Dreams

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I've done a lot of vivid dreaming on this trip. I wake up often in the middle of the night feeling like I'm in an even more unusual and adventurous place than I really am--and believing it. Sometimes, I suppose, I've been trekking on mountain peaks, getting lost in labrinthine underground sewer systems, or having rabid discussions for hours on end about life, the universe, and everything with mobs of stoned-out, gibbering foreigners.

I suppose dreams are a way to process what is going on around you and what is going on in your head: sights, sounds, experiences, imaginings, emotions, stresses, and hopes, all thrown into a pot and stirred. So, when every day of your life is like something from a dream or fantasy, the dreams and fantasies get even more odd.

Yesterday, I guess I got reminded a little too much of home. I spent the morning amongst used bookstores, coffee-shops, and internet cafes, then napped through the midday, and spent my evening talking with a girl from the Bronx. My late night was wasted away (but not wasted) at a place called Irish Pub, where westerners (mostly English and American) come on Thursday nights for trivia, sports, and beer--and the first good hamburgers I've had in Thailand. The conversation was about life back home, work and school, places to live, roommates and parties--normal shit.

Anyway--last night--I'm asleep in my four-post bed here at the River Ping Palace, with ground beef and Heineken rolling around in my belly, and I'm dreaming, of course. This is one of those dreams where every time you wake up, you fall right back into it uninterrupted. Maybe you have to pee, so you put it on pause and then get back to the show once you're under the covers. So all night I'm drifting in and out of this place.

In the dream I work at this wild building in Seattle. It's like all glass and metal and cushy chairs, and it looks really cool. The place is awesome like something from a super-hero movie or some cool sci-fi or something. I'm still not quite sure what we do there, but it's totally lame and corporate. The coolest part is that--aside from offices--people live inside this building in some totally sweet apartments, and me and a work-buddy are getting ready to rent one: we just have to figure out who's getting which room and how we're laying out the furniture. The uncool part is that every single part of the dream that I remember now was about stress.

We were all stressed out about work, especially me--I think I was the manager--stressed about late faxes and missed phone calls and people who show up for work late. Plus, me and the future roommate weren't connecting on things, like who was gonna get what room and what the place would look like, and he was never showing up where he was supposed to be anyway, so I'm getting worried that he doesn't really have enough money to rent the place and he's trying to screw me. Then there's the stress about, "man, I drank too much last night," and, "I think I gotta go home early." And there's girls at work, just to make things more complicated, and something like a big client that's coming for a meeting, or maybe some late paperwork that's due to the city and we're barely gonna make our extended deadline. Aaarggghhh!

Anyway, so here I am, halfway across the world having adventures and meeting amazing people and seeing so many wierd and cool things that my eyes want to explode, and I dream all night about work and stress and the daily grind. Look down your nose and shake your head at me, because I AM pitiful.

And I didn't even tell you about the cell phone bill...

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Comments

[Jay]

So you dreamed you worked at Microsoft....big deal...

[Rachelle]

I read this journal three times. Each time more grossly astounded and disturbed than the previous. You have just described my day-to-day-reality nearly verbatim. And, on top of it all I do work for Microsoft, heh. This is a sick awakening. I hope you don't mind me living vicariously through you for the next few months, but after that... I'm doing what I have wanted to do for years. Thanks, Nic - you are amazing!! Sending you a couple thousand mile away THANK YOU! Rachelle

[Mary Decker here]

WOW
I'm living your dreams, while you are living mine. PS. Remember the first time you got drunk at 2nd and virginia and you siad I have child-bearing hips. <3 Mary