Sever the Head to Spite the feet

I seem to have the most intense dreams when it involves my family.

A few weeks ago i was in a house that was being repaired, walking thru rooms that had walls being gutted and removed like some quick changing video set or movie shoot. I was talking to my dad on an old cellphone telling him i'd found his empty wallet. I knew it was his because of the beat up leather feel but also his Military ID was the only thing  left in it. he was talking about something i was half listening to when he goes into cardiac arrest over the phone. I hear him gasping for air. wheezing as his pulse beats loudly thru his ears. I can hear the blood splash against the closed artery. His lungs stop. Each breathe more shallow than the last. I start crying like a child unable to do anything as i cluth his empty wallet in hand.

Of course i wake up and call him and he says he's fine. My big sister however had her car repossessed that morning and was terrified that she couldn't pick up her boys from daycare. plus it was at work so she was afraid that her employers would think poorly of her.

maybe i was feeling her anxiety.

This morning i had a dream that i was back in school. ( I always get thrown back to elementary school. I'd never attended college . So there is always this fear that when i go back to school, i'll be so far remedial in non art courses i'll be at grade school level which is absolutely untrue....right? )

I'd missed yet another math course that would mean i'd be back in that god forsaken place again. sitting in a chair way too small for me, while children a 1/3 of my age run math loops around me.

It felt like i'd spent years there, missing the same class. Having to take other classes since only take one class is not customary. When i decide again to leave not having passed the courses i needed i find my boyfriend. We're standing in the front stairwell of Public schol 40 where i attended grade school in manhattan, he tells me how he's moved on but not in a i'm breaking up with you way. More of a I had a threesome with the friends we went to NY with  with out you. I was angry, angry in a way that almost seemed comical or juvenile. .I wasn't myself for this one sentence. I was Emily, my little sister. I was wearing her dress, long and dark and cotton with a small shrug to cover my shoulders. I had her slight lisp, i hugged my knees as my boyfriend for a brief moment was someone else. we played these rolls for a second. My anger was temporary as if he's not just told me he cheated on me but that he ate the last cookie in the box. I got up and walked towards a store and he said he needed air and i'd meet him out on the field. I saw what happened in his mind. I see my friend Stacy in a room in the corner with a cast and crutches.... that however had nothing to do with what had happened. A dream in a dream i suppose.

I'm in a toy store or a super department store in the toy section. There are people in the dream i know in the dream only. I do not recognize them. I was talking to a man , light skinned black man with a white shirt dress shoes and slacks. He could have been Trinidadian, or Panamanian. There was a hit of something other than just black in his face i couldn't recognize. He talked on and on about old gaming systems and thought it would be a good idea to put on the power gloves and hold on to the shelf and put his feet up on it, showing the power of the new magnet in it. He didn't count on the neighboring she;f to teeter over, crashing toys and cheap things made in  china on the warehouse floor. I helped him clean up, saw a game Camron would like , bought it then proceeded to go out to the field where i knew Camron was.

It was overcast, you could smell the ozone. A storm was coming and i could hear Camron's voice over the young football players screaming out plays on the lawn. He's talking to a woman who resembles a gingercat. Her hair is blown out like a giant orange sponge. She's wearing thick 70's beige framed glasses and he clothing is so busy i can't tell where her bobbles begin and her fushia flower patterned shirt ends.

" You can feel the storm coming. Was it like this when the tornado passed thru tuscaloosa?"

I start to walk towards him clutching the streetfighter game i found, when suddenly a billboard breaks from its post. I watching horror as the oval Orange sign with Navy letters and white stripes with the word GO on it falls on Camron, knocking him unconscious. The sign had a Vendetta against him as it swirled with Tornado like forces ; scoping his lifeless body off the ground, throwing him into the air. He was throw n up 60 ft, then 100 falling down harder to the earth each time. The final plummet to earth snapped his body at the waist. I run with every bit of speed i can muster. In those times i use to run track i would run so fast i'd step on air not knowing i'd gone over a  hole. the ground couldn't come to my feet fast enough then. i picked up the orange board using it as a stretcher using its unearthly power to keep him alive. his shirt was gone, his legs were gone. But there was no blood. I thought, "Oh no, he'll have to be in a wheelchair. I don't care. I'll learn to drive, I'll learn to fight. Just please please please make it thru this. I can't lose another one...."

I get Camron to someplace safe, a room i assume is mine, but i don't recognize.  room. The bed was high and the walls were dark and a small tv was on. I realized by the time i'd gotten there I only had his head. He was gasping for air his body hundreds of feet away. I ran back out to retrieve it and implored someone to grab his legs. In placing his dismembered body together he came back to life. gasping when there was too much of a gap between his head and shoulders. I fumbled with a cellphone, dialing 911 . i forgot my address when asked by the operator, jumbling the numbers together. The operator thought it was a prank and hung up. At that i started to Cry. I knew help wouldn't get here in time. i couldnt hold his head and legs together by myself. my friend who i'm rather pissed at right now was there. holding his legs in place. But his head kept falling. I didn't want to dream this anymore. I was tired. my limbs felt heavy. I was slipping away from the dream and violently reached out for the phone.

noo... i need to help him...  don't take me yet...

I Woke up crying. grabbing at Camron. relieved it was a dream....i'm crying now i think...i never want to see him hurt like that.// I mean obviously  i can't do much if his body is broken apart. But you know what i mean...