It's been a while, but last night I finally had a dream that stuck in my head when I woke up.

I was in a shop of some sort cleaning before it opened (similar to my Gap job).  There was one other associate with me and our manager.  A guy was arguing with me out in the hallway when I came in to escape from him, but he followed.  He gave us a hard time and then spit a giant loogie into our trash can, hitting the side of the trash bag.  He seemed pleased how thoroughly grossed out we were and left.  Later that morning, while cleaning, I accidentally touched that loogie and freaked out - immediately washing my hands.

While talking to another associate, the store/house begins to shake.  A violent storm is suddenly outside and we feel the building lift off the ground and move.  A few seconds later, it's still again.  We all agreed it had to have moved at least 10 feet, so we ran outside to see our foundation has completely lifted up and replaced itself 10 feet away from its original sitting place.  At that point, we looked across the street and noticed a house on fire and a large team of people (maybe 20-30 folks) wearing red t-shirts piling out the door as fast as they could to escape the fire.  We knew it was the 'red team' (a la Biggest Loser), but it appeared they had been building the house, because we could see straight through the unfinished walls.

My alarm went off as I watched the last few red team members scurry out the door, giving high fives to Bob Harper.

Dream from 10/16/10 that I found typed out in an email:

I was shopping with my mom at a mall and I bought a whole bag full of things that were on clearance at an expensive store, including a mini tea set.  When we left the store, I was looking through my bag of things and noticed the tea set was originally marked at $330. I freaked out because I realized I had forgotten to check how much everything had cost before I bought it.  Then I opened the tea seat and saw the mini pieces were all broken, too.  I started to go back to the store, but realizing they wouldn't let me return it because it was on clearance.  Then I pulled out my receipt and realized it had been marked down to where everything I had purchased that day only added up to $7.99 and then I was excited I had made such a good deal. 

At one point at the mall, my mom got mad at me for absolutely no reason and I got frustrated and walked out. At this point, I was holding two pairs of tennis shoes in my arms.  When I walked around the building (which was now a high school or some sort), two guys started taunting me and stole my shoes, ran away a bit, and then threw them back at me, hitting me.  Then they guys ran off. After picking up the shoes, I went inside so they wouldn't bother me anymore.  At this point, the school turned back into a mall.  I walked past the food court and saw Michelle (who I used to play dodgeball with in San Diego), but she didn't respond when I yelled her name.  Then I saw Teresa (my old roommate and best friend from San Diego).  She kinda half smiled when I yelled her name, but seemed too into her conversation to bother talking to me.  I remember being really sad and wondering why she wouldn't call me when she knew I was in town.  I headed toward the parking garage to go to my car and leave.  It was really dark inside with a long walkway (kinda of like an under ground sewage system) before actually getting to the cars.  I noticed a large man following me and tried to stay calm.  He said something but I largely ignored him and kept walking - trying to get to my car in case he tried anything.  Then, he pulled out a syringe of some sort and stabbed the needle into the back of my right leg, below the knee.  He put some liquid into me, pulled out the needle and did the same thing to the front of my left leg below the knee.  At this point, I saw that Teresa and one of her friends had been following me and when they saw this guy was dangerous, they faked the needle stabbing, too, and fell down so he would think they were harmless.  But I know they were watching me to make sure I was okay.  Whatever it was, it made my legs go numb from the knees down and I ended up falling and sitting on the curb in the dark.  I'm not sure what happened to the man, but he couldn't do anything either.  

Then it flashed to me sitting in my home with 5 or 6 people I know there.  Mr. Julian (my neighbor and old teacher from our school) and his son, Matt, who used to be a friend of mine and is now a firefighter came in with a couple other big guys to check on me.  They had heard what happened and wanted to make sure I was okay.  One of the guys with them was wearing a giant diaper (like he lost a bet or something).  Then, Matt handed me a tazer wrapped in a washcloth and told me I should keep it with me.  He said it wasn't illegal.

Last night I had a dream that the GAP at the mall was closing....except it was a salon store where you buy shampoo, etc.   It was the last day and I was closing the store by myself when a huge group of usual customers came in and surprised me to say goodbye.  By the end of the night I noticed one of the customers had left her baby with us because she couldn't care for it.  I remember feeling ill equipped to be a parent and talking to Josh about it.   He ended up going on a hike through the woods and meeting up with a wise native american woman who helped ease his worries and he came back convincing me that we should go ahead and keep this baby who needs us and everything would be okay.  I stood at the end of the trail where I met Josh that day and laid out a couple things knowing I would come back on Thursday and hike the trail myself, hoping to have the same sense of peace about the whole thing.

I also remember thinking about adoption papers and how I needed a specific folder for them to go inside my lock box where I could keep all the important information safe.

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Last night was the first of (what I imagine will be) many wedding dreams.

I was meeting all my girlfriends the day of the wedding at a restaurant. Our table was in front of a giant projection screen where we were scheduled to watch a show (don't remember what show/movie it was). I remember Aunt Jana and Kiernan showing up last and sitting down at the table with us. When it was time to get ready for the wedding, we left the restaurant and I remember the exit was like a haunted house. Once you pressed the button that opened the doors, there were 4-5 men dressed up in terrifying costumes. It was as if I had been there before, because I asked one of the people who worked there to tell them not to scare me...especially this one shorter guy whose face was painted all white with scary black painted features. They were really creepy, but the employee walked out with me and basically told them to lay off as I left the restaurant.

Then it jumped to me walking down the aisle (no bouquet). I don't remember anything else about the ceremony. All I recall is having a huge dinner afterward (it seemed like a fairly normal dinner, aside from its size...not reception-like). I remember my parents being there and the Sullivans, but there were many more in attendance. Part way through the meal, it dawned on me that no one was taking pictures and then I realized the photographer never showed up. I was devastated and ran away from the dinner crying. A few people tried to follow, but my mom stopped them and told them to let me be. As I was running up the stairs, I pictured myself walking down the aisle again and realized I didn't have a bouquet and that the florist must have forgotten, as well.

Last night's dream was so strange. Lately all I've been having is dreams about folding clothes or dealing with things at GAP, because it's where I've been working (sometimes 9 hour days).

In my dream last night, I went to the mall for a GAP Conference of some sort. I don't remember the beginning as much, but I remember afterward, they let us roam around the mall with our conference giveaway bags and name tags on. It was a huge mall with 3 or 4 floors. I walked around a little bit and then decided to go into Old Navy because I knew I could use my employee discount there. When I walked in, the main floor had clothes, but only in half of the room. You were required to walk through a maze of lane lines...as if you were in line for a rollercoaster. The first half of walking through that floor, the walls were all empty and I couldn't understand why. The second half had clothes lining the walls mostly out of reach, but none looked interesting anyway. I thought there must be more than this, so I took the stairs down to the basement hoping the Old Navy was just remodeling and there would be more options down there. To my confusion, it was dark and no clothes to be found. Instead, it lead me through the basement on a maze through a haunted house. I remember being quite scared a few times - especially when I cut through to find the exit and then realized it wouldn't open without a huge metal key that you were supposed to find earlier in the haunted house. I ran back for it and got myself out of there as fast as possible.

As I was walking away from Old Navy, I realized I had a voicemail on my phone. It was Julie (a person I was friends with years ago who lived in Brookville, IN). She was crying to me because she couldn't get ahold of anyone else and I immediately called her back. When she answered, she seemed so relieved to hear my voice and then told me something mumbled about her and Bill's engagement (she and old friend Bill Hodge are engaged in real life). Then she handed the phone off to someone and I realized it was Justin (boyfriend from when I was 17 from the same friend circle). Justin started to explain that they went on a trip somewhere and Bill went off on a date with a girl. When Justin asked how many dates like this he'd been on while he and Julie were engaged, he said many. While listening, I was weirded out, but also slowly coming to the conclusion that Bill had married someone 6 months ago...and never told Julie.

And then I woke.

Three strange dreams I can remember from last night:


I dreamt I was helping out at a daycare facility as a second job. All the kids I was watching had been picked up for the day so I was helping a woman with the three young ones who were left. As we walked back inside from the playground to change a little girl's diaper, the other woman there asked me to pick up the two boys books or lunchboxes to help keep them from fighting (weird, I know.). I picked up a lunchbox and a book off the shelf (there were only two options and one had pictures of the Peanuts crew on it). At this point, two women walked up to pick up the girl that was being changed. One of them said she was the girl’s aunt. I walked back inside to let the woman know the girl’s Aunt was here and she rolled her eyes and complained saying we were going to have to walk around the block and use a payphone to call the police since she didn’t know of an Aunt coming to pick the girl up.

All of a sudden, it jumped to me boarding a plane for somewhere. As I was getting ready to board, a woman stopped me and asked if I had purchased three books. I said yes, because I remembered having three earlier. Then it occurred to me that someone else was holding the third book as we walked through the line and then gave it to me after I had purchased the other two. They asked to search my bags and found the third one and confronted me about not paying for it. I tried to explain the mistake and then they asked to look at my bank statement to prove whether or not I had paid for them at all. I handed her my debit card….which she was somehow going to use to look up my account online. I begged her to let me enter my own pin number when it came up on the screen so I could maintain safety. She was going to allow me as long as I didn't tell anyone she let me behind the counter. I remember looking over at the plane that was waiting and seeing my parents watch me skeptically through the plane window. I was terrified because I realized I hadn't paid for the third book, but not intentionally.

I also had another dream where Josh and I were staying at a friend’s house. Turns out it was Sarah Julian’s house. In real life she is in college, but somehow she owned this huge mansion of a house. I remember being very envious. I also think she was only 16 in the dream. When we were cleaning up sleeping bags in the morning from sleeping in the basement, Laura Galdorisi called (a friend from San Diego) and asked if she could drop off our wedding gift while we were there – I said sure. Laura showed up with Megan Sullivan and disappeared into the downstairs. I walked around the room trying to find them, but all the doors surrounding the room were closed. Finally, we were sitting down at a table upstairs while Josh was packing up the car and Laura and Megan walked out holding a HUGE platter containing the largest helping of mashed potatoes I’ve ever seen with a bunch of toppings (mashed potato bar style). Laura was so proud of her gift because she KNEW I loved mashed potatoes so much (not necessarily in real life).

From what I remember of last night's dream:

Josh and I went to the Contemporary Art Museum in San Diego (although it did not look like the actual museum in San Diego). When I turned around one dark corner, Josh was amidst the art completely naked. He thought he was being funny until I yelled at him and said they have security cameras and we could get arrested. He started sprinting for the front door and I tried to yell at him to come back as I grabbed his pile of clothes off the floor…

Last night I dreamt I went house hunting with my boyfriend and his mother (both of whom I didn’t recognize in real life). His m om had carpel tunnel and couldn’t get the needle and thread out of a piece of fabric so we helped. She gave us a tour of this house they were looking at and was talking about how it only had one bedroom so they weren’t sure about it. When we got to the bedroom, it wasn’t even enclosed with a door - it was more of a wide hallway that was big enough for bedroom furniture. In the back behind this hallway-type room, there was a small door that the three of us walked through and it was a skinny long room just big enough for a couple bunk beds end-to-end. That’s where my boyfriend was going to stay. It was so strange.

Afterward we went to dinner. (At this point, I’m with my actual fiancé, Josh). We were sitting at a table at an outdoor restaurant on the property of an old barn. Our table was enclosed kind of like a phone booth, but bigger. We spotted this girl Laura who went to my high school and her cute blonde boyfriend at a table across the way. I haven’t seen her in 10 years and we kept looking at them. When they got up from the table to go out and pay, she saw Josh staring at her and she walked over to our table. For some reason I had taken my jeans off, so I had an extra table cloth wrapped around my waist. When she got to our table, her mother was with her. She introduced herself and I told her who I was and she lit up and was excited to see me after so many years. It then occurred to me that she was in town for the 10 year reunion. I admitted that I would have completely missed it because I had forgotten and was going with my fiancé to see another house his mother might buy out in the country near Indiana. When she said goodbye, I remember thinking I should hurry up and put my jeans back on before anyone saw….but I stood up and wrapped three sheets of paper around my left calf like I was making make-shift pant-legs out of them. Then, I strung a rubber band around my leg to keep the papers rolled around my leg. Before I got to the other leg my alarm went off.

Last night in my dreams, I was making a care package of some sort. At first I thought it was to donate to a nonprofit that would give it to a child in need. It had snacks, cereal, juice boxes, and a bunch of other stuff. Then, all of a sudden I had a baby elephant next to me. I had fostered this baby elephant and it was going away somewhere. I opened up the big bag that held the contents of the care package to show my fiancé what I had packed. I then pulled out big grey sweatpants and told him I had packed them so the elephant would have something that smelled like me and feel at home once he’s gone.

I took the cute little elephant outside and he started running down the street with a huge elephant smile on his face. He thought it was so funny to be running from me…his black leash dragging on the ground behind him as I chased him…

And then I woke up.