Toucan Parable

So, this is the story of a little random subset in a dream I had recently. The main part of the dream involved 1920's geisha, awesome pyrotechnics, and God impersonation. But never mind that.

So I find myself narrating a sort of... child's book, or maybe a child's PBS morning cartoon or something, because it was also like a nature video of a toucan Family. With my voice-overs. 

This is how it went.

"Once upon a time, amid the wet, green jungle bordering the Amazon River in South America, there lived a toucan Mother, and a toucan Father, and a toucan Son. They were very happy in the jungle eating nuts, showing off their colorful bills, and chatting with their neighbor toucans.

But one day, Toucan Father decided that his family did not get enough respect from the other toucan families. So he decided to tell a little fib.

'Did you hear that my son just got back from university?' He asked his toucan neighbors as they all sat on a branch cracking nuts together.

'Toucans don't go to universities,' they replied. 'We crack nuts for food and fly around the Amazon jungle, looking for adventure.'

Toucan Father went slightly berserk at this. He had expected his gullible neighbors to believe anything he said, no matter how preposterous. 

'He has been to university, I tell you! And graduated with honors! He is now a certified *hedonitrician! A hedonitrician, I say! My son is a hedonitrician!" Toucan Father flapped his wings as he shouted, and Toucan Son hid his beak in his feathers in shame.

No one ever really believed Toucan Father, but he continued to repeat this lie over and over throughout the years. Eventually Toucan Son, desperate to give credence to his father's dishonesty, became a Toucan Thief and stole jewelry and other valuable objects in order to prove that he was indeed as successful and rich as a certified hedonitrician would be. But everybody knew of his misdeeds, and the Toucan family soon became a despised and shunned presence in the Amazon Jungle community.

The moral of the story is, don't let your pride goad you into telling lies, because you will end up hurting those you love most. And nobody will believe you, anyway. The end."

*My brain made this word up

Office Space meets Pod People

I, um, "awake" to find that it's 10:00 a.m. on a Monday, and that I've slept off my carpool only to wake up with a dream hangover.

"Oh noooooooo," I say, suddenly showered, dressed, and present at work.

My boss Michael — who is normally always very chill — is so angry at me that he relocated my cubicle to a weird, scary, undiscovered corner of the building, complete with blue-glowing alien lights and otherworldly foliage snaking around the office equipment. He informs me of his displeasure in a passive-aggressive fashion, then folds up a large, wood-slatted Oriental fan and throws it into my arms with enough force to sting. Then he walks off, and I stand flabbergasted in my glowing cubicle holding this heavy fan. I sigh and turn on my computer.

Before long I learn that the company is requiring "mandatory immunizations," and we're all supposed to be inoculated by the 14th of September [I started the draft of this post on the 7th]. I'm extremely reluctant to get them, since they seem so shady, and I notice that coworkers who had been skeptical about them immediately become pro-immunization after getting them.

"Oh, they're great! I've never felt better!" is the kind of wide-eyed, manic opinion they try to force on me.

In the break room, the Inoculated use an Energy Restoration Machine instead of eating or playing foosball. They walk into a phone-booth-sized pod, strap in, and the machine recharges them, their bodies convulsing with electricity. Their faces twist into strange, lizard-like jaws temporarily, but once they're out they look refreshed, happy, and high on life.

Before long, Bill -- and this is actually his name in real life -- comes over and sits on my desk in my cubicle, even though he has no say over my tasks in real life. For some reason he perfectly imitates Bill Lumbergh from Office Space:

"Yeah, so . . . I'm gonna need you to mosey on down to Human Resources and get those shots, 'cause frankly, Willie, I'm not quite seeing the Winning Attitude we've been talking about in our meetings." The alien zombie coworkers approach from the adjoining cubicles, forming an impenetrable wall of of opinionless flesh, their faces lining me in with expectant and malicious faces.

Adventures of a Sensible Lad Who is Magic

So there I was (I love starting any story with that phrase) in this ultra modern space craft. To call it a ship would be an insult to this advanced technology and we were flying and crashed into these woods, which didn't jolt us at all for some reason. I get off with some random friends and we go searching for this school we were flying to. So when we find it, the ground was made of yellow brick and there was a big circular patch of the original yellow brick road that "only the true of intent" could pass over. So I'm thinking wtf does true of intent mean... that could be anything good or evil. Oh well. Anyways, so we walk across it and try to go inside. So there's this old actor there who I think was the lion maybe telling us that if I didn't drop to my knees and have my friend give me a blessing-- we weren't students. I obviously refused and told him to check my student number and he wouldn't so I BLASTED him with a huge ball of magical goodness and flew past. I even got past some random screen door, but when I saw the two old women selling tickets in front of the gym, I knew we were busted. So, we ended up being sent to the principal’s office (which turned out to be Dorothy herself) and got scolded, but I could stay. After being treated like that, however, I had second thoughts. So I went out to some river to go swimming with some girls who I thought were my friends, but they started laughing insanely and tried to strangle me with a scarf. At this point, I realized that they weren't my friends at all. So we floated downstream for a while (I- being strangled and they-laughing) they stopped and swam to the side as I fell down a small waterfall. Lucky for me I hid in a small eroded underwater cave under the fall. Lucky for me, I could now breathe underwater! So they’re trying to reach down and grab me out when I remembered from the vast amount of useless knowledge I know that ants can live up to 14 hours underwater. So, I did what any knowledgeable magical person would-- I turned myself into an ant. This way, I could float downstream safely and not be detected by the psycho sisters. And so I did. Until I thought it was safe. I met this ogre-pig guy who I thought might possibly be trustworthy, but I took precautions. He invited me into his hut/cabin thing and I said ok, but what he didn't know was that I noticed the ring of soot he had laid around his house. I didn't really know what it was for, but I had a bad feeling about it so I drug my right heel across it as I went inside. My intuitions were right and he tried to eat me or capture me or something negative that I would object to. Lucky for me I could blast the crap right out of him with big wispy balls of light. So, when he was unconscious, I laid a bigger circle around his house so he could never leave. He ended up getting so hungry, he ate his house and then withered away as most evil ogre-pig things should. The End.

For the love of Jennifer Garner

I had this dream a while ago, but I thought I would share.
The beginning is a little difficult to remember, but there were a bunch of us in this huge old farmhouse that had secret passageways and stairways that led to nowhere and hidden lofts and stuff. It was pretty cool. I seem to remember that it belonged to Cindy Wadsworth, and that she was having a bunch of people over for something (like she does). I think that there were puppies around somewhere. Then there was this event outside, and this man had a beautiful white horse that I wanted to ride. He said that he had to put another horse away first (one that I could only see from the front) and then when he turned to horse around to take it away, I noticed that the front half of the horse was normal, but that the back half of this brown horse was the front half of a white llama. Kind of like a Push Me Pull You from Dr. Doolittle. It was very strange.

Then there was this contest going on between (I think) Annie, Liz and I about who would be the first to be able to win Jennifer Garner's love. Annie and Liz couldn't and so it was my turn, but for some reason Dad and Mary wouldn't let me leave the house. During this time I got some sort of message from Mom (it was like a poem, but I don't remember if it was on the phone or written) and I had a strong feeling that Oma had died. I didn't know if it was true or not so I kept crying off and on. It was especially vivid because I remembered (in my dream) that I had had another dream where Oma was sick and in the hospital, so this made sense to me. But I wasn't really sure. I finally got out of the house to find Jennifer Garner and there was someone with me (I think it was Annie, but I can't be sure) and we found her just about to leave in a car with some guy. She walked around the car to throw something away in the trash can on the sidewalk when I stopped her. She was a lot shorter than she is in real life (I assume) and she was wearing khaki knee shorts and a light pink button-up top. She had on sunglasses and her hair was straight and loose and long. I said, "Um, Jennifer?" to get her attention and she turned to me and said, "yes?" Very shyly, I said, "I was wondering, if there was ever the possibility of someday you...you being with me." She looked right into my eyes and said, very seriously, "I would eagerly await that day." I grinned and then asked if I could have a small kiss, and she said yes, and so she gave me the smallest, sweetest, softest little kiss on the mouth and then she drove away. I walked home really happy, but the person who was with me (was it Annie?) was a little miffed that she hadn't won the contest. Then I woke up.

Intimidation

I dreamt last night that Davey and I were still dating. Davey, Tim, and I think Shanelle and I were staying at my house here in Oregon and of course we ALL slept in my bed. In the morning I gave Davey and hug, got out of bed and wrapped up in a jacket. Davey was becoming disenchanted with our relationship and Tim was helping him to recognize his feelings. I made eye contact with Shanelle and I knew that I could count on her to stick with me and hang out with me. So I ran down the stairs to the kitchen, which was larger than usual. And I saw that my Mom had made this ginormous blackberry crumble with a butter cookie on the bottom. I mean this was probably 6 ft in diameter and 1/2 foot tall. It was already mostly eaten and I nibbled on the cookie. Right before I awoke I remember wondering if Davey was intimidated. Now, I have to admit, that I am almost embarrassed by how nice my home is. I live in a rather large home and we keep it up pretty well. My sister had her "good friend" visit and he was intimidated by the family and all the above. I realized how intimidated I was when I went with Jeff Pringle to Texas and met his family. I enjoy finding a moral to all my dreams and I think this one helped me to realize that I should not be annoyed when things that aren't right don't work out. For instance - and I am going out on a limb talking about things I usually wouldn't -Davey intimidates me. And I feel really awkward around him because I worry what he thinks of me. I think my dream meant that in fact I have equal power in our relationship (that is still struggling even with friendship) and that I shouldn't grudge the fact that he moved on.