My first crazy dream was that the wife and kids went back to Wichita for a long visit, and while they were away, the husband's crazy ex-wife came and tried to take over. She tried to move in and pretend like nothing ever happened. This was kind of funny to me, because this couple have been together ever since they were young and in high school. No chance for an ex wife.
I've had countless crazy dreams in between numbers 1 and 2, but I don't remember every bit of them, so there are too many holes. I remember one point, when I belonged to a village, and an evil witch had been impersonating me to do mischief, and I had to prove to everyone that I was really me. (It was a lot like playing Mafia.)
The second dream began when I was working in a room with my old boss, and one of his six children, a boy my age who he affectionately calls "John-boy" Besides regular work, my boss would ask his son, (and me too, in this case) to do spiritual, educational work. He was trying to prepare us for the end times. With each completed task, he would give his son what he called manna, which was just a creamy-white precious metal; some type of currency. I think my pay came in a regular paycheck. One of those such spiritual-educational tasks to prepare us for the end times was to be able to accurately arrange C.S. Lewis's Narnia series in chronological order. This was a little difficult because one of the books was missing a cover, another was written in The Message style, and as we all know, they usually One of those such spiritual-educational tasks to prepare us for the end times was to be able to accurately arrange C.S. Lewis's Narnia series in chronological order. This was a little difficult because they were numbered in the order they were written, one of the books was missing a cover, and another was written in The Message style.
I left the room, and wandered down a hall. To the left, I noticed a long barn-like room filled with about 30 large horse stalls. Out of each stall poked the head of an elephant. At the end of the hall, I entered a larger room. There were some wooden bleachers for seating, and a manure/straw covered fence kept the stands separated from the show: a man swimming in a tank with a hippo, which we all know is a very impressive feat. The fair (or whatever it was) must not have been very busy that day, because so few spectators were there, that they sat on the edge of the hippo tank and dangled their toes in the water. The swimmer called me over by name. "Hey, you're from Kansas, right Grace?" he asked. "Uh, yeah..." I said, edging closer. "You know that song, 'Camptown ladies sing this song, do-dah! Do-dah!' Well, I guess back then, the 'do-dah's' were only put in to cover up the bad language! Bet you didn't know that about Kansas, huh?!"
"Huh." I said, feigning interest, and then I left to return to work. In my locker in the work room, I found a set of purple and black rings. I then remembered telling my boss that they would sell really well. He had asked his ceramics class aid to make them for me! I considered running back to the hippo room to tell the swimmer, but at that moment, I turned around.
For lack of space (probably because of all the elephants) the circus or fair had decided to keep their giant, man-eating crocodile in a large baby crib. The reptile scared me, and I began to notice that because of the changes in the way Joel had been feeding it, that it was learning that it could easily step out of the crib... which it did.
The crocodile moved very slow, and I was able to run up the basement stairs in my parents' house and into the living room. Joel, Dale, and my parents were all sitting there. "The alligator got out!" I shouted. "Here's what we'll do-" my dad started, always the one to have a solution, pulled out a tranquilizer gun. He handed it to me. It didn't look too impressive. It about as small as a .22 or even a bb gun. I held it in my hands and aimed at the door. There, standing in the doorway, was Joel and Paul.
Joel was 2 or 3, the way I remember him from our days before school. Paul was only 4 or 5, like all the childhood pictures. "Guys, move out of the way!" I said, as I quickly moved my gun. I handed the gun back to my dad, and then my mom and I went to see if the crocodile was still in pursuit. The stairs to the basement were strewn with clear packaging bags and silica gel packs from work. We didn't see anything at first, but then the crocodile moved. Apparently, we couldn't see him because his head was stuck in a bag. When he moved, my mom made that sound that we've heard a few times in our lives, when she came across a particularly large snake in a basement bedroom, or when a field mouse ran at her from the pantry.
We ran back to the living room. Everyone jumped on a couch, and pulled our feet up from the floor. As the crocodile came into the room, and my dad aimed, I suddenly realized how small the gun was, and that if he missed, he wouldn't be able to get away in time. I thought of the headline, "Man in Kansas Eaten by Crocodile" and then shouted, "Daddy, don't miss!!"
Just then, he shot a round of pellets at the Croc's forehead. The pellets looked like mini-marshmallows, or mothballs, or possibly those melt-away wedding mints. It was a pathetic show. The pellets bounced off and scattered on the floor, but I knew better than to doubt my dad's inventions. Apparently, each pellet contained a potent tranquilizer that came out upon impact in powder form that instantly absorbed into the reptile's skin. The last shot was a small device with spider-leg spikes that stuck into the crocodile's neck to monitor its unconsciousness.
That was when I woke up.
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