unsettling serenity
i was in the desert, on some kind of mission, and was walking alone. i stopped suddenly; off in the distance, i could see a spaceship, a bulky one--much like Serenity in Firefly. it was hovering above a clearing where there were a few cars, and it was too far to see what was going on; but i had the sense that they would destroy any sign of life. with urgency i thought of my camp, where there were some important documents and things. with a panic i realized that the aliens (?) would soon look for other places to attack, and would destroy the camp if they saw it. i turned around and headed away from the ship, into the desert to find my camp, so i could rescue the important things. i had an intuitive sense of where the camp was, but things began to look strange to me as i walked further. the beige-colored sand and scattered creosote and other brush were familiar to me, but on the left appeared sheer glassy cliffs, peaked with razor-sharp edges and creased with near-vertical lines as if they had just splintered suddenly out of the earth. i was struck by how ... digital they looked, as if they were part of an animated world. coming upon a small arroyo, i found three raven carcasses. each bird was in a different position, and all looked as if they had died in sudden agony. this scene frightened me; i remembered what mom always said--that three ravens seen together were a sign of danger. much to our annoyance, this was driven into our heads as we grew up, since mom would make major decisions based on the presence of what she thought were "signs" from god. there were many times when she changed direction or altered our course entirely because she saw three ravens flying about. i grew to hate her interpretations of such signs, and had long scoffed at her notions, but the appearance of three dead ravens caused a visceral fear reaction in me now. i also wondered what this meant for other wildlife. had the aliens done something to kill them? but then i saw something alive. it was strange, too; a seagull, flying low, obviously disoriented and sluggish under the desert sun.
discouraged and feeling desperate now, i continued on. i walked for a while longer and felt more and more lost. the land in front of me seemed to grow more narrow; the cliffs were closer on my left; and finally, ahead of me, i saw a lake surrounded by smaller bodies of water. i knew that there shouldn't be any standing water here, and since it was all i could see in front of me, i gave up on the idea of searching for the camp and decided to look around me and try to absorb what was going on. i felt a sense of wonder; the water was beautiful, and so translucent it was almost opaque, like the inside of an oyster shell. the weird thing was, it didn't have any banks. it just sat there, liquid, but held in shape by its own tension. curious, i stuck my hand in, penetrating a strangely thick layer of skin-like water as i did so. inside, it was strangely still, but pleasant and cool. then i stuck my face in, and opened my eyes under the water. i couldn't see anything but more placid, clear water. when i stood up to look around again, i saw that there was a speed limit sign stuck to the side of the cliff. it said 40mph, and was a goldenrod sign, like the kind you see on winding roads. i realized then that the physical laws of the world, or of this place, had been changed or suspended. i was still rooted to the ground, but i couldn't know what to expect. there was something both serene and unsettling about all of this.
and then i woke up.
discouraged and feeling desperate now, i continued on. i walked for a while longer and felt more and more lost. the land in front of me seemed to grow more narrow; the cliffs were closer on my left; and finally, ahead of me, i saw a lake surrounded by smaller bodies of water. i knew that there shouldn't be any standing water here, and since it was all i could see in front of me, i gave up on the idea of searching for the camp and decided to look around me and try to absorb what was going on. i felt a sense of wonder; the water was beautiful, and so translucent it was almost opaque, like the inside of an oyster shell. the weird thing was, it didn't have any banks. it just sat there, liquid, but held in shape by its own tension. curious, i stuck my hand in, penetrating a strangely thick layer of skin-like water as i did so. inside, it was strangely still, but pleasant and cool. then i stuck my face in, and opened my eyes under the water. i couldn't see anything but more placid, clear water. when i stood up to look around again, i saw that there was a speed limit sign stuck to the side of the cliff. it said 40mph, and was a goldenrod sign, like the kind you see on winding roads. i realized then that the physical laws of the world, or of this place, had been changed or suspended. i was still rooted to the ground, but i couldn't know what to expect. there was something both serene and unsettling about all of this.
and then i woke up.