The Ill-mannered Door (humorous sci-fi)

9.2: Sock It to Me!

I woke from this fitful sleep sometime during the night after having had an odd dream.

I often couldn't remember my dreams upon waking, but after a particularly memorable one years ago about chicken farming with David Lee Roth, I had come up with a hypothesis: my brain was randomly selecting persons, places, and topics and then mixing them together into a sort of crazy dream stew in an effort to throw me off the trail of whatever sinister plan it was busy hatching.

My latest dream had me matched up against Mrs. Jenkins, my diminutive second-grade teacher, in a game of one-on-one basketball. The game began well, and just when I believed that I had her on the ropes, as she seemed completely powerless to stop my lay-ups, she revealed that she possessed a tremendous jump shot. So, after making several three-pointers from nearly half-court, it wasn't long before she had trounced me soundly.

Although the woman clearly had game, as it were, rubbing it in my face after the match was simply uncalled-for. Mrs. Jenkins had been my favorite teacher, but after seeing her display such poor sportsmanship by gloating extensively over her win, I quickly struck her from my favorites list, thereby moving Mr. Albertson, my fourth-grade teacher, up into the coveted number one spot.

Now, given that many people believe that dreams have some important meaning, I tried to puzzle this one out but simply couldn't solve the mystery. I was quite certain, however, that it couldn't possibly bode well for the future and I resigned to keep at least one eye on my brain at all times. And, with that decided, I rolled over and went back to sleep.