the star on the peak of the conifer
(The following is the unedited result of my desperately trying to write a dream I had just woken up from. It was quickly disappearing; the more awake I got, the less of the dream I retained, so I had to get typing even though my brain was still partly asleep. Hence it ended up hilariously incomprehensible, but the process of getting the gist down like that is important for remembering more of the dream later. It's now possible for me to edit (if I want) and thereby revisit the memories more carefully... but its kind of funny in its current frankenstein form):
I was first downtown in a dark city lined with shops, trees and many residential districts. I got assaulted by someone who robbed me after luring me to him with the promise of an umbrella, which I needed. I went to him for the umbrella and he grabbed me and wrestled me I think.
I went down further into the city after that, to a gas station and complaiend to someone in there about the assault.
Outside, I got into a car that was being driven by a woman. Actually it was a white van without wndows and she said, sure get in although I have some “of my guys” in the back (hope thats ok). I just got in. I think they were homosexual prostitutes. They seemed like nice people. We passed a couple clubs.
Then the next thing I remember is driving down through many of the residential neighbourhoods. There were many thick stemmed trees and it was a hypnotizing drive.
The next thing then, I was inside a grocery store with a friend or two. I dont remember what they look like. We were practising a secret way to exit the grocery store in order to embark in a private journey together; we had to leave the store in a way without being noticed or else it wouldnt work, or the staff would thwart our private journey. With some effort, I managed to successfully leave. We were using special walking sticks that had jagged spear like things coming out of them, like skiing poles or something…
Outside the side of the building, we exited into oncoming traffic and bumped into an older gentleman who we knew. They tried to come with us and we had to perform out grocery-store exit again. We did so successfully.
Then our little party managed to get on our way finally. We were trying to look inconspicuous to everyone who might be looking out for us; people in the streets, in the shops, in their cars; and navigated gravelly shoulders of the roads as the cars drove, with out walking sticks and each other (3 of us I think). We walked a long time, until we were on the outskirts of town and it was daytime eventually. There were trees all around and open sky, as if we were hiking inland, away from a coastland, deeper into forested area and mountainous area. Indeed, there were steep inclines and less business development the further we went. Evetually it was just trees and a single road or two, not much traffic. The air was colder and the environment was brighter.
There were very steep and gravelly (light/lavender blue coloured, grey coloured rocks) passages to get past as we finally left the roads and cars behind us. It was very quiet, like a private park or climbing/camping area that only daring people went to, or loggers when it was in season.
I had a sense we were following something very important, like an inner map in my mind; we were walking slower and slower, looking around, confused and not sure where we were supposed to go or end up, but sure that it was leading us this way. I remember looking down finally to a very steep drop off: it dropped off a cliff, to a plateau surrounded by trees. The plateau was about the size of a classroom and had a steep cliffs on all sides, like it was a pillar-like object or a mountain with its top shaved off.
We all looked around for a while, dumbfounded by beauty. Then suddenly, I noticed another plateau nearby with lots of people sitting around in a small group, together. There were little, narrow, natural stepping areas that formed a way I might have been able to use to get to them, but it looked dangerous, so I just observed it.
They noticed us and we spoke to them in greeting. I had a feeling they weren’t like us but I didn’t really know what that feeling meant, so I didn’t say anything about it.
One of the young men addressed a party member of mine, while I spke to a girl. She was telling me about a little gold star ornament she had saved from Christmas time I guessed, and I said - wow, thats beautiful, what a good idea, saving it from christmas time! my own (a star we had for the same reasons? having to do with dreams?) was not quite like hers. Hers was gold and very shiny. She was deeply flattered by the compliments and said “I jst want to put gold on everything” with a smile. I noticed out among the trees that some, or at least one of them, had a little star on its topmost tip, and I said something about it to her, noticing it out loud.
Then the air changed from good to a little less than good. My party member wanted something from them, I forget what. I was trying to diffuse the situation as my female friend noticed and got up, getting defensive. I said “lets calm down, we have to listen to them, they may not be like us but they have desires and wishes at least like us, so lets respect them, ok?” I desperately wanted to stay and communicate.
But our two groups were now leery of each other, and we were all standing now, eyeing each other. It was decided that we had to leave.
We were arranged against a wall of the mountain/earth, into special sleeping bags that required we prop most of our bodies up against the mountainside 90 degrees to our body, which rested on the ground. (legs flat against the mountain wall). The lead boy and girl were seeing to our zippers closed up and night was falling; it seemed like they did not find us that dangerous, because they were “tucking us in”, it seemed like?
One other member of the group, a female with long wavy hair:
I remember an image of her, like a ghost, wavering and looking scared as she shouted in fear, her image being sucked into a little bottle held by my party member. The leader boy of the group looked very alarmed at once and questioned us/me - what did you do?! I reassurred him nothing, it was just a memory we were bringing with us, and indeed the girl who shouted in fear was safely among his group and said “I’m just fine” to him, when he went to check on her.
I recall then that we were drifting to sleep, away from them. In our sleep, I caught visions of beautifully manicured gardens on lush green lawns, deeply hidden, away in valleys and on the sunny mountainsides of the forest we were in/the mountains we were in, way beyond thick, unnavigable forest. I saw the sun growing dimmer and the light getting darker, more like the light of dawn (frigid, white light, foggy), and then my POV dove a bit into the trees. The trees and platforms all dislodged from their roots, as if they were part of a mechanical puzzle, and mixed with each other rapidly, as if scrambling their locations in order to prevent anyone from coming the same way as my party, to find their whereabouts.
I then thought I woke up in my house. I felt like I desperately needed to try and record something, anything about this dream. Then I heard Julia in the house, and she entered through the patio door/deck/back of the house; it was then that I realized I was in my father’s old house, a house I grew up in from 4-6 yrs old or so.
Julia was trying to distract me by talking about a bunch of different things, and trying to get me to put the computer away, to not write. I was finding her really uncharacteristically agitating at this time. I found her downright annoying - then she sat down beside me on the bed and I todl her finally, “I really want to write this dream down”.
At that, she said “I forbid you”, but her words were all high and stretched out, more like a silly howl, and she leaned down to my neck, where I felt her mouth’s dampness and warmth. I wondered if she was going to bite me, or what?