Tag Archives: writing group

I live!  Mostly.  I’ve had some horrendous allergies lately, and it’s kind of becoming the center of my life.  I just don’t feel like doing ANYTHING anymore.  So, naturally, I don’t do anything.  I try to keep my breathing at a calm level (since I’ve had a series of asthma attacks I can’t seem to control), try not to rub my eyes, or itch the random hives that keep springing up on my forearms.

Maddening, I tell you!  Maddening!

And now here’s some fun.  I had a weird dream last night, and it leads me to believe I have to stop eating before bed.

So, I show up for our Inkwell Imaginings group, but it’s not at the library.  I’m suddenly facing this enormous old boarding house, vaguely Victorian in style.  The dark gray paint is peeling, the windows are black beyond the glass, shingles left bald spots on the roof; the whole thing looked to be falling apart.

For some ridiculous reason, I don’t question any of this, and just wander up the steps and into the boarding house.  Apparently, the boarding house is a school, and it’s brightly lit, and there are children everywhere from five to about eleven-years-old.  The rooms were converted to classrooms.  I didn’t know which room we had reserved, so I went about checking all of them on the first floor, and finally found our room with one person in it.

“Sorry I’m so late,” I said.  “Where is everyone?”

“Jess switched our rooms,” he said, and started for the door.  “We’re on the second floor.”

I stepped aside so he could lead me up to the second floor, but when I turned he was gone.  Naturally, I attempted to chase him up this big staircase, but honestly there was no one there to chase, and I couldn’t yell for him, because children were napping in some of the rooms.  So, I just kept going.

Finally, I found our room.  A bunch of people I haven’t seen since high school were there, and Jess was standing by the teacher’s desk at the head of the classroom.  “We’re being moved,” she said. “Third floor.  We have all this stuff, though.  I’m going to go find the room.  Have everyone gather their things.”

Aaaand she was gone.  I turned to look, and everyone had backpacks and suitcases, and even a big teddy bear.  Two of the bags were mine, a suitcase and a rolling duffel.  I didn’t have any idea how they got there, or what was inside of them, but I took them anyway.  They were mine, after all.  So, hauling all these bags, we started up to the third floor, dragging our luggage with us.  We were panting and complaining and struggling.  No one wanted to go any further as we were shoving the larger bags ahead of us, sliding them up the stairs as best we could.  The third floor seemed much higher up than the second.

Finally, we reached the third floor, and it seemed mostly empty.  Everyone sat on the stairs while I went to find our room.  Each room seemed to be full of napping children or singing children.  I walked into one and I was under a stairwell.  I started freaking out.  It was well let, and there was nothing in there, but it did seem like the stairwell to a boarding house hallway, and not the school that the inside of the place projected.  The walls had those bare wooden slats inside  holes in them, chipped paint, and an odd smell.  After having a minor panicky moment, I slammed the door, brushed the cobwebs off of myself, and walked back toward the group.

The longer I walked, the more I spotted some dirty men leering at me from where they were perched on the banisters.  They shouldn’t have been there.  It was a school.  I kept walking, and found that the luggage was still there, but most of the group was not.

“They went to find the room,” one of the others I didn’t recognize informed me.

I sighed.  I was getting tired of the wild goose chase.  It wasn’t long before I ran into Jess and the rest of the group.  Everyone was getting sketched out by the random men appearing out of the woodwork, all grubby and grotty, and homeless looking.

“We have to get going,” Jess said.

“Why?  Don’t we have the room?” I asked.  Stupid, right?  All these nasty men closing in, and I’m concerned about our writing group reservation.  Typical.

“I really think we should just go.  I can’t find the room.”

I conceded.  We went to the rest of the group waiting on the stairs, and the next thing I know, we’re in the parking lot.  Almost everyone had gone.

“Come on, get in the car.”  Jess motioned me over, but I couldn’t seem to make myself leave.  It was real effort to tear my eyes away from this house.  Finally, though, I did get into the car, and then I woke up.

It strikes me odd that everyone in my dream was oddly deadpan or just entirely unenthusiastic in everything they said.  It was weird.

Anyway, so that’s my dream, and I’m not dead.  Thanks for reading. <3