The Pure Life of Dreams

December 8, 2022March 9, 2023

Throwing Sandwiches Doesn’t Do Any Good

I was sitting with Georgie when it was time to go. This was after cleaning up the avocado sandwich that I threw at the wall.

We were seated in deck chairs outside, in a garden with fake grass, and I had made the sandwich earlier with the only ingredients I could find. A piece of white bread, a thick slice of pâté, cut, but placed in one solid chunk on the bread. Then the avocado buttered on top.

March 31, 2022October 22, 2022

Family Drive in the Country Turns Irritating

I take the short cut through the neighbor’s Tudor built house. They haven’t caught us walking through their house before, and it is the convenient route to the back of our house; but I always feel a little bit guilty doing it.

This time however, as I sneak along their low ceilinged back hall, an ill-fitting pine wood door ahead on the right creaks open slightly. It leads to the study and I won’t make it to the back door in time. Then out comes a man in round metal rim glasses; he has short black hair, a bowl haircut.

The man looks straight at me, no expression, and I slink out his without saying a word. As I enter the back door to our mud room, I think to lock our door. Usually we leave it open but this time I turn the key already in the keyhole and cry out to the front of the house.

“Ok, we are ready to go!”

Finally. We are off to a restaurant but Lizzie is already grumpy. She does not want to go. She gets in the back on the driver’s side and I sit with her on the right. Liam is front passenger side and Siobhan is driving.

We are arguing god knows about what.

And when Lizzie gets in she leaves the door wide open. It is the 1992 black Mercedes with black leather and red trim and the rear doors are from the low and wide sports model.

Siobhan drives off, with Lizzie’s door still wide open.

“Shut. The. Door,” I say through through griiteed teeth.

“Why does it matter?” Lizzie quips, “nobody is passing us.” as we pull out from the driveway.

When we come to an intersection she finally reaches out and pulls the door shut. Then Siobhan pulls over. Sharply she stops, tight against a hedge of brown wheatgrass.

“I cannot take it anymore,” she says as she puts her head in her hands. She is half crying. She gets out silently and comes round the back. I squeeze out despite the wheatgrass and we swap places.

In the driver’s seat look to the right at the wing mirror. It is bent forward after hitting a lamppost to the side of the hedge. (By rights it should have been bent back). And I lower the right side window.

“Liam, can you pull it back into position?”

He pulls it towards him without making a sound and the mirror returns to its natural position without breaking.

But Lizzie has pushed the car door wide open again. I know better than to comment. Instead I pull the car out, car door still open, and up to the junction so we can turn right and back onto the route. As we reach the stop sign a red and white open top convertible overtakes on the left veering wide to avoid Lizzie’s open door. The driver looks back at us quizzically, Lizzie is sheepish in front of a stranger, and she leans out again to pull the door shut.

“Ok, where am I going?” I say, as I make the turn and start along the country road.

“Just go back where we came.” says Siobhan.

I turn right.

“If I do that I will just be going round in circles.”

Then I turn right another time, more to make the point than because it is the right direction.

“I cannot get my phone out of my jeans pocket while I am driving,” I add, though this has not stopped me before.

“Just a minute,” says Siobhan through gritted teeth as she pulls up navigation.

Image by Stux from Pixabay

January 20, 2022April 25, 2025

Anxiety and Finding the Bathroom in a Hotel

I step out of the hotel and ask to hitch a ride in the back of a white van with a group of doctors. They also have to go to a conference, all of them dressed in white coats and talking amongst themselves about the day’s events. I check my papers, they’re in the case with me and we are headed downtown, the day bright with the early morning sun like you only find in Washington.

Then the van pitches suddenly to the right, down a steep spiral cobblestone street. We flit past old buildings covered with posters and tall enough to block out the sky.

“Woah!” the doctors cry out as they grip the door handles of the van.

I need to leave, it is the wrong way for me.

“Can I get out?’’ I plea with the driver, but only at the bottom, the van comes to a halt and the driver lets me go.

I am in a park, green manicured lawn, the walls on one side remind me of the Tower of London. Then I notice the doctors get out too and it becomes clear that they are actually sightseeing.

To get some directions I step into another hotel but realize I’ve forgotten something on the van. What was it? I have my wallet and my jacket jangles with keys. Whatever it was, it cannot have been important and first I need to pee.

“Can you tell me where the bathroom is?” I ask a woman in uniform.

She points up towards to the bar area. “Then go through to the steps on the other side”, she says.

I follow the sign through the bar, spot the entrance then slowly I descend slick orange and white marble steps glistening with moisture from below. The steps spiral down, each becoming more slippery, but instead of a bathroom I come to what looks like the steam room of a gym. There is a man behind the steamed up glass, whistling and the steps are fully wet now. I shouldn’t go in I think to myself, he is probably undressed and uncertainly, I turn back.

(Then I remember what it was, that I left my camera in the van, brand new, a pocket camera that I had rested between my thighs when in the van. It’s annoying, but it’s not my immediate concern.)

I am in a restaurant area when I ask the woman, I think she is the same person, “Where again is the bathroom?” But her answer is not clear.

“Look, I’m going to piss in that thing right there in the middle of the restaurant”, I retort, pointing at an oval shaped vase with toothed rim made of some sort of alabaster. It is pretty, but only a foot or so high, a strange place for it, in the middle of the restaurant. You could trip over the vase if you were not looking.

“You can’t do that!” she replies.

I take off my cardigan, and throw it on the ground in front of her for it is getting hot. Then I throw down my jacket, right there. A man comes into the restaurant, he doesn’t see it on the floor and steps right on the splayed out jacket.

“Hey!” I shout at him. “You’re standing on my jacket!”

He looks up at me threateningly, curls up his left sleeve and makes a fist to swipe me with. He is young, well built in a smart gray jacket; has a handsome face and short curly black hair.

I don’t want to fight. I feel an affinity with him… Instead it would be better for us to get a drink at the bar.

Photo by Stephen Bowler from PxHere

December 11, 2021October 22, 2022

Going to the Interrogation Room for a Bruising

We are in a large federal building, in a corridor, it feels menacing, before we are singled out and taken to the waiting room. As we enter, I see that the room is full, with people sat on two lines of plastic chairs on opposite walls, facing each other.

We take our place, and are waiting for a long time until finally a woman comes over to our seats. She singles me out as the spy and with my eyes closed she presses a flashlight against one of my eyelids. Are they trying to read my thoughts?

The woman says, you will have to come with me so that we can administer a bruising.

November 20, 2021July 29, 2022

Talking Cat Says it is an Alien

A talking cat says it is an alien, before it tells me something indecipherable.

Then it swipes my face.

Photo via Pxfuel