The Dreams

I've missed the bus home to Fredericton and I'm stranded in Moncton. While I'm trying to figure out what to do, I'm hanging around in a corner store which is on the third or fourth floor of an apartment building. I hear some sort of ruckus outside and go to the window. I see a large group of Hells Angels fighting with guns and knives. "We have to get out of here," I say.

A twelve- or thirteen-year old boy is standing next to me. "Why? They're not that bad, are they?"

"Yes, they are. Didn't you hear the gunshots?"

He looks frightened. I peek out the window again and see a couple of prone figures in the midst of the brawl. Then, off in the distance, I see what looks like a lightning strike in downtown Moncton. The sky is lit up in brilliant shades of purple, indigo, and green. "Whoa!" I yell. "Did you see that lightning strike?"

And then I realize it isn't lightning at all, but an enormous tornado which has just come from nowhere. It's huge and grey, and it roars like a locomotive in a tunnel, and it's heading right my way. "Get to the basement now!" I shriek, and run out of the store.

It's about 2:00 in the morning, and as I run through the hallways and staircases I yell, "Tornado! Get to the basement!" Confused and grumpy people burst from their apartments and follow me down to the cellar. Once there, I see a half-door. I open it and see a small bare room. It has no lights, windows, or furniture--just a grey carpet. I go in there, shut the door, and sit alone in the dark waiting for the tornado to pass.

....

I'm a male soldier in my early teens, and I'm patrolling the cliff faces of a small rocky island. I'm alone and nervous. I know the enemy is nearby, and I'm unarmed. I hear someone coming my way, and I panic and run for cover. Unfortunately for me, my idea of running for cover is jumping off the cliff. Too late do I realize there's no real foothold, and only a sheer rock face with the water below. I yelp and manage to catch the edge of the cliff with my fingertips.

I hear a girl's voice: "I'm coming!"

Before I can warn her, I see a girl about my age with her reddish-brown hair in braided pigtails. She too jumps off the cliff, but somehow, her braids get caught in the rock and she's hanging by her hair. She screams with pain and terror, and that's when I notice there is a small toehold off to one side. I manage to step onto it, and I try to hoist the girl up. It's not working too well, though. I can't get a very good grip.

I hear voices again. This time, it really is the enemy. A patrol group dressed in brown uniforms with red chest straps is rushing along the rocky clifftop. I know they're coming to finish us off, but there's nothing I can do about it. But then a middle-aged man with glossy black hair and dark brown skin intercedes. He's one of the good guys, but he's outnumbered about ten to one. He begins fighting with the enemy, and while I hang on to my precarious perch and clutch the girl, I know we're all doomed. And then I wake up.

Interviewed by fiachra

fiachra asks,

What is your worst sexual experience ever?

I had to think about this for a while, and I guess it would be from when I was about ten years old. At that point, I lived in a 31' fifth-wheel travel trailer with my Mom, Dad, and sister. Living in such cramped quarters made my parents' intimacy not nearly as intimate as they'd have liked. Although my sister always seemed to sleep through every incident of my parents going at it like minks, I was awake and desperately trying not to hear the sounds or feel the shaking of the trailer.

The one time that particularly springs to mind is when I heard my Mom say, "Yuck yuck yuck! Get it off me; it feels like snot!"

Talk about traumatizing, hmm?

What was the worst part of growing up a Jehovah's Witness?

There are plenty to choose from, and I'm not sure how to rank them. They'd include all the time wasted in stultifying meetings, having it hammered day in and day out that women are always subordinate to men, the fear that people you love will be killed in Armageddon or won't be resurrected afterwards, the fear that you might ever be in an accident which might make doctors want to give you a blood transfusion, and missing out on the glorious materialism and gluttony of holidays/birthdays. Those are all pretty bad, dontcha think?

Have you ever had reason to suspect anyone went home and spanked the monkey to the thought of you after you modeled for a figure drawing class? ;^)

Yeah, there was this one older guy who used to draw me in Moncton. He always seemed a little too happy to be drawing me, and once he even said, "I so love drawing your butt!" It was a bit squicky, but he seemed harmless enough. I think there were far more boys beating their bishops because I was the hot chicky manager at their favourite games/comic shop. That was much more disturbing!

For all your martial arts training, have you ever been in a fight where you could use it?

Every time I spar! But if you're talking about outside the kwoon/dojo, I'd still have to say yes. However, the fights were all before I ever started my martial arts training. Go figure. If I knew in grade school what I know now, I'm sure I wouldn't have been beaten up the way I was. In any case, I hope I never have to use my training. I'd like to think I could handle a situation, but there's no way I could know unless it happened.

Favorite movie ever, and why?

I don't have one favourite movie. I have many, and whatever springs to mind readily changes from day to day. I think my favourite movie du jour is Harold and Maude. I normally don't give a shit about love stories, but this one is so quirky and understated that it really gets to me. I hope I'm as zesty and colourful as Maude when I'm an old lady.

Exploitation Sells

For my most recent religious studies homework, I was assigned the reading Plastic Shamans and Astroturf Sun Dances: New Age Commercialization of Native American Spirituality by Lisa Aldred. This reading was provided as a followup to the reading I did on Carlos Castaneda a little while back. Castaneda's works, although allegorically valuable to many, are fictions and not anthropologically accurate.

( Lisa Aldred's article discusses the misappropriation of North American aboriginal spirituality. )

Old Pictures

My sinus headache just won't give up the ghost. Bah! ( Here are some old pictures bound to distract and fascinate. )