fiction - brigits_flame - transcendent
Jan. 16th, 2012 11:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hwangoHey. I’m Harry. I have this recurring dream.
Hey, anyone ever say that to you, and then tell you about this really awesome dream, and they’re really happy that it comes back over and over, and they look forward to sleep because maybe they’ll get to dream it again? I doubt it. But if you do know anyone like that, next time you see them I want you to punch them in the face for me.
Anyway, recurring dream. I’m on this game show. The only bright spot in this whole train wreck is that I guess I come in at the end, or at least I can’t remember anything about the game show, so at least I don’t have to watch myself be humiliated in front of a studio audience for a whole half an hour. People are applauding and this weird dream amalgam of Bob Barker and Alex Trebek is telling me that I’ve won the ultimate prize, and I’ve got this insane grin on my face and I’m actually jumping up and down and waving my arms like I think he’s about to tell me that I’ve won a billion dollars and I can tell my boss to go to hell and that I’ve been sleeping with his wife. I haven’t, incidentally, but the look on my boss’s face would be a memory that I would cherish for all time. But then the host says to me,
“You’ve won a two week all-expenses-paid vacation outside of corporeal entanglement!”
I think I stop smiling and then I stop jumping up and down, like I don’t want to lose my momentum in case he tells me that he’s just kidding. I get this expression on my face that, because this is a dream, somehow adequately conveys my confusion, frustration, lingering hope that I’ve misunderstood, and the fact that I’m really thirsty for some reason, all at once. Bob Trebek has this little laugh at my expense and then,
“My friend, you are going to transcend the boundaries of human existence and perceive reality unclouded and with full understanding for the first and only time if your whole sorry life! It will be a revelation! You will be free of earthly cares and desires! And when it’s over you will be plunged screaming back into your miserable, dreary life, with only vague, tantalizing memories of the unutterable bliss that was yours for just fourteen glorious days and thirteen fabulous nights.”
Then he hits me with his microphone like it’s a police truncheon, there’s this bright light, and then weird little fragmentary images of smiling angels and rainbows and an unearthly voice is telling me that my oneness with the universe has been brought to me by some brand of orange juice that I can never remember.
Next thing I know, I’m curled up on the stage with blood dripping down my forehead, and that unearthly voice is back to tell everyone that second and third place contestants will receive a fabulous jeweled tiara and the respect and admiration of their peers. And then this housewife from Alabama and a software consultant from Iowa are getting these crowns placed on their heads by little winged cherubs, and the whole audience stands up and applauds in that polite, reserved way people applaud for royalty or something. I realize that the housewife looks like my ex and the software guy looks like the guy she left me for, and then Bob Trebek kicks me in the gut and tells me not to bleed on the stage or the cost to clean it up will come out of my winnings.
Then I wake up, and my mouth tastes like I just drank orange juice.
Anyway, that’s why I’m awake. How about you?
Hey, anyone ever say that to you, and then tell you about this really awesome dream, and they’re really happy that it comes back over and over, and they look forward to sleep because maybe they’ll get to dream it again? I doubt it. But if you do know anyone like that, next time you see them I want you to punch them in the face for me.
Anyway, recurring dream. I’m on this game show. The only bright spot in this whole train wreck is that I guess I come in at the end, or at least I can’t remember anything about the game show, so at least I don’t have to watch myself be humiliated in front of a studio audience for a whole half an hour. People are applauding and this weird dream amalgam of Bob Barker and Alex Trebek is telling me that I’ve won the ultimate prize, and I’ve got this insane grin on my face and I’m actually jumping up and down and waving my arms like I think he’s about to tell me that I’ve won a billion dollars and I can tell my boss to go to hell and that I’ve been sleeping with his wife. I haven’t, incidentally, but the look on my boss’s face would be a memory that I would cherish for all time. But then the host says to me,
“You’ve won a two week all-expenses-paid vacation outside of corporeal entanglement!”
I think I stop smiling and then I stop jumping up and down, like I don’t want to lose my momentum in case he tells me that he’s just kidding. I get this expression on my face that, because this is a dream, somehow adequately conveys my confusion, frustration, lingering hope that I’ve misunderstood, and the fact that I’m really thirsty for some reason, all at once. Bob Trebek has this little laugh at my expense and then,
“My friend, you are going to transcend the boundaries of human existence and perceive reality unclouded and with full understanding for the first and only time if your whole sorry life! It will be a revelation! You will be free of earthly cares and desires! And when it’s over you will be plunged screaming back into your miserable, dreary life, with only vague, tantalizing memories of the unutterable bliss that was yours for just fourteen glorious days and thirteen fabulous nights.”
Then he hits me with his microphone like it’s a police truncheon, there’s this bright light, and then weird little fragmentary images of smiling angels and rainbows and an unearthly voice is telling me that my oneness with the universe has been brought to me by some brand of orange juice that I can never remember.
Next thing I know, I’m curled up on the stage with blood dripping down my forehead, and that unearthly voice is back to tell everyone that second and third place contestants will receive a fabulous jeweled tiara and the respect and admiration of their peers. And then this housewife from Alabama and a software consultant from Iowa are getting these crowns placed on their heads by little winged cherubs, and the whole audience stands up and applauds in that polite, reserved way people applaud for royalty or something. I realize that the housewife looks like my ex and the software guy looks like the guy she left me for, and then Bob Trebek kicks me in the gut and tells me not to bleed on the stage or the cost to clean it up will come out of my winnings.
Then I wake up, and my mouth tastes like I just drank orange juice.
Anyway, that’s why I’m awake. How about you?
