the old-school guestbook archives
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strange dreams and a shipwreck of a morning... ~ May 13, 2003 - 5:48 p.m. yesterday was weird. after that four hour nap I took in the afternoon, I went to the movie at saignam and fell asleep during the movie. it was some godawful boring italian movie. I mean awful. and I like foreign films-- when they're good. so I fell asleep in the movie and woke up with the credits rolling, feeling woozy and overheated and weird. couldn't get my equilibrium. I felt all emotionally fucked up too, like I wanted to scream or cry or hit someone. or get drunk. or smoke a cigarette. I was just all over the place weird. I wanted a man to come and hold me and stroke my hair. a man, not a woman. I don't know why. I took myself home, and wobbled around getting ready for bed. crawled into bed and fell right to sleep. then this morning, I had the hardest time waking up. I fell back asleep and had this dream (as e-mailed to my sister): I dreamed I'd come home to find that mom and dad had adopted a new kitten. no big surprise there. except that suddenly the dream changed and it wasn't a kitten, it was a baby. just about the most beautiful baby girl ever, all sparkly and smiley and sweet. we were all in the living room, mom, dad, you, me, and sean -- I don't remember the boys being there, or jen, but I was thinking about them, so they weren't out of the picture.
but we were there and passing the baby around, and I just had to hold her. once I had her, I just carried her around with me and wouldn't let go, and she loved being carried by me. and it wasn't really clear exactly who had adopted the baby, but I thought it must be either you or mom and dad. I kept trying to work it out, but neither made sense... I couldn't imagine you taking on another little one right now-- and mom and dad????? for some reason, it never occurred to me that it could be sean and jen. we were all in love with this little baby, though. anyway, there she was, and there was some tall, dark, imposing, unfriendly guy in the living room, too, all kind of hanging over us and interfering, and I realized he was some kind of caseworker. finally, he left, and I said to the baby girl "bet you're glad to see the back of him, huh?" and then this guy I hadn't noticed before said "maybe you should pay attention to who's around before you say things like that." and I realized that he was the baby's natural father. he was brown-skinned and missing his left leg below the knee, which was wrapped in bandages, and he was stumping around on crutches. and then I realized that the natural mother was there too, this young white-trashy looking girl who reminded me of clare's former sister-in-law (who perpetually got pregnant and gave babies away). THEN I realized that there was some kind of custody battle going on, and that the adoption was being contested. and I kinda wondered about the wisdom of entering into such a situation, and that's when I really started to wonder how this whole adopting-a-baby thing came about and why. the father was pretty nice, though. I was embarrassed about the remark I'd made about the caseworker with him in the room, but he said "it's okay, I'd probably feel the same way if I was in your place." the girl was bitchy and weird, though, and not very smart. the baby was crawling across the floor, and poked its head under the footstool-- that brown one on wheels we used to have in the livingroom when we were kids. I went over to get her, and the girl said "she's crawling into the rubbish bin," like we were being negligent and letting her baby crawl into the garbage. I picked up the baby and said, "it's not a rubbish bin." then she made a face and said "it's for the dog!" and I said "it's a footstool-- we don't have a dog!" and you and me and sean were looking at each other with our hands clamped over our mouths trying not to laugh because the girl was just so stupid. and that's when I woke up. with the sudden realization that I had to get out of bed, because I had gate duty this morning. gate duty is just greeting students at the gate, but it means you have to be there at 8 instead of 8:15, and I'm always late. and I'm not really in good graces with the big bosses right now after being sick so much. but the thing was, I was a wreck. maybe it had to do with waking up partway through a dream, but I just couldn't even function. I kept curling up in a fetal position on the bed while I was trying to get dressed. I was in a fog (and I did *not* take valium last night), and I was out of coffee, and it was raining, and it was one of those mornings where I just didn't know how I was going to cope. getting up in front of a classroom full of kids felt like a sheer impossibility, but calling in sick was simply not an option. so, somehow, I managed. pulled on a dress. gathered my things together. threw a couple of containers of yoghurt into my bag for breakfast. I had no raincoat. I was worried about riding my motorbike in the rain. I threw a flannel shirt over my dress and did it anyway, and it was fine. I got to school just before the bell rang. along with the other teacher who was supposed to be on gate duty today, and overslept. and then I found out that I had a new student. so I had to orient a new shy and scared fourth grader while teaching math class first thing on this shipwreck of a morning. but somehow, it worked. and by second period I was feeling better. I changed my plan for english class so we could play the game where everyone is coming to the picnic and bringing a thing that starts with the same letter as their name. so that marshall, my new girl, could start learning names, and they could start learning hers. and my kids are sweet, and funny, and silly, and by lunchtime I felt just fine. didn't even need a nap today. I'm still wondering about that dream, though.
(((rings))) |