This morning I was jolted awake from a dream. It was quite surreal: spectacular, beautiful, and bizarre ~ and by the time I woke myself up to get out of it, it had become quite frightening.
It began as a random little festival-type affair in the backyard of the house I grew up in, back in Tennessee. There were small African artifacts, knick-knacks, and tchotchkes on display everywhere and little coin-operated rides shaped like lions, giraffes, tigers, and antelopes, with kids I'd never seen before riding on them. As strange as all of that was, considering the house I grew up in had no indoor plumbing and no bathroom, it got even more strange when I turned from watching a kid riding on a mechanical elephant to watching another kid playing with an actual koala ~ which suddenly made me realize that I was not in my old backyard at a Africanesque mini-festival, but somewhere in/near Australia.
As I turned back around to re-survey the scene, I saw that it had changed, and that I was now at a full-out carnival: there were Ferris Wheels, Tilt-A-Whirls and other similar carnival-type rides strewn all across the vast expanses of land that had grown from nowhere and where there were woods and forests before. I started walking and taking in all the sites, still trying to figure out exactly where I was, and wondering if by chance I needed to figure out WHO I was: none of this was making any sense, but now and then, something familiar would catch my eye. I just didn't know exactly 'why' they seemed familiar.
There were authentic-looking structures everywhere, and things began taking on a decidedly more African look again; I went strolling thru fields and scenes of African-style buildings and crafts where the rides and concession stands were mere seconds prior to my last blink. I walked and walked thru these scenes, surrounded by people in what would be considered traditional African garb, doing traditional-looking African dances and chanting African hymns and songs. I felt a strange comfort as I walked thru these scenes, oddly knowing and feeling that that was all that they really were: scenes, and not reality. I felt, as I wandered in and out of fields filled with people and animals, that "the bright sun was shining down on me, baking me, darkening my already chocolate skin to an even more African hue, centering me and making me more whole, leading me closer to be one with the Motherland." As I walked and thought these thoughts, I suddenly began to feel less calm, and I realized that I has stumbled into what could only be considered a cemetery. It was remarkably elabourate and detailed; words I somehow understood but had never seen were etched and printed into and on stone, shadows began shifting into something seemingly other than shadows, as the sun was quickly settling beyond its halfway post in the sky. Figures began to rise from behind what I finally realized were tombstones, and I began to feel a strong sense of unease and to fear for my safety if I remained there much longer ~ but the only way to get out of there was to jump off/over/down a wall that had to be at least 50 feet high, with water flowing down it from the cracks and crevasses that lined it. As the animal howls and shouts began to sound more sinister than sweet, I decided to jump for it...
Once I fell from the graveyard to the much lower level, it took me a minute to assess where I was at this point: I was simply back at the beginning of when I thought I was at a carnival, only the carnival had left and all that remained were the people who'd been there celebrating before. Plus a couple thousand of their deranged and psychotic friends and acquaintances.
I walked around for a bit and eventually came across what appeared to be my childhood home. I knew that it couldn't be, seeing as though nothing else seemed to fit that scope, and I hoped that it wasn't because I had to use the bathroom! I opened the door, peered in, and finally went inside and found the bathroom. After I'd flushed and washed my hand, I looked in the mirror and saw that my dreads (!) needed some tending to, or at least to be tied back and/or covered. So, I walked back out to the front room -- and HERE is where it really got bizarre!
In the front room, on the telephone, was my friend Kim Fields, and along the far wall were most of the wigs she'd worn when she was on "Living Single", along with several scarves and hats. After getting her attention and asking if I could borrow some scarves, I grabbed a few, tied up my locs, and went back outside. Where it would seem a war had just been fought. And lost. It was essentially an African wilderness in the parking lots of several abandoned warehouses, and it had been ravaged, severely...
People were running around looking at the damage that had been caused, while other people were standing over bodies that had been ripped and torn asunder, and as I stood seemingly still, taking it all in, it seemed that it was all getting closer and closer to where I stood. So, I took off walking, not having any idea where I was or where I was going. The unfamiliar-yet-familiar house that I'd just left was gone, and there was no trace of anything that seemed even the remotest bit like "I know what that is". I sped up my pace, reaching for my phone to text or call somebody to help me figure out what the fuck was going on and tell whoever to come and fucking get me -- I was beginning to be more than a bit scared. As I was texting someone {I don't have a clue who!}, a small, bloody hand reached out to grab my phone, and I spun around to see who it was. There were several young African boys standing there looking at me, looking at my phone, and the looks in their eyes told me to BE UP & OUT, so I started walking backward as they began speaking, yelling at me in their native language, causing my slight fear to turn into pure terror. I turned and took off running, trying to finish and send my text all the while; for whatever reason, I looked back over my shoulder to see how far back the boys were, but oddly they'd not even begun to chase me. So, of course, I fell, and THAT'S when they gave chase! So, I'm up again, running for my life, screaming, text be damned, just running and running, I dropped my phone but kept on running...
...and that's when I woke up: standing just in front of our bedroom door, my mobile phone laying on the floor where it had fallen when it disconnected from its charger, both of which had been on my nightstand, both of which were now on the floor. I felt scared (though the fear was fading), tired, relieved, and quite damn silly, as it was becoming more and more clear that I'd ran myself outta the bed from a damn dream. But I was still a bit shook up. AND, I had to pee!
I went back to bed afterward, but I turned on the TV. It was about 8:30am, and I wanted to go back to sleep, but since I was now wide awake I figured I'd watch some telly. Besides, I wanted to allow that dream to move the hell on before I attempted to sleep again! ~LMQAO~
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