My Vivid Dream

This was experienced about a year or two ago now, recorded from memory at the time, recently rediscovered and edited for publication.

Bradley

Apr 23, 2023

My Vivid Dream

NOTE: This story exists within a dreamscape - rigid and literal in some senses, yet fluid and surreal in others. It doesn't always make sense. It won't. It can't, because that is not its purpose. Heat and sunlight disturb the vision, adding to the sense of comfortable displacement, moving through familiar feelings and obscure sensory stimulation. The colors are warm and bright - yellows, oranges and earth tones - at the peak of a summer day. We are at the point of our vacation where the threat of its ending has yet to weigh on us.

We were on the beach in Santa Monica – D, M and me with a bunch of friends and relatives. Maybe the Cousins were there? A gorgeous day and D and I decided to go get some more supplies or something, so we took a minivan back to a hotel room where things were comfortably messy.

I picked up some weed and stashed it under a bunch of clothes in a kit bag. I got a phone call on my early 2000’s cell phone, a nokia, and it was some man on the other end who wanted to hire me for a job, which was good because I needed one, although I was happy and not too concerned about it. I was interested and tried to listen although it kept breaking up like they did in those days. He and his wife had heard about me, they wanted to hire me to coach their daughter in acting, but also to kind of help her find her purpose somehow, she was directionless and they were concerned and believed a teacher of some sort like me could help her.

I wanted the gig, but the phone call kept breaking up and I ended it, going back to D suggesting we should get back to M on the beach, which we did.

I had moved and helped D move stuff to the van and we were on the road on our way back. The ride was pleasant and we were happy, not really talking, just enjoying each other’s company. D got a little lost and we were working our way up a back alley. I had a smallish brown cardboard box that had been mailed to me and when I opened it, there were some vintage action figures I had bought.

I was happy to see them, particularly a vintage r2 unit which wasn’t in the best condition (his paper sticker with his body design on it had been worn away), and just as I was about to pick him up to take a look at it, a woman’s hand reached in the vehicle from outside and snatched it out of the box (we had our windows down because of the wonderful summer day and breeze).

I was immediately angry and snatched it back out of her hand just as she began laughing and showing it to her husband. As quickly as I snatched it back, snarling some sort of curse at her, I smacked her alongside her face – not hard, but enough for her to feel it. I put the figure in the box and kept my eyes on the both of them as her face went from smiling to surprised shock, recognizing she had just been hit.

I looked at her like, yeah, that’s right bitch, you just got smacked, and as I looked at the husband, he seemed like he was about to do something. I gave him a hard look and said, “Don’t”. I said one other word, I forget what it was but I was looking at him like I was ready to fight if he wanted. He didn’t.

The van moved on up the alley and D didn’t seem to mind that this minor altercation just happened. Seemed unaware of it. Oh well. It was summer, we were on vacation, and life was good.

I was able to direct him back to a main road. The streets were packed as one might imagine on a summer day in Santa Monica and we were working our way back to the beach.

I felt something hit the backside of my head, just above and behind my left ear. I put my hand back there rubbing the spot and felt shards of cork stuck to my head. I can still feel the spot where I was hit as I write this. Looking back, I saw a young man, early 20s with dark shaggy hair sitting at a bus stop looking right at me. He was sitting with someone else – a fat homeless person who was ignoring everything as they waited. As I think about it now, he looked quite a bit like this British actor/comedian I had seen on TV, only younger and more mischievous.

He was wearing a short-sleeved collared pullover shirt (like an izod knock off) and some white khaki shorts. He held a larger than normal chrome colt 45 six-shooter that gleamed in the sunlight and he was looking right at me – there was no doubt he deliberately shot me.

Somehow, this didn’t upset me. Instead I was impressed he had made the shot at that distance (it was a few car lengths back from the opposite side of the street and came through the open rear window to hit my head – a truly impressive shot with a pistol like that), so I chose to blow it off like a prank. I smiled at him and laughed with a wave that said “Yeah, you got me!” And I turned back to face the direction D and I were going. We were on vacation and it was a beautiful day and we were happy.

Then I got hit in the head again. I put my hand up and there was more cork, I looked back and this guy had shot me again. Now I was annoyed, but he was so far back I was wondering how I was going to get him. Then I looked directly behind our van and about two cars back was a police squad car with two patrol officers and both of them were looking from this guy to me.

The larger cop, who was the driver, got out and chased after the guy at the bus stop who immediately began sprinting away, I didn’t think they were going to catch him, and then both cops were standing at my window, asking me what was going on and if I knew that guy. I told them I didn’t know who he was and we had been minding our own business. “You don’t know that guy?” “I have no idea who that was. I don’t know him!” So the driver cop went back to his car to look around for him. The other cop, who looked unimpressed by everything said he needed to get my statement and could he ride along with us while he took my statement?

I flashed briefly on the weed I had tucked away, but shrugged and turned to D and said “I have to give a statement.” To which D shrugged and didn’t seem to mind at all. He was driving in Santa Monica on a beautiful summer day and was happy to keep going.

The cop got in the back seat and asked a couple of forgettable questions and took my statement saying they probably wouldn’t catch the guy. We both knew it was because he ran so fast and his partner wasn’t in the best of shape, but we didn’t say that out loud.

The cop got what he needed and left. I joked with D about how I loved the way Cops could detach and look so bored and disinterested about their jobs, which were obviously pretty dangerous and required contact with all sorts of people.

I called M and instead of speaking with her somehow messaged that we were on the way back to her and everyone else.

Then the dream shifted. The colors, the energy, even the temperature blurred and became somehow more relaxed and pleasant. I was in an open-air hallway painted in blues and whites, with a soothing breeze lightly drifting from one building to another in this single story hotel. Someone – a woman – had my cat on a harness with two leashes, like they rigged up horses to pull wagons, and he was pulling something when I came across them.

It was time to take my cat back though, and as I approached, my cat moved past me in that ways cats have of simultaneously recognizing you and ignoring you completely. I took the reigns that had fallen and were dragging on the ground before they got out of reach. The woman disappeared, which made sense to me as I was no longer concerned about her. I had the reigns and let my cat lead us back to our room.

We reached a slope on the concrete path of this partially enclosed (therefore shaded from the sun, but still open to allow the breeze to pass through) hallway. As we hit the slope, he picked up speed, determined to make it to the top before I could stop him and bring him in. I laughed. It was fun to feel how strong he was as he pulled me along – never strong enough to escape me, but I let him pull me anyway.

I had everything I wanted in that moment, I was happy, and as I came out of the dream, my first recognition was that it was a message. Those cops were my guardian angels, and they were looking out for me. I was protected. I had nothing to worry about, even though I am so unhappy with my current situation. I actually felt better about my life overall. I’m happier now as I write this. It was a good dream, and I tried to cling to this feeling.

My cat kept insisting it was time to get up though, so even though I would pet him and then turn away, or hide my hand and arm so he couldn’t lick them to stir me back awake, eventually, I had to relent and accept that the dreaming was done and I was here in this normal life. Back to the shit I am unhappy with, but at least comforted in the knowledge that my guardian angels were there somewhere looking out for me.

Then I recognized the one cop that rode along with us and took my statement was the cop who had pulled me over in Indiana and let me go with a warning. I was so grateful to him in that moment that he reappeared in this dream as a guardian some eight months later.

Life was good in that dream – a golden memory bathed in the warm sunlight from another life somewhere – and life really wasn’t all that bad here. Then my cat insisted it was time to feed him and I had to get up and get back to this life I live in, because this life goes on despite the beautiful dream ending.

I can still feel the spot in the back of my head where I got shot with that cork bullet, though. Maybe a latent memory to keep this feeling from the dream alive as long as I can remember it.

It was a good dream.

P.S. - I have spent a few days reflecting on this person in my dream before coming back to make this notation – when I awoke, my first impression was that he was representative of my Brother, in what I might consider his most handsome and vivacious days of his late teens and early twenties. He was vibrant, intelligent, compelling and mysterious/mischievous in his own way, and that flashy chrome pistol of his clearly representative of a desirable sort of power, something he wielded of which I might find desirable. Something of his of which I might be envious – but why two shots? Both to the back of my head, causing me to turn in his direction, feeling both appreciative as well as annoyed? He was trying to shoot poison bullets into my mind, but my skull was too thick to allow it. My senses too dull to understand his purpose in the moment.

Over time I believe I understand all of this now – one shot to gain my attention and recognize him as possessing something that I might desire. After showing appreciation and even encouragement, a second shot to call further attention to his possession – this power. To flaunt this object in a way that would evoke envy and a desire to possess this flashy weapon designed for inflicting pain on others. And once possessed of such an item, surely I would feel compelled to use it.

And yet, I only see him from this distance, at a bus stop – a transitory place with another individual, so bloated and sedentary that they could not be recognized as anything other than someone not so fortunate as this representation of my brother - my Brother, looking at me, getting my attention with his flashy gun that did nothing but become more annoying and desirable to me the longer I was aware of it. He possessed something I found appealing and he was very capable at using it.

Even so, that morning as I was first processing the waking impressions left from my dream, I rejected that this was an actual representation of my brother. It only somewhat looked like him, and why would he bother to be shooting at me? Goading me to annoyance? No, I rejected it then and I reject it now.

The highest lesson and message of this dream, for me, was that I do have Guardian Angels. I am protected. I have nothing to fear. This was why – after the second shot, when I was feeling the rise of my ire – I saw the two policemen in the patrol car that had witnessed everything. This was why the one officer I didn’t recognize chased off this imposter of my brother, and the other officer, whom I did recognize, rode along with us further to “get my statement” and essentially assure us that, while they may not catch the imposter of my brother, they would do their best and we, collectively, would be fine.

I know that deep within me, no matter what, my Love for my Brother, and his Love, not only for me, but also for our Family, would not bring him to this action. No, this was a Demon of some sort. An aberration of malice attempting to sow division between myself and my family on this happy day of relaxation, retirement and recreation.

That was what these policemen – my Guardian Angels – were chasing away. A reminder that my brother’s successes are exactly as they should be, and there was no need to feel anything other than love and praise for his successes, not only as my brother, but also as a member of our family, even if he was not actually there on that day with us.

This demon attempted to undermine our happiness and our love with this flashy object – an object for inflicting pain and even death, although against me it merely caused a brief annoyance. No, this was not my brother in the dream, and if anything, I was correct to reject my first assumptions upon waking. Our Love, and our Love of Family remains. I would protect his wife and children as if they were my own if need be, and I know that had I the same circumstances, he would do the same for me.

This Demon failed. He was chased away by my Guardians, and my Love only grew stronger for my Brother, my Family, and my desire to preserve the Love and Happiness we hold for each other.

Love will always win. I am blessed to have such Love. Blessed to have such Guardians, and doubly blessed to be able to receive these messages and come to understand them clearly as intended.

Thank you to whatever Higher Power delivered this to me. I still feel the place in my head where that Demon hit me. I feel it every time I think about this dream. I consider it a physical reminder that Love is all around me, and the ill intentions of such demons are only a minor annoyance – an irritation to be mindful of, and yet never allowed to consume my thoughts or perceptions.

The Demon failed. Love reigns Supreme.

It was a Beautiful Dream, and I am a better person for having lived it.

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