DREAM MESS JUSTICE
13 Oct 21Oct 28 Oct
I found myself standing outside the building where I worked. I wasn't sure how I had arrived there, if I was early or late, or even if I was supposed to be at work should this be a weekend day. There was also someone with me. I felt that I knew him but would have been hard-pressed should I be asked who he was.
"Okay, so what are you going to do?" He asked with an irritated look, indicating very clearly that I should know that and already be in the process of doing it - whatever it was.
"Who the Sam Hill are you?", I asked, "And what business is it of yours what I do?"
"I am your escort of course." His face looked like he had just bitten a particularly sour lemon when he got to the word escort, "and you are extremely lucky you got me. You could have done much worse."
"That, I will wait to pass judgment on." I put a little horseradish in my reply just to let him know I wasn't to be trifled with.
"Okay then, I see you already like me so get on with it." A little horseradish of his own.
I didn't want to give him the satisfaction of admitting I had no idea about any of the "W's", the what, when, why, and where's of the moment. So, I charged boldly up the few stairs leading to the door only to find the door locked. With my glance revealing him shaking his head in a "knew he would choose wrong" fashion, I tried several of the other doors down the side of the seemingly never-ending building. At the third door, I found it open and went in.
"Hi Boss," one of my workers said meeting me, "what are you doing here?" Well, in truth, he looked nothing like John but was, without a doubt, John. I just knew.
"Hey, I came in to work. Where else should I be?" I asked, giving him my anyone could ask foolish questions look.
"I do see you are here. But boss, you know you retired over a year ago right? Did you decide to become a volunteer and work for nothing?" There was no mistaking his "he's gone round the bend" look returned to me.
"Yes,...well, yes, of course I know, haha." My laughter sounded very hollow even to me. "Uh, just stopped in to see how everyone is doing. I guess I will head on home."
"Probably best boss," John said as he turned and more just went away rather than having walked off.
"That had to be the most smooth recovery I have ever seen" My uninvited sidekick offered.
"You really think so? Do you mean it?'
"Not on your life. You didn't just stumble over your tongue, you did a proper face plant."
"Well, you were no help. What are you here for anyway? Aren't you supposed to be guiding me through this mess?"
"I said escort, there was never anything said about any guidance. You are on your own making all the wrong decisions."
Okay, I thought, so I came to work when I shouldn't. No big deal. I will just walk to my car and go back home. I walked back out the door I had entered to find there were no longer any steps close by that led down to the parking area. Not only that but as I looked there were acres of parking with every space filled with cars and for the life of me I could not remember where I had parked my car. My "escort" was busy sadly shaking his head again.
All I had to do was think it through. I drove in this morning and came in the west gate... no, that is much out of my normal route... I parked in the back so my new car wouldn't get scratched,... is it new?... and I must have been wandering as I was thinking so hard because I found myself standing next to my car.
Wonderful, I thought as I got in only to find my escort already inside and buckled up. "Didn't think you could leave me behind did you?" he asked.
"I guess I am ever hopeful!" More horseradish.
Starting to drive toward where the exit was supposed to be, I was surprised to find the road unfamiliar and curvy with things going past that I did not recognize. A watermelon stand of a type I had not seen since childhood. A man at an ice cream cart handing out Nutty Buddys to a long line of kids. A car lot, although there were no cars. And oddest of all a kangaroo just sitting on his tail watching us pass.
"Do you have any idea where you are going?" My escort was looking smug and I wanted to smack him in his head until he learned a little respect.
"I'm heading home." saying this wasn't nearly as satisfying as I thought smacking him in the head would feel.
"What home?" He asked and I realized my destination was the home of my childhood. I was heading down roads that were familiar but that I had not seen since moving away shortly after high school. This road went past the bread factory that always made my mouth water as I drove past. Just up ahead was the railroad track that came just before the pool hall on the left, the fork in the road with the gas station/grocery store in the middle, and the left fork led toward home.
Without it seeming at all strange, I was now riding my bicycle and the road that led to home became a city street in a downtown area. I studied the lighted signs in the storefronts and looked both ways trying to determine which way I should be traveling. "Well this is great, you're lost." Said my escort in that smug tone of voice.
"I am really getting tired of you. Can't you go plague someone else?"
"Oh, I couldn't possibly leave you in your time of need."
"What I need most is for you to go bug someone else! Anyone else!"
Justice would be if he wound up having to escort my mother-in-law. She would eat him up like a dog with a chew bone, a delicious chew bone. How did I get a mother-in-law?
I was getting very frustrated. I headed left following some unseen GPS route in my head which led me down a flight of stairs, now toting my bicycle, in a door of a restaurant kitchen, out of the dining area where people were looking at me surely wondering why I would be toting a bicycle, and as I exited the front door I was in a cave. I was hurrying now. I had to get somewhere, anywhere! The cave was blocked except for a small opening I had to climb to reach. I struggled toward the top still keeping my bicycle on my shoulder, I couldn't lose it. The little bit of progress I made was lost to the blockage of rocks getting higher. I climbed faster and faster trying to reach the opening, knowing that would allow me to finally get home. I was breathing hard as I climbed from one rock to another. Closer, losing ground, closer, losing more ground, faster, climbing faster, and just as I was about to reach the opening the roof fell in on me!
I sat up in bed as my wife said, "WAKE UP HARV," she was shaking my arm, "You must be fighting demons again. I told you eating that horseradish would make you have a bad dream."
I blinked as the memory of the dream was already starting to fade into oblivion, knowing that shortly I would not even be able to bring it back to mind. I can't swear to it but it seems I heard my escort chuckling as he said "see you next time bud." I lay back down, shutting my eyes, wondering where I would wind up next.
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