Lost in France

October 17, 2008

I had one of my crazy dreams last night. Sometimes my dreams are so vivid, so real. A couple nights ago I dreamed I was in France. I didn’t know it at first; I was in this public library with 3 or 4 other ladies, who I suppose were my “friends” but I didn’t know any of them. I found a book I wanted to check out. I discovered that it was one I had checked out long, long ago, and turned in 15 years later. Somehow I got separated from my “friends,” and got lost in France hiking around by myself.

I was hiking around the country, trying to get by with the very few French words that I know. It was a sunny day, sky was blue and clear. I hiked down this paved sideroad just past the freeway – like a service road -- that dead-ended at this old abandoned brick warehouse. The warehouse was 4 stories high and nearly as big as a city block. It looked as if it had been built fifty years earlier.

Guards that looked like MPs were guarding the road that went on past the warehouse. I tried to backtrack, but one of the guards called me over and wanted to know what I was doing and where I was going. I was afraid I would be arrested. All I wanted to do was to find my friends again, but I didn’t know enough of the language to ask anybody anything.

The guard wanted to know if I had any “papers;” that is, any sort of identification or paperwork that would show me where I needed to be. I found a rental car agreement in my purse, and he was like, “Oh yeah!” and took me to this waiting area, like a bus stop or car stop, where my lady-friend was waiting.

In another part of the dream, my girlfriend and myself, and 10 or 20 other people, walked down a dirt road to this lake. The lake was remote and hidden, surrounded by trees and foliage and rocks. An evil weird guy told us we were kidnapped; that we were trapped and couldn’t get out. Everyone else just sat there, wishy-washy and defeatist. But my friend and I were determined to get out if we could. We walked up the dirt road and found that the weird crazy guy was gone, and there was nothing or no one blocking our way out. So we left.

Later we came back and told the people that no one was keeping us here. Just then the weird crazy guy showed back up and was going to punish each of us for escaping. I was trying to hide by slithering through the tree limbs and rocks, but he saw me. For my punishment he put this squid-like creature in my hands, which latched onto my left hand and injected its poison. I had to pull the creature off; then went down to the water to keep my hand cool and to try to wash out some of the poison. I thought, This won’t kill me, will it? I thought that the poison would just make my hand numb and itchy for a while, but that it wasn’t fatal. I could see the blue and green poison seeping into the veins in my hand…

The evil crazy guy was a homeless man living in that abandoned warehouse. That is all I remember. But it was so real, I really felt as if i were lost in France.