My Weird Fucking Mind

 

Generally, I don’t remember my dreams, but sometimes they will wake me out of a sound sleep and I have to say to myself, “what the fuck is this?”  Last night was a doozy. 

So I crash about 10:30 last night (it’s the weekend, I usually stay up a little later than usual.)  I do my usual routine, make sure the air conditioning is set to low, put my earplugs in, and put on the nasal cannula for my oxygen generator. So I go to sleep.  Now mind you, I am not a sound sleeper (hence the ear plugs) but I do have to get up in the middle of the night to go pee, around 1am.

Now, my brain must have been in that twilight state between woken and asleep, but I remembered the dream that I had.  They say that dreams are the manifestation of our subconscious, and I think in this case it must have been true. 

Enough exposition, here’s the story:

I am approaching an auditorium, going to some sort of mandatory company presentation (which is a red flag to begin with given that the company I work for usually gives them in the break room at work.) There are security personnel at the entrance, plus a shitload of audio-visual presentation equipment.  I venture into the auditorium, and it is decrepit, and only has half the seats in the front end of the house, maybe enough to seat about 150 people.  Behind that, there is presentation gear, and tables with refreshments (pastries, beverages, and pizza.)  So I am told to find a seat, and they are not the usual theater seats, but look more like the kind of seats that you would find in a high end air travel carrier, like the ones that Emirates uses in the Airbus A-380’s.  While I am going to sit, I run across my friend Christian, who I worked with a long time ago, and have remained friends with.  This is very weird.  The last thing that I would expect was to see him.  I reach out to say hello to him, and he ignores me.  That threw me off right then.  The next thing that I see is my husband, and instead of holding our Great Dane Della, he is holding our long gone Great Dane/Mastiff mix Rosie (sadly gone for 11 years.)  I am wondering why he is here.

Well, a faceless corporate drone tells all of us to be seated for the presentation, so I do so and it starts. The screen lights up, and the narrator starts droning on and on about “operational security.” We are shown images that can only be described as what could happen if we don’t take “operational security” seriously.  The images are dystopian in nature, showing people struggling to survive all the while the voice drones on and on about “operational security.”  What the fuck does “operational security” have to do with the industry that I work in, which is manufacturing corrugated paperboard containers (what you would call cardboard boxes.)  I look around, and everyone (including my husband and Rosie) are transfixed by the imagery that is being shown to them.  I don’t know why I am not affected in that way.  Maybe it is my cynical mind (coupled with the fact that I have astigmatism) is preventing me from being programmed. 

This so-called presentation goes on and on, and the only thing that is on my mind at that point is my full bladder.  Finally, it ends, and they invite us to partake in the refreshments.  My husband comes to me and hands Rosie off to me so he can partake.  So off I go in search of a place to take a leak.  The rest rooms are at the back of the auditorium so I go off with Rosie in tow.  One thing you have understand about Rosie is that she was very protective of me and Dan, and would react when there was a threat.  At the entrance to the rest rooms, there are faceless presentation staff in matching sweat shirts.  As I approach, Rosie starts growling.  They start peppering me with questions, not giving me a chance to respond.  I tell them to back off but they won’t. Rosie suddenly breaks free of me and attacks the closest one to me, grabbing his pant leg and starts shaking her head.  They all back away (and the one she grabbed onto runs away VERY quickly.)  I go pee, and then make my way back to Dan.  I hand her off to him and go and get some what turns out to be quite dreadful pizza. 

As I am noshing on this shit-pizza, I look at the screen, and the credits for the dystopian presentation are scrolling by, and I notice this:

Written, produced, edited, and directed by:
Christian.

I am quite shaken at this point.  My friend Christian, who I know very much is a non-conformist, had a hand in this corporate propaganda clusterfuck.  He would be the last person that I would expect to sell out to corporate interests. 

Dan and I go to leave, and as we make our way to the exit, I run across Christian again.  He sees me, and hangs his head in shame. 

At that point, I fully wake, and try to process this.

Yeah, I got a weird fucking mind.

 

-30-

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