The People Behind My Eyes

My mother, a family friend and I were driving by the second grade house in the middle of the night in a yellowish orange van. I noticed she was speeding and so was everyone else. Cars were swerving in out and nearly causing crashes but somehow managing not to. I turned to watch 2 cars merge into the same lane and noticed one of them him something. I realized it was a child who had fallen off his bike. When I turned back around to tell the mother I noticed about 10 children riding the same kind of BMX bike towards on coming traffic. For apparently no reason at all they began to fall, one after the other. Cars attempted to miss the kids but they were run over again and again. I began telling the mother from the back seat how to maneuver around the fallen children so as not to hit them. She was stiff, driving carefully, listening to my calm instructions. The passenger in the front seat was silent, perhaps stunned by what was happening. We got through the children without killing any but we ran over the hand of one. The body was laying face down, blue jeans, dark hair and a green shirt. We ran over the hand but were happy we didn’t kill the child. I never looked back to see if anyone else hit him/her. What I did notice was that children kept coming, riding their bikes directly into traffic, falling for apparently no reason at all.

After we got through the children we were past the 2nd grade house. The mother and family friend wanted to get something to eat so they stopped at a restaurant in the house I lived in during the 4th grade. I wasn’t hungry so I went to a little store next door while they ate. When I came out to join them the restaurant was just about to close. I had to convince them to let me in. The two waitresses argued about if they should charge me for a donut. One waitress talked so badly about the other that I felt sorry for her. The mother and family friend finished their meal and said they were going to the van. I stayed behind to finish the donut. As I walked to the van the sister entered the dream and walked beside me. When we saw the others they were attempting to dig the van out of a ditch. The mother had gotten so upset about the fallen children that when pulling out she ran into a ditch. At this point the van turned into a small double decker bus but the first level was hollowed out and nothing but a shell. The top existed but the bottom was a shell, a frame, the same colour but with no sides, no protection from the outside. Anything and everything could pass through with no barriers.

I tried to ask the mother exactly what happened. She started telling me but turned her back away while speaking. I kept trying to tell her if she was talking to me she would need to face me. She’d start over but again turn her back to me. I couldn’t hear what she was saying so finally I yelled at her, “You might as well say nothing at all as to turn your back and talk to me when you know I can’t hear you.” I was pissed because all she had to do was stand still for 2 min, look towards me so I could hear her and/or read her lips. The sister then stepped in front of me to tell me what the mother said but she was speaking so softly I couldn’t hear her. She was also using her hands to speak. I kept expecting her to sign but she never did. I was distracted by her hand movements and never thought to read her lips. I kept asking her to speak up but it never occurred to me to ask her to sign and it never occurred to me to read her lips. I woke up from there.

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Dream Therapy: Woman Child-Friday, February 29, 2008, 11:35 pm