Saturday, October 16, 2010

Freddy, move over...

As long as I can remember, I've had the same nightmare. It's simple and not really that scary...and as I've gotten older, it's seemed more silly than anything else.

I'm perpetually 4 years old in this nightmare. I'm sitting alone in a solitary chair pulled up to a small child-sized table that actually existed when I was 4. It was blue and black on top with shiny silver legs that folded so that it could be stored under momma's bed. Those folding legs were always waiting to pinch my little bitty fingers...and sometimes would get them, leaving blood blisters that healed just in time for the next pinch. I didn't care...I loved that table. It was my vehicle to imagination land. A sheet over it and one of mom's knee-high stockings tied around my head and I could be anyone, anywhere...an Indian in a teepee or a genie in the desert or sometimes even a princess in a castle. I would make clay sculptures on it or turn it on its side to block me from the enemy's sight.

In my nightmare, there is a single daisy in a vase on the tabletop and I'm sitting very properly with my hands folded. Then there is a noise...a humming kind of like a vacuum cleaner. The humming gets louder and the flower petals begin to shake. Then the flower flies out of its vase and I watch it get sucked into what I've always thought of as "the carpet machine" and I'm not sure why...is there even such a thing as a carpet machine? If there is, I'm sure I've never really seen one. Next in the dream, my chair begins to shake just like the petals on the daisy and I know that I'm going to be sucked into the carpet machine just like the daisy was. I know that when I do, it will be the end of me. Little 4 year old me grabs the table to hold on and the legs collapse, pinching my fingers and in reflex I let go. Then I'm floating and it's a really amazing feeling until I realize what is happening and what is going to happen to me. The dream ends with that mixture of butterflies in my belly from floating and dread mixed with fear creeping in. I wake up frozen, half smiling with tears slipping from underneath tightly closed eyelids. The feelings wane and I fall back to sleep...usually not remembering that I had the nightmare until later the next day.

The nightmare used to come with terrible regularity but as I've gotten older, it makes rare appearances that I'm aware of. I haven't had the nightmare in a good year.

Then today...today the carpet machine snuck into reality...sort of. Today I was reading a friend's blog and there was a short animated video about a bunch of birds on telephone wires. I watched the video and smack dab in the middle was firmly clutched by fear. The creator, Eran Hilleli, took the carpet machine straight out of my nightmare detail for detail and placed it in his animation...and 26 second into it, the poor bird is sucked into the carpet machine to an untimely end.



I'm a little sick to my stomach now. It's that same mixture of dread and fear in the pit of my belly...and I'm not sure if I love Eran for being the only other person I know with a carpet machine in his head or hating him for bringing it out in the open.

I'm filing this one under "weird" and at this point, I'm not just a little afraid to go to sleep tonight. I'm a lot afraid. All of the sudden it's not a silly dream, it's scary again.

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1 comment:

  1. BEAUTIFUL EXPRESSION OF RAW UNADULTERATED LIFE. NIGHTMARES ARE SCARY! BUT TO HAVE SOMEONE WHO KNOWS THE SAME FEAR IS INCREDIBLE ACTUALLY. YOU ARE BRAVE AND BEAUTIFUL! WHEN AND IF THE CARPET MACHINE EVER COMES BACK SCREECH LIKE THE OWL OF THE NIGHT! IT WILL SURELY RUN AWAY!
    XOXOXO

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