Dream
In my dream, I was in Fredericksburg. I think it might be some confused version of my grandfather's funeral, because I was wearing my suit, and everyone was formally dressed, but my grandfather was there, too. At some point, I got into a fight with my family, and I got so angry at my father that I just left, on foot, the two of us screaming at each other as I walked down the road and out into the city.
I was worried, because I had almost no money, and no idea how to find my way home, and it was, of course, an extraordinarily long walk, but I was too angry to go back, and had decided that I was walking.
Somewhere along the way, I picked up this girl's notebook, from the side of the road. In it were portions of lyrics of songs that she liked, lists of her friends, random doodlings, and then dozens and dozens of pages in the middle that all had photographs of women's faces glued to them. They all looked calm and peaceful and beautiful, and I found them comforting.
But then I recognized one of them as being an actress who had died, and I realized that all the pictures were of women who had died, and were in fact pictures taken right after they had died.
I wandered along the side of the interstate in my suit, flipping through the pictures, trying to decide if they were still beautiful, now that I knew. I couldn't tell. Part of me thought it didn't change anything, but part of me was repulsed.
Just before I woke up, I had turned past the pictures and found part of a song, and as I was reading it, I could hear the girl singing it, and I was trying to sing along, crouched down in the median, between the trash and passing traffic.
I was worried, because I had almost no money, and no idea how to find my way home, and it was, of course, an extraordinarily long walk, but I was too angry to go back, and had decided that I was walking.
Somewhere along the way, I picked up this girl's notebook, from the side of the road. In it were portions of lyrics of songs that she liked, lists of her friends, random doodlings, and then dozens and dozens of pages in the middle that all had photographs of women's faces glued to them. They all looked calm and peaceful and beautiful, and I found them comforting.
But then I recognized one of them as being an actress who had died, and I realized that all the pictures were of women who had died, and were in fact pictures taken right after they had died.
I wandered along the side of the interstate in my suit, flipping through the pictures, trying to decide if they were still beautiful, now that I knew. I couldn't tell. Part of me thought it didn't change anything, but part of me was repulsed.
Just before I woke up, I had turned past the pictures and found part of a song, and as I was reading it, I could hear the girl singing it, and I was trying to sing along, crouched down in the median, between the trash and passing traffic.