Wednesday, April 16, 2003
TGIW!
Sike.
First and foremost, I have to get something off my chest.
Last night, I slept like a fucking rock. I didn’t wake up once during the night and I had the deepest and most powerful sleep. Sometime before I woke up, I had the most upsetting dream. It started out completely normal, but then ended in such a way that even though it has been a good 3 hours since I woke up, I still have the feelings of anxiety and sadness coursing through my veins.
Here’s my dream:
I am hanging out with some friends at a house in upstate New York. We are all sitting around in a living room area playing cards and listening to music. Some of the people are drinking beer, but I am feeling tired and not in the mood to drink. Eventually, the craziness of the drunken people starts to get to me, so I decide that I am going to take a quick nap. At this point, it must be around 2pm. The sun is shining through the windows and the room is very brightly lit, despite the cloud of smoke that is hovering in the air from all of the cigarette smokers. I pick up my soda from the room and put my own cigarettes into my pocket. I tell everyone that I will “be back” and I head up the stairs to a bedroom at the far end of the house.
I enter through the door and immediately smell fresh linen.
I set my soda and cigarettes on the bedside table and I take off my shoes. I feel good. I feel happy to be taking a nap. I feel exhausted and immediately lay down on the bed. As I lay there, I have a hard time falling to sleep. I try to get as deep into the covers as possible, but no matter how much I toss and turn, I can’t fall asleep. I decide to sit up and smoke a cigarette in order to relax myself. I lean over and turn on the television and light up my butt. When the TV turns on, one of the news stations is broadcasting a shuttle landing in St. Louis. There is a picture of the Arches and a crowd of at least a couple thousand people standing behind them watching the spectacle. There are cameramen, signs with words of support, and families screaming and cheering at the excitement of watching the shuttle return from space.
The camera zooms in on a figure in the distance and although I can’t make out the exact shape of the shuttle, I can feel the energy in the crowd start to pick up. After a couple minutes, the camera pans back to its position behind the crowd of people. It was quite a beautiful scene. There were people eating ice cream and hot dogs. I remember seeing balloons and happy faces and feeling the excitement from the crowd as the cheering grew louder. The camera switches angles again and now we can see the shuttle moving closer to the landing spot. We, the people at the site and me through the television, watch the shuttle moving faster and faster, almost in clear view. The cheering of the crowd escalates to a moment of surrealism and then the unthinkable happens.
The shuttle picks up even more speed and instead of moving towards the pre-determined landing site, it flies off course and smashes right down in front of the St. Louis Arches. The crowd has no idea what has happened and immediately people start screaming, grabbing their children and running as fast as they can away from the crash. The crowd is so thick with people that I can see families being knocked to the ground and trampled. The cameraman, despite the chaos, moves in closer to the crowd and through the arches, I can see the burning shuttle. There is a sudden explosion causing debris and flames to shoot out of the center of the shuttle. Like in the climactic scene of a disaster movie, the top half of the arches split in half and tip over on to the remaining people in the crowd. I see men and women alike raise their arms up in a futile attempt to stop the concrete from crushing their bodies. The concrete hits the ground with a SLAM and everyone that was previously standing under the structure has been buried.
The camera, through which I am watching all of this devastation occur, shakes uncontrollably and when re-focused I see that we are now panning over the rubble. Screams still fill the air and now I can hear sirens and see a fire hose open up over the burning wreckage. The cameraman moves closer to the destroyed arches. There are people all around him trying to save their loved ones or to put out the flames that are spreading all over the area. In the midst of all of this chaos, someone shouts into the camera “MOVE! IT’S GOING TO FALL!” The camera jerks violently towards the sky. A huge piece of the Arch breaks off the top of the remaining structure and hurtles towards the lens of the camera. I watch as the lens and TV screen is filled with a picture of falling concrete. There is a loud crash and the picture cuts out.
I sit shaking in bed. I feel as though my guts have been torn out. I stand up quickly and run out of the room. I run as fast as I can to get back to the people that I left at the party. When I enter the room, I realize that there is no noise, no music, and none of my friends. I see a piece of paper tacked to the door. On it the words read:
“Went to see the shuttle land at the Arches. Help yourself to a beer. Be back later.”
In the pit of my stomach, I know that all of my friends have been killed in the tragedy. The fear and grief that I feel begins to overwhelm me. The room starts to get very dark, as though somebody was playing with a dimmer switch that is connected to my vision. I fall to my knees and wake up in my bed with a jolt.
I woke up covered in sweat. I immediately sat up and realized that I was shaking uncontrollably. I reach over to light my morning cigarette. I sat in bed for 15 minutes running the dream over and over in my head. The emotion I was feeling was very intense and I did my best to shake it off. I got into the shower and got dressed, the whole time trying to convince myself that it was just a bad dream. This tragedy never happened and nobody died. But how scary that life can change over the course of a couple minutes.
I don’t think I started believing that it wasn’t real until I got to work.
Even as I write this, I still feel a bit shaky. Dreams that are that realistic stay with me for a long time. I can remember it all as though it truly happened. And it’s scary.
SO that’s that. Kind of a rough morning.
In other news, Rita gets into town tomorrow morning. I get out of work today at 1pm and will not be returning until Monday at 9am. Tonight is Paul and my “Date Night” and since I have not seen him since last Saturday, it is sure to be a great time. I can’t wait to crawl into bed with him. I miss him incredibly and need to spend some serious alone time with him before the weekend extravaganza begins.
YAY RITA! YAY WEEKEND! YAY YAY!
Happy Passover all!
Chag Sameach or some shit.
Sike.
First and foremost, I have to get something off my chest.
Last night, I slept like a fucking rock. I didn’t wake up once during the night and I had the deepest and most powerful sleep. Sometime before I woke up, I had the most upsetting dream. It started out completely normal, but then ended in such a way that even though it has been a good 3 hours since I woke up, I still have the feelings of anxiety and sadness coursing through my veins.
Here’s my dream:
I am hanging out with some friends at a house in upstate New York. We are all sitting around in a living room area playing cards and listening to music. Some of the people are drinking beer, but I am feeling tired and not in the mood to drink. Eventually, the craziness of the drunken people starts to get to me, so I decide that I am going to take a quick nap. At this point, it must be around 2pm. The sun is shining through the windows and the room is very brightly lit, despite the cloud of smoke that is hovering in the air from all of the cigarette smokers. I pick up my soda from the room and put my own cigarettes into my pocket. I tell everyone that I will “be back” and I head up the stairs to a bedroom at the far end of the house.
I enter through the door and immediately smell fresh linen.
I set my soda and cigarettes on the bedside table and I take off my shoes. I feel good. I feel happy to be taking a nap. I feel exhausted and immediately lay down on the bed. As I lay there, I have a hard time falling to sleep. I try to get as deep into the covers as possible, but no matter how much I toss and turn, I can’t fall asleep. I decide to sit up and smoke a cigarette in order to relax myself. I lean over and turn on the television and light up my butt. When the TV turns on, one of the news stations is broadcasting a shuttle landing in St. Louis. There is a picture of the Arches and a crowd of at least a couple thousand people standing behind them watching the spectacle. There are cameramen, signs with words of support, and families screaming and cheering at the excitement of watching the shuttle return from space.
The camera zooms in on a figure in the distance and although I can’t make out the exact shape of the shuttle, I can feel the energy in the crowd start to pick up. After a couple minutes, the camera pans back to its position behind the crowd of people. It was quite a beautiful scene. There were people eating ice cream and hot dogs. I remember seeing balloons and happy faces and feeling the excitement from the crowd as the cheering grew louder. The camera switches angles again and now we can see the shuttle moving closer to the landing spot. We, the people at the site and me through the television, watch the shuttle moving faster and faster, almost in clear view. The cheering of the crowd escalates to a moment of surrealism and then the unthinkable happens.
The shuttle picks up even more speed and instead of moving towards the pre-determined landing site, it flies off course and smashes right down in front of the St. Louis Arches. The crowd has no idea what has happened and immediately people start screaming, grabbing their children and running as fast as they can away from the crash. The crowd is so thick with people that I can see families being knocked to the ground and trampled. The cameraman, despite the chaos, moves in closer to the crowd and through the arches, I can see the burning shuttle. There is a sudden explosion causing debris and flames to shoot out of the center of the shuttle. Like in the climactic scene of a disaster movie, the top half of the arches split in half and tip over on to the remaining people in the crowd. I see men and women alike raise their arms up in a futile attempt to stop the concrete from crushing their bodies. The concrete hits the ground with a SLAM and everyone that was previously standing under the structure has been buried.
The camera, through which I am watching all of this devastation occur, shakes uncontrollably and when re-focused I see that we are now panning over the rubble. Screams still fill the air and now I can hear sirens and see a fire hose open up over the burning wreckage. The cameraman moves closer to the destroyed arches. There are people all around him trying to save their loved ones or to put out the flames that are spreading all over the area. In the midst of all of this chaos, someone shouts into the camera “MOVE! IT’S GOING TO FALL!” The camera jerks violently towards the sky. A huge piece of the Arch breaks off the top of the remaining structure and hurtles towards the lens of the camera. I watch as the lens and TV screen is filled with a picture of falling concrete. There is a loud crash and the picture cuts out.
I sit shaking in bed. I feel as though my guts have been torn out. I stand up quickly and run out of the room. I run as fast as I can to get back to the people that I left at the party. When I enter the room, I realize that there is no noise, no music, and none of my friends. I see a piece of paper tacked to the door. On it the words read:
“Went to see the shuttle land at the Arches. Help yourself to a beer. Be back later.”
In the pit of my stomach, I know that all of my friends have been killed in the tragedy. The fear and grief that I feel begins to overwhelm me. The room starts to get very dark, as though somebody was playing with a dimmer switch that is connected to my vision. I fall to my knees and wake up in my bed with a jolt.
I woke up covered in sweat. I immediately sat up and realized that I was shaking uncontrollably. I reach over to light my morning cigarette. I sat in bed for 15 minutes running the dream over and over in my head. The emotion I was feeling was very intense and I did my best to shake it off. I got into the shower and got dressed, the whole time trying to convince myself that it was just a bad dream. This tragedy never happened and nobody died. But how scary that life can change over the course of a couple minutes.
I don’t think I started believing that it wasn’t real until I got to work.
Even as I write this, I still feel a bit shaky. Dreams that are that realistic stay with me for a long time. I can remember it all as though it truly happened. And it’s scary.
SO that’s that. Kind of a rough morning.
In other news, Rita gets into town tomorrow morning. I get out of work today at 1pm and will not be returning until Monday at 9am. Tonight is Paul and my “Date Night” and since I have not seen him since last Saturday, it is sure to be a great time. I can’t wait to crawl into bed with him. I miss him incredibly and need to spend some serious alone time with him before the weekend extravaganza begins.
YAY RITA! YAY WEEKEND! YAY YAY!
Happy Passover all!
Chag Sameach or some shit.
