This is a children's story, but there is no guarantee
that you won't find it entertaining at any age.
As on most other days, I woke up at six this morning. That's what my body does without even asking for my permission. I gave up on a good night's sleep a long time ago. I go through the morning dragging my body around like a wet rag, until the demands of work and family forces me to ignore the feeling of exhaustion.
Today then, was no different. I stepped into the shower cell on automatic pilot, turned on the hot water and fumbled for the bar of soap with my eyes closed to rub in my face. I must have fallen asleep again, because the slippery egg-shaped object with a faint smell of almonds had suddenly disintegrated.
Instead, I was holding a tiny little miniature whale in the palm of my hand. It wasn't really a whole whale, mostly a mouth with a minuscule whale body. It stared at me with its beady little black eyes, suddenly stopped moving altogether and then spat in my face.
‘Who do you think you are?’ it said with a squeaky, piercing voice. ‘Rubbing me all over your body like that? Have you no shame? All that rubbing has caused my skin to break out. Look at me, I am a mess!’ It rolled over in my hand to show me his white belly, but it kept rolling and wriggling until it slithered its way through my fingers and landed with a flat thud on the floor of the shower cell.
I felt bad that such a small creature would suffer such a painful belly flop, even if it was in a dream. I bent over to pick it up and put it neatly back in the soap container, wondering when I would wake up.
After I had dried myself off I shuffled to the kitchen to make coffee. I was about to plug in the coffee grinder when it suddenly started to wobble back and forth with increasing force until it tipped over on its side. The lid fell open and a coffee bean with little spindly legs that buckled under the weight of his shiny brown body, jumped on the counter top. I became a little irritated with myself. This falling asleep business while I was already well on my way to getting ready for my day was annoying, to say the least.
The tiny bean looked up at me with a furious expression. The groove down the length of his face made it look like he was going to explode with anger. "What do you think you are doing!” he said as he put his spindly arms in his sides. “How would you feel if I stuffed your entire extended family in the proximity of such a sharp blade! Have you no feelings? Come on, help me get them out of there!”
He turned his back to me and helped the other coffee beans, who were standing in line waiting their turn to jump out of the grinder. I tried to lend a hand by scooping them out, being careful not to make them touch the blade. I heard a muffled sound coming from the grinder and saw that the last coffee bean, probably a cousin twice removed, was stuck under the blade. His legs were thrashing about, so I carefully gave the blade a little push with my fingers while Mr. Coffee bean pulled him out.
'Get us back in the coffee canister, lady. And don't forget to close the lid this time. There was a draft all night because you forgot close it all the way yesterday.’
I put the canister flush with the kitchen counter and swept all the beans carefully back inside with my palm. Mr. Coffee bean, the last one left on the counter, pushed my hand aside with an irritated motion and jumped in without my help.
I realized I was in a double-bind. How was I going to wake up without coffee? Why did I have to dream about jumping coffee beans now? The timing was less than perfect.
Still on automatic pilot I opened the fridge and went through the usual motion of boiling an egg for breakfast.* I placed the egg in a small pan and was about to fill it with hot water when I heard a crackling sound. The egg had sprouted two small webbed feet and a pair of winglets. It was walking around in circles inside the pan, bumped into the metal side, obviously unable to see where it was going. It staggered, dazed from the bump and turned about face, only to bump into the opposite side. It kept going like that for a while until it finally sat down in the middle of the pan, totally out of breath.
'Oh, I am so sorry' I said, 'I didn't realize you were fertilized'. The egg stood up and fumbled with its little wings all over its egg-shape only to realize that it had no eyes and therefore couldn't tell where the voice was coming from. It dropped its arms in resignation and stood motionless. Then, seeming to have made a drastic decision, it gathered speed, ran as fast as it could and crashed head-on into the opposite side of the pan. The top half of the egg-shell broke off and a tiny little chick-head peered over the edge of the remaining shell. It shook itself vigorously, trying to shed the yolk remnants from its face. Then it looked up at me. 'Could you help me out of this shell, please? I keep rolling about and don't seem to get a grip on things.' It said. So I picked it up and gently started to peel the egg shell off until it was free enough to jump on the kitchen counter. The chick walked around, his webbed feet making it sound like a tap dancer. It seemed to be searching for something. 'Would you mind pointing me in the direction of the granola box?' it said politely. 'All that running around in circles has made me very very hungry.' I took down the granola and poured some on the counter, hoping that this would be the last dream episode of the morning.
I squeezed my eyes shut, maybe that would give the chick a chance to dematerialize and let me finally get on with my day, but when I opened them again, the chick had fallen asleep, curled up on the counter, two little slits for eyes, blissfully dreaming within my dream. I gently picked it up and put it in my knitting basket, covering it with wool fragments.
I wasn't quite sure how to proceed. All I could think of was to go back to bed and give myself a chance to wake up the proper way, so I walked over to the bedroom. I was about to doze off for real when a faint motion inside the faded photograph of my grandmother on the wall caught my attention. Oh God, not another dream episode, I thought, I don't have the time for this!
I saw my grandmother's head turn left and right, as if she was searching for something. She leaned over to pick up a pair of glasses which she had obviously found somewhere behind the frame and put them on her nose. 'Ah, it's you' she said, 'Don't you have to get ready for work? I usually don't move about like this unless I am sure no one can see me.'
'Sorry' I said, 'I cannot seem to wake up this morning. I keep bumping into creatures that I am dreaming about, like tiny whales and jumping coffee beans.'
'That's because you forgot the password', she said. 'It won't work without the password, you know. Did you write it down somewhere?'
'I am afraid I didn't know I needed a password to wake up' I said.
'Of course you do. What if you woke up from someone else's dream? That would mess up everybody's waking life, wouldn't it? I suggest you request to have your password reset.'
'I see. How do I do that? Who would reset my password?'
'Well, I am not an expert in those matters, but you can always Google it,' She smiled wisely and nodded in the direction of the door, encouraging me to go and sit at my desk. I thought it would be best if I followed her advice, her being part of my dream and all.
I sat down at my Mac and typed in 'Reset password to wake up from dream', thinking that a cryptic search would get me a better result. Lo and behold, the first website that Google found had the title: 'How can I gain access to being awake if I forgot my password?' So I clicked on it.
One section said: ‘Forgot your 'wake up from dream password? To reset your password enter your email address. We will email you your new password’. There was a large 'submit' button. A warning in big red letters at the bottom of the form read: Beware!!! Resetting your password might cause some loss of dream material. Make sure to back up your dreams prior to resetting your 'wake up from dream password'.
I typed in my email address and received the new password with the following instructions: ‘Right before you fall asleep, keep repeating your password ten times. Then repeat the password backwards ten times. This will be a guaranteed way to wake up from your dream.’
I woke up at eight am. I dragged my body to the bathroom and stepped into the shower cell, fumbling for the bar of soap with my eyes closed and rubbed in my face. The slippery egg-shaped bar of soap with a faint smell of almonds kept its shape this time and there was no trace of a whale of any size anywhere.
I felt a little nervous when I opened the coffee jar in the kitchen, but none of the coffee beans looked angrily at me. I didn't boil an egg that time, not wanting to run the risk that my password was failing. I didn't want to have a cooked chick on my conscience.
Just to be on the safe side, I wrote down my new password on three separate pieces of paper, which I placed in three very safe places. I’ll probably forget where I hid them, but that’s ok, I thought, I could always re-Google a new one.
I wasn’t nervous about falling asleep the next evening. But an hour later, Mr. Coffee bean’s grimacing, brown face appeared, staring up at me from inside the coffee canister. With a smirk on his ugly face, he said: ‘You didn’t upgrade your system. Your new password won’t work. How are you going to wake up NOW?’ He rolled on his back, laughing and laughing and the whole coffee canister joined in, like a chorus.
I stepped into my slippers, walked to the kitchen and ground every single coffee bean, relishing the agonizing screams in the long drawn out process. I walked over to my desk and upgraded my system, but got stuck in a reboot loop.
That is why I started a thread at gotstuckindream@twitter.com. Any suggestions on how to get me to wake up would be greatly appreciated. My privacy policy stipulates that I will not share or sell your personal data, either awake or in my dream. leave comment here
* This was proof that I was dreaming, since I am vegan.
