Weird Dream

Well, I have to record last night's sleep adventures because they were so weird. My mom's birthday is today so maybe I had her on my mind...(I usually don't need her birthday to do that!). I used to write dreams I remembered in a journal, but it's getting harder to write longhand for very long (my fingers & hand fall asleep or get pins & needles), and I figured this might be a long entry, so I decided to share it with all you lovely folks. You're welcome to try to translate it, but I'm usually good at doing that and this one leaves me stumped.

Anyway, there were two distinct parts of it:

In the first, I was living in mega-surburbia. Big house filled with family (yes, even Mom) and lots of neighbors who kept dropping by! One of the neighbors brought some very large (desk pad sized) black & white photos to me--they were all pictures of my father and the ships he was stationed on in the 40s and 50s. There were group shots and shots of him on the quay next to the ship. These neighbors were all dropping in unexpectedly, bringing food, drinks, gifts, and setting up events. In one scene, I remember going into my great room and finding a stray game table (you know, the octagonal, leather-topped ones). I thought, "oh! Mom must be having a card party later today and someone brought this by in preparation." In another, someone came over with some kind of drink they wanted us to try. It was sticky red and yellow in layers! I also remember walking from one house to another. Karma (my dog) was with me cavorting around my legs as we walked through a muddy lane.

In the second part, I was in the hospital having some type of procedure done. And (here's the kicker!), Tom Cruise was my boyfriend! He was also in the hospital...lying on the gurney next to me in a hospital gown with his butt hanging out! Now, if that isn't weird enough, I figured out that my mom (!) had set up the procedure for me and that after they did one fairly inocuous treatment, they had me waiting around for something else that would help my "arthritis medicine do a better job" of working. I kept asking questions about what it was...and finally found out that it was a hysterectomy! So, I gave them all a piece of my mind and told them they were going to do no such thing and got off the gurney and was trying to find my clothes so I could go home. Somehow during this phase, I lost Tom. He was going through something that made him sad, and I was trying to fix it (no surprise there) by talking to him, but then when I figured out the thing about me, he just faded away (maybe has something to do with me taking care of myself?). I remember thinking about the health insurance and wondering who, if anyone had gotten approval from the insurance company. At any rate, I certainly wasn't going to allow any such thing, and somehow that's about all I remember. It was a very busy place...people walking by, my family in and out, tons of nurses. I remember one who came in and clipped her mini Ipod to the side of the bed so she could listen to her music while she worked on me.

Wow. It's always nice to see Mom in dreams. Tom Cruise was a surprise. I'm not especially fond of him, I usually lust after the Tom Selleck types. Of course, an added very sick piece of this is that my dad's name was Tom...but I'm not about to go there!

Whew. I feel better now.
(BTW: Happy Birthday, Mom!!! [and to my very much alive-and-kicking friend, and soul sister, Donna!])

One week left...

A week from today, I return to work. Ugh. Not that I don't like work, actually, it's one of the best jobs I've had in a long time, but it's that I've used up half my time off and have done NONE of the things on my project list. My family/friend dinner on the 26th was delicious, although my bro and nephew didn't come in from Palm Desert because Bob was sick. Big disappointment! (I really, really like my brother...in case you didn't know.) Good news: He's driving in today for leftovers. Bad news: it's another excuse to still not get started on my projects!

Yesterday, I helped my daughter by volunteering at the Community Faces booth for the South Bay Children's Museum. They were, in turn, helping another group, the Chula Vista Nature Center, which is being threatened with closure by the Chula Vista City Council because of--you guessed it--lack of funding. So, the Nature Center had a day of fund-raising at Bayside Park. It looked like they had a fairly good turnout. The media was certainly there! But, despite being in lovely San Diego, the SBCM's booth was in the shade, right in the path of a fierce wind from the bay and it was FREEZING! Well, at least it seemed that way to us San Diego wimps. We were all taking turns standing in the sunny spots and doing all we could to get warm. I think the cold kept a lot of the children from visiting the booth where they could draw a self-portrait or use the special paints for face-painting themselves and each other. I stayed about 2.5 hours and had to leave. I don't know how Connie and her friend Erica (the ExecDir for the museum) managed it for the full 4 hours!

When I left, I spent the rest of the day with my long-time friend, Connie Vickers (who happens to be my daughter's namesake). We visited at her house for a little while, then went to La Bella Pizza Garden for a DE-LEE-CIOUS late lunch/early dinner. La Bella has been around since the mid-50s, and it was a spot my family used to go to when I was a little girl! I grew up in Bonita and Sunnyside (little towns east of Chula Vista--so we had to go to Chula Vista to get to restaurants and stores back in those days), but when I came back to San Diego, I decided to buy a home in a completely different area of town, so I don't get to the old haunts often. Those old memories are nice when I want them, but I wouldn't want to have to live with them all the time!

Yesterday, I felt up to a little nostalgia and it was just fine...in fact, being with Connie and eating there was pretty special. (Side note: I went to La Bella with my new husband right after we got married by the judge in National City back in March 1967--Connie was there then, too! [The first Connie, that is! LOL!!] See? La Bella has a lot of memories that are usually best left in the past.)

It was a great day of both reminiscing and setting up thoughts for the future. Connie and I threw around some ideas for our Bucket List! Connie will be 60 this May, so she'll catch up with me then. We both need to add South America to our list of continents visited...so we discussed how that might happen some day... Hey! you've gotta start somewhere...

And, with 2009 almost here, what better way to spend an afternoon with an old friend?