonight, I am the stereotypical, grouchy old man. I've never been an extrovert and tonight took further steps in the direction of anti-social. That said while laughing at/to myself in case someone thinks I'm too f'ing serious.

Gone

So, all those years of having your back, apparently meant nothing. All the efforts to brighten your day, forgotten.

You walked off for the final time without a word. Like it never entered your mind. Like we were total strangers. I could not have done that to you. It's funny how two different people can have totally different ideas of what friendship and a connection is. I must have imagined that I made a difference. 

I would have gone out of my way to make sure I found you and say goodbye, let's keep in touch or I'll see you later. Something. 

And this is what it got me. Easily forgotten.

CRAMP!!

 Oh what a feeling .....

There's few experiences quite as enjoyable as waking up at 3:00am, stretching your legs and ...... CRAMP!!! Instant and intense, there was no strategic pause involved as inserted in the prior sentence. I had just awoken from a dream that my boss invited me inside his front door where he had some weird flashing lighting going on. I'm not sure that if allowed to continue, the dream would have turned into a nightmare involving chainsaws and axes. 

I'll be 'walking slow' for a bit. One of my favorite songs. (Jackson Browne). When 'Late For the Sky' was released nearly fifty years ago, I thought the song was filler material. Years later, it became a desert island song choice. I have memories of walking down the sidewalk in front of my college dorm (Go Beavs) and the song blasting from the third-floor speaker in the window, of the guy who resided across the hallway from me. We had yet to meet so that was my reason to knock on his door and introduce myself. Being shy, that was a difficult few steps to take. But I felt driven.

It's funny how time and/or distance can change opinions and perceptions.

And it proves, or at least suggests, that memories are more clearly retained when associated with a song. 

"Walking slow down the avenue of my old neighborhood. Don't know why I'm happy, I've got no reason to feel this good."  

That's all it took to make a new friend. He invited me inside to check out his record collection. I invited him across the hall to check out mine. His was much cooler. 

The Storm .... Or Things to Make the Evening Interesting

That was quite the storm last night. An intense hour or so, occurring at sunset. 

Severe storm alerts suddenly scrolling across my television. I walked outside to immediately witness a large and intimidating lightning bolt flash and streak, east to west, across the sky. Almost seemed like it was only a hundred yards away. Bright sky to the west ..... dark and threatening to the east. A weird, eerie orange glow, reminding me of the new color witnessed when we had a total solar eclipse a few summers ago. Not the same hues but reminiscent in that it was a color never seen before.

(I was expecting the spell checker to pop up on 'reminiscent' ..... maybe I got it right?)

An intense thirty minutes to an hour followed with continuous thunder, lightning, wind and heavy rain. The damaging hail mentioned on the alert didn't happen here. Not sure of the length of the fury as I lost track of time. 

Then just as suddenly as it arrived, it was over. A few minutes later, it was like it never happened. there had been forecasts for 48 hours of the possibility of afternoon and evening thunderstorms but of this intensity wasn't mentioned or expected. 

I read that there were 5400 lightning to ground strikes around the NW area. I don't know, but that seems a bit extreme to me. 

Maybe some are accustomed to weather like this but it's a rarity here.

And through it all, I alternated between storm watching and a thirteen inning, 1-0 Yankee loss to the Mariners where there was no mention of a storm, a few hours away in Seattle. 

And just an hour or two before the storm blew in, I was at the new record store in town, excitedly stumbling across a 1969 Chick Corea album, (on original vinyl, I think), that I've never seen before, with no idea what was coming our way.

The Process

Just a thought about new music from old, and even not-so-old favorites. 

Upon first listen you're often unsure .... or disappointed. It's not what you were expecting. It's not what you hoped for. It's different and your soul was expecting similar.

But you promise yourself that you'll give it another chance. The musician is an old favorite after all.

Then after three or four listens, it's even been known to take three or four years, you've decided that you like a song or two. Quite a bit in fact. Then another .... and another. 

At some point, you begin including it in your mind, right there with all the older, classic albums that came before. 

And before you know it, it's time for another new record. Renewed expectations and excitement about the release date, often leading to initial letdowns only to eventually become loved treasures.

..... and further notes and thoughts:

• Should all of the above be one paragraph or is it good as is?
• New release day isn't what it used to be. Even with all the access to information now, more often than not it seems, I find out about new releases, AFTER they've been out a few months.
• Or maybe I should just accept that my favorites are just not as popular with other age groups as they are with me. They've been replaced by new names and genres a few years ..... errrr decades ago. 
• And why does my ankle feel tonight, like all my previous sprained ankles are coming back to haunt it?