Month: September 2010

I am backstage at a Phish concert, which has the stage set up at the top of a ski resort mountain. A large, Atlas-like statue stands about 30 feet above the main stage, with the figure’s arms holding a smaller stage above its head. Trey, Mike, and Page, along with a frightened Stephen Colbert, ascend the platform above Atlas’ head. Four other people are on the stage, and the band and Colbert climb on top of one of them and, in a row, begin to do choreographed movements. As they move, Colbert does not lean over the edges like the others do. He’s too scared. Of the Phish members, Trey has the most courage, looking precarious at times as he reaches over the person he’s on top of and over the edge of the small stage.

They end their movements and then grab notched rope that let’s them descend beyond the stage-level and all the way down to the bottom of the mountain where the ski lodge sits. As they make their Batman-like exit, the audience roars in hilarious approval.

The scene shifts and I am back in time just before the show starts. Still backstage, but at the lodge-level of the mountain, I see an old hippie looking a bit lost. He holds a piece of paper and shuffles up to a door that opens to a stairwell leading up to the stage-level. He mumbles something about the audition being fake, and then opens the door and climbs the stairs.

I walk through a dark, dingy nightclub somewhere in New Orleans. Bad dixieland plays as I find myself quite sober at the exit, trying to avoid tipping the players. I have to step on a series of small sets of squares to get out of the club. and into the parking lot. I see someone from my Alma Mater tailgating in the lot, which makes me want to call J. B. I haven’t spoken to her in years, so we chat and decide to have lunch in NOLA. Making a lunch date leaves me hungry, so I walk over to a shopping center in hopes of finding food. I find a store full of Star Wars toys instead, and end up standing with two people and having a drink with them. The woman makes me feel uneasy, and when I nervously look at her from out of the corner of my eye, she blinks, revealing a third eye. She grins as the third eye, with cat-like slit and off-white color, stares through me.

I wake up groggy and disoriented, not knowing where I am. My vision blurred, and fear hitting me, I start making up jazz scatting to try to ground. I hum fun melodies, not sure if I am singing in my mind or out loud in the now-focusing surroundings. I stand up and try to look around, staggering like a drunk, and begin to see that I am in an empty floor of an office building. Cubicles stand silent in the semi-darkness, and I finally see things clearly. I begin to walk around, picking up a plastic cup and pretending that it is a Star Wars light saber. Pretending that I am Darth Vader, I pretend battle through the office and come to a glassed wall with a door. A security guard exits the door towards me.

“Luke, give in to the Dark Side and we will rule the Empire… together!” I say to the guard.

Laughing, he says “here’s the latest copy of Wizards. You might enjoy it,” and he throws the magazine on the desk in front of me.

Another guard walks towards us from the direction I had walked. The two of them discuss a woman who is not doing too well in another part of this reality.

“Where am I?” I ask. They don’t answer.

“Why am I here?” I ask. “You assaulted a woman with a cup,” the friendly guard tells me.

“I want to leave here,” I tell them.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he replies.

“Can I at least get something to eat? I’m hungry.”

“Yeah. I’ll get you something,” the friendly guard says.

…

I am wide awake in this present reality, with the woman’s third eye haunting me as I try to go back to bed. (This dream woke me at 3:55am; an unusual time for me to dream.)