Date: 17-01-2023
I had a very intense dream last night, and looking back it was quite hilarious. This dream started off at a friends house, which could’ve been a student dorm. D was with me too. We were staying over. It was a pleasant place, good vibes, nice people. We were playing board games (which I don’t like in real life) and talking. I believe some of them took psychedelics. I didn’t. The reason for our visit was some kind of festival in that city, where ever that was.
The next day it was morning and I hung out the window. On the streets it was very busy. Mostly young people. Teens and tweens. Good vibes still. Everyone was on the streets because of the festival. I then saw my friend RT. He was talking to some people. D and I started calling out his name. It took him a while to hear it. And when he did he seemed to have difficulty to discern where it came from. We waved and shouted. Eventually he saw us.
We went down, through the window actually, but it wasn’t difficult at all. We were down in a heart beat. We talked to him but he responded kind of vague. It took me some interaction with him before realising he was on drugs too. Psychedelics. We were talking about alcohol and how I don’t drink it because it numbs the senses. His responses were weird and erroneous.
But it wore off and we were all of a sudden ready to go home, as was he. RT mentioned seeing my mother and sister in this city. They were at the festival too, or at least near it. To get home we needed money. RT had taken a job where he would be cleaning apartment windows. He offered me I helped him so he would share his payment with me. I did. We cleaned the windows of the student dorm and we talked while cleaning the many windows.
The topics of dads came up and he talked about my dad as if he didn’t know he died. I told him, and thought it had just slipped his mind. He was visibly sad after hearing it. He knew and somehow also didn’t know. What I do know is my mom never send him a card. And so it was like he had to take the loss of my dad again. I hugged him, and explained to him my mom must’ve forgotten to send him a card. In real life she also didn’t send him a card but I suspected she didn’t because she tried to turn RT against me but he remained incorruptible. She didn’t like his responses to her suggestions. Anyway, we continued with the window washing.
He’d explain to me how to clean the windows and in which order, using a reference to a card game with a deck of cards, but I didn’t understand any of it. But we managed to clean the windows just fine. I winged it, and would now be able to travel. I went alone into the city centre for some reason and found out the festival was some kind of four day long reptile trade faire. I tried to get people to tell me where it was but I didn’t understand their instructions. I went back to the student dorm.
On my way there I ran into my sister and my mom. They were walking my mother’s two dogs. One dog was her old (and deceased) dog Pandy, but he was a different kind of dog now. It was a black pug dog. Old but in good shape. The other was a sheep dog or perhaps a collie, without a tail. When that dog saw me it started wagging its whole body from side to side as to signal it was happy to see me.
My sister held the line of Pandy and my mother the line of the other dog, which’ name I couldn’t remember. But they alternated who held which line throughout our encounter. My mother was displeased with the dogs reaction to me and disciplined the dog, pulling the line and telling it to stop. We talked superficially. Apparently the dog with no tail was a stay over dog, of friends who were going through some problems and couldn’t look after the dog during. But my mother was of the opinion it was taking much too long and she feared they would eventually let this situation last indefinitely.
She claimed taking care of these dogs was a strain on her. One she could barely do. I almost rolled my eyes at her. I thought to myself: “This again…” She herself wanted these dogs, but whatever. All she did when I lived with her was complain about how others wronged her, and that hadn’t changed a bit. I asked them (my mom and sister) why they were here. I found it strange they would come to this festival. But they weren’t here for the festival but to get their bikes repaired. They had cycled to this city and took the opportunity to take the dogs on a long field trip.
But we were nowhere near the city centre, but somewhere in a residential neighbourhood so I asked where this bike repair shop is. It turned out my mother had found this Ukrainian or Czech guy, who was operating from an ally in that neighbourhood. He occupied the backyard and shed of one of the houses there. It was apparently a stones throw away from where we stood so we went there to show me. We came into this ally filled with bikes and some shady dude was talking to another guy there.
Both guys were obvious criminals and the bikes were stolen property. Everything about it screamed “criminal enterprise” but my mother seemed very content with the service. The bike guy pulled out a stack of bills, counted a number of them, and handed it to the other shady guy who had delivered a few bikes supposedly. But I kept it to myself as we walked back to the grassy patch so the dogs could do their thing. I thought to myself: “If she wants to do business with criminals, than that’s her choice.” Though I was worried she was pulling my sister into this too.
We arrived at the grassy patch and I petted little black pug Pandy. He was delighted I gave him this attention, and looked at me with his big black eyes. But then my mother started again about how caring for these dogs was a drain on her. And now she revealed that she was going to bring the dogs to an animal shelter for adoption. Both dogs! Not just Pandy. Both of them. And if that wasn’t crazy enough, she also told me it would be a shelter in East Europe.
Apparently she had talked it over with shady bike guy and he had offered to take both dogs off her hand for a price and had promised to take them to a shelter in his country. My mom started this fantasy talk about how happy she was for the dogs, because in those countries they really knew how to take care of dogs. They would go to a family that wasn’t going to abandon them. She told me that without realising the irony of what she just said.
I had kept my mouth shut but this made me snap. Not only was she abandoning these dogs, she was going to sell them to this criminal? And the collie wasn’t even her dog! The only thing this guy was going to do was to get more money out of these dogs. He’d sell them to anyone, and if he couldn’t he wasn’t going to feed them. He might even just kill them out back behind this shed! But I didn’t think I could convince her of this because she portrayed shady bike thief as an angel from the east so I tried a different route.
I told her these dogs have a connection to her. They love her! I told her she can’t just cut her connection to these dogs and expect this also cut the connections from the dogs to her. These dogs were going to miss her dearly and would be traumatised for life! She looked at me all surprised like she hadn’t realised anything I’d said, but she also downplayed it all, constantly trying to discredit everything I said. I told her that when she took those dogs in she accepted a spiritually responsibility. She can’t just negate that responsibility by handing the dogs over to another person.
But she wouldn’t have any of it. It was already decided. I panicked and feared for these dogs’ lives. I pictured this asshole taking her money, wait for her to be gone, taking the dogs into his shed, just to smack them on the head with a big wrench. It was a terrible thought. I asked her if she could be certain this guy wasn’t just going to kill the dogs. She scoffed at me. It frustrated me so much! Fuck! I knew what to do, though. I needed to tell my dad.
D and I travelled to Amersfoort. Strangely enough my dad was there, alive, together with my brother. They were in my parents’ old house. Somehow my mother made it there before us but she hadn’t said anything about our encounter. She was together with another man now. She hadn’t divorced my dad in this dream, but my dad had also gone through the process of dying, and in this dream that meant he was still around, and when a spouse died you were allowed to have other relationships. Which in this dream people sometimes did if they felt victimised by their spouse if they went through the dying process.
My mom was walking around the neighbourhood in a costume, and so was her new husband. Their costumes were truly incredible, and partially made of paper mâché. Especially the heads of the casts were huge! They towered over their shoulders, and you couldn’t see their faces as they encapsulated their entire heads. He was dressed up as Peter Griffin of the Family Guy cartoon, and mom was Marge Simpson from The Simpsons cartoon. But although accurate in form they were coloured completely purple. Every inch of the cast and their clothes was dyed in purple. And they were striding around the neighbourhood as if performing a weekly act, which caught the attention of many spectators.
But in the living room I spoke to my brother and dad but I forgot all about the troubles. I told them about my weekend staying in that student dorm and about the fun we had there, while sometimes pausing because they’d stand and watch in front of the window to watch mom and her new husband pass by on the street. I don’t know why we did that, though, every time they came by I flipped her off. Then we’d get back to my story. I told mostly my brother about running into RT, and what I had been doing, and all the fun I had, and the jokes I heard. It was fun to talk to my brother again. But then I suddenly realised I had a mom story, which I wanted to tell them about.
I told them about the shady bike guy, and explained in detail why this must be a criminal enterprise. I took way more of my brothers time and attention than this warranted, and he listened in disbelieve shaking his head. My dad had wondered off. Why would she not just go to an actual bike shop? It was still so her though. We talked and talked. But all of a sudden I remembered the dog story. I had forgotten to tell him about that! Oh boy, this caught his attention again. “She is going to do what?” Exclaimed my brother.
My dad (who was now about 7 feet tall somehow) moved back towards us hearing this part. He couldn’t really care about the first bit with the shady bike guy but this stuff with the dogs caught his attention. He said he would intervene. This wasn’t going to happen. The dream images fade after this. I remember vaguely we went to a family party. I barely knew anyone there, but there was one particular aunt that was nice to me in the dream. I have no idea who this person was supposed to be in real life but in the dream she was really nice to me and we had a close friendship.
At this party I confronted my mother again about the situation with the dogs, this time using the guests of the party as a crowd, but I wasn’t tactical about it. I was so mad at this woman. How could she completely disregard any grace or sanctity for justice and righteousness? How could she just abandon these dogs, of which one wasn’t even her own dog! How could she entrust the lives of these dogs to such an untrustworthy person! All she seemed to care about was her wallet and the attention she got from the crowd when she parades around the house playing dress up, and that idiot of a new husband of hers couldn’t even see he’s just another prop for her in her giant masquerade.
I realised this situation with the dogs was a perfect analogue for how she treated her children when we were teens and tweens. That’s where the heart of my anger was. I saw the analogy and I couldn’t stand it no more. At this point after I had just shouted insults at her, my mother was in her purple Marge dress again, parading around the tables at the party, entertaining people who sat there. Everyone laughed and applauded her with every new gesture she made. But every time she moved towards me with her big fake Marge Simpson head cast I’d flip her off again. I wasn’t going to play along with this game, whatever it was.
I vaguely recall leaving with D, but also made sure this one special aunt got a warm goodbye.
