Big Sur and the Phantom Hands

The Big Sur Coast has always been a source of strength and wisdom for me. I gather it from the elements around me : the ocean and the trees. Its a place I go to get grounded, to center myself. Like magic, I always run into dear old friends, and always make new ones, (usually at Fernwood Bar believe it or not, but I have yet to make friends with the old guy that sleeps in the corner of the bar....hhmmm, next trip.) Additionally, Big Sur is excellent territory for dreams and nightmares....




My shoddy, little cabin welcomed me with open, decrepit doors which hung on rusty hinges. Pasha immediately jumped on the ancient quilt, and began his hilarious ritual of rubbing his face, hence distributing his scent everywhere, snorting and snuffing and basically messing up the bed. He looked up at me with his coal brown eyes, and disheveled hair. We were home.

After a relaxing day sitting in my obligatory plastic lawn chair, feet in the river, cowboy hat on, beer in one hand, Stephen King's book Desperation in the other ("Desperation , Nevada, a horrible place to live, a worse place to die") I was ready to get under that musty quilt and have some truly peculiar, phenomenal, and hopefully spooky dreams. I never disappoint myself:

Toss, Turn, Toss again, get Pasha's tongue out of my ear, roll over, untangle, untangle Pash. Soon I found myself leisurely floating down the Big Sur River in a taped up, maybe soon to be deflating innertube. Fog lifted off the water and the near distance shore filled with campers from Bakersfield. Beer bellies teasing out of much too low jeans, mouths agape like hungry little fish. I waved, feeling like the queen in my own white trash parade. They waved furiously, I rotated left palm side-to-side, pageant style. As I came to a dark, murky pool, I realized that the campers were yelling and frantically jumping up and down, white bellies bouncing and exposed. Before I knew it, hands pulled my waist down and I found myself embarrassingly stuck in the innertube, hands at ankles, booty, belly and thighs underneath the now black water. Worse yet, at the mercy of the phantom hands. (Note I once got stuck like this in the toilet and my Dad had to save me. It's been a fear of mine ever since. Note to self: avoid innertubes.) The dark, underwater phantom hands grabbed again and I woke, taking sweaty, plentiful gulps of air.

This ironically is not the first "phantom hand" dream I've had in Big Sur. I'll share the other at a later time. The first picture is of me and Pasha at Pfeirffer's Beach. Note the rocks, precariously balanced on top of each other making fragile sculptures. Tons of them. Someone went to a lot of work. In the honor of my Californian heritage I say the following: "Dude, that's like way Blair Witch"

Brussel Sprout Love

Not last night but the night before, I dreamt that my dear friend Nicole had all of her tattoos removed. She had her back to me and I could plainly see the ghostly remnants of them, faintly outlined on her pink flesh. The one on the back of her shoulder was replaced with a tattoo of a bundle of brussel sprouts, done quite realistically I might add. Every leaf was perfectly veined and varied in lovely shades of pale green.

"Why Brussel Sprouts, Nicole?" I asked.

She turned to face me. "I love Brussel Sprouts," she replied. It made perfect sense to me. Emotional relief, like a flood, soothed my spirit. I found tears well up in my eyes.

"I love Brussel Sprouts too", I stated. She nodded in understanding. We embraced and held each other.

I do love Brussel Sprouts but I love you more Nicole.

And Dolls Scare Me Anyways...

The dream began in an upstairs room, somewhere along Higuera Street. You know the building, its on a corner and the dark windows I have always wondered about. I sat on a sort of fainting couch as a somewhat fashionable butch woman violently brushed my hair. "Now remember, just stay away from anything wet, no toner, no aromatherapy spray, no frolicking in fountains. Nothing Wet! Try to appear natural, though you are not. Try stuttering sometimes, or giggling inappropriately. " Apparently I was the host of some reality show (I hate reality shows by the way, except for So You Think You Can Dance). Unbeknownst to the guests on the show, I , the host, was man-made, some sort of super realistic doll, flaws and everything. They didn't want me to appear too perfect. That would be a dead giveaway.

I looked behind me, at my reflection in a gilded mirror. They had painted on my tattoo perfectly. I followed the various cameramen and makeup people out into Farmer's Market. We were going to film an episode on Cal Poly students. I watched my beautician go into Coverings, my cameraman walked in the opposite direction. I observed, spinning in a circle, as if thru a fisheye lens, my crew dissipate throughout the crowd. I felt afraid.

A dense marine layer drifted in and blurred my vision. I teetered on heels much to high for me. Don't they know these are dangerous, that I could fall and break. Things were getting darker and it seemed as though it was started to drizzle some. I saw a man, quite a large, dark man, approach me. It was OJ Simpson, of all people. He grasped me in a tight embrace. "I recognize you! Your the host of that reality show! I always watch that, love it. Hey maybe you could talk to the producer, and you know mention..." I couldn't hear him anymore as I stared, appalled at the stain my face left on his expensive Armani suit. "Gotta go. Always a pleasure OJ." I spun around and started running down Higuera on legs unequipped for such cardio activity. I glanced in Coverings, where were my people? How could they have left me in the rain! I know they can fix me, but what if they come across me as a pile of melted plastic, somewhere between here and Broad Street? What then? I stood at an awning outside Boston Bagels and wiped a hand across my face. Flesh colored goo hung in strands between my fingers. Several eyelashes were stuck to it. I began to panic, and awoke. Luckily, everything seemed intact, normal except for the light sheen of sweat that covered my face.

A Dark River

Yesterday I slept in until 12:30, which put me in bizarre dreaming territory. I'm talking about those quivering, falling, and oddly vivid dreams. The ones you sometimes prefer not to return to.
It began with my mother and I and a little blond girl of about 1 or 2 years. We were driving down a dirt road looking for a scenic spot to take a picture. The girl was to be the main subject of this picture. We stopped at a farm advertising fresh vegetables and, ironically enough, photo ops. The farm seemed pretty deserted, a ghost farm really. The tired and dirty vegetables lay next to a slot which seemed to be regulated by honesty and either coins or tightly folded bills. The signs advertising "scenic/rustic photo opportunities" lead to a barn with a dirty white sheet tacked to it. Apparently this was the backdrop. The girl ran down a trail to the right which lead to a beautiful river. The wood around the river was thick and various logs, branches and other detritus created dark, tranquil pools.
Now any dream interpreter will tell you that water, in dreams, symbolizes emotion. If the water is dark and stagnant, this means deception, and contrary if the water is clear and running, this symbolizes clarity in your waking life. Obviously, I had a wide range of emotions going on in this dream.
I told my mother that this river would make the perfect backdrop for a picture. As my mother, always prepared, rummaged thru her camera bag, I watched the girl wade in the water. Suddenly, as if she was pulled underneath by someone, she disappeared under the water. "Save her!" my mother mouthed. I couldn't hear her because the river seemed so loud. I looked for her blond hair but all I could see was a reflection of the branches from above. I dove in, head first, which considering that the water was only about a foot deep, proved to be a bad idea. It was more a belly flop then a dive. How did she disappear in such shallow water? Up ahead I say her swiftly crawling on the river bottom. It was a disturbing site. I could hear her laughter. She crawled to a natural dam of logs and branches and crawled underneath. I followed. How many seconds had passed? 8? 10? How long can a little girl hold her breath?
I started pulling away branches, slick with algae. Their was an old wagon wheel, cardboard, various soda cans. How did I not notice all this garbage before? I ducked underneath and glimpsed blond hair amongst the branches and trash. I reached out to her and her to me. We struggled to the surface. I carried her small body to my mother, trudging over river rock. The girl seemed fine, she pointed to two frogs mating at my feet.
"Just a bump on a log that's all it is." My mother proclaimed.
I answered "Um, actually mom I think their..."
"Oh, no, no. It's just a bump on a log, look" and she softly nudged the desirous frog couple with her toe. They came apart, dead, just two fossilized corpses.