Dream sequence...

The dealer agreed to our offer after some haggling. I pick up my "new" car Friday after work. Part of my deal was they include tinted windows - I told them I want it gangsta dark tint so no one will know when I have goats in the back of my stationwagon!

I came back to work after my break and signing papers with Furry Husband - excited 'bout my "new" car and there were 2 messages on my voice mail from my Dad.

He was crying and wanting me to help him and telling me how much he loves me... which is more of a manipulative thing than anything. I mean, yeah. I know he loves me. But growing up, he would often cry as a manipulative tool - sobbing - clutching at us - smothering hugs full of snot and tears and wailing. "I love you sooooo much.... no one could ever love you like I do.... I love you more today than yesterday.... I can't live without you.... I will die if you leave me... "

Now what small child could ever have any defense against this? Shit. I hardly have the defenses now to deal with it and I'm 38 and I know better!

Dad can't find his words anymore. His brain is active but because of the dementia, he can't put together words that make much sense. It's sorta like talking to someone whose cell phone is cutting out badly and all you catch are every 3rd or 5th word in between long pauses and sometimes there is a word thrown in completely out of context like - dishwasher. It doesn't make any sense.

Sorta put a damper on my new car experience.

I know he is miserable. I know his disease frightens him. I know it is progressive and things are only going to get worse. I can't help him. I can't fix it. I can't make him happy. I can't stop it. I can't care for him in my home like he wants me to. I can't do anything for him.

I have to try really hard to focus on the fact that he is safe. He is fed. He is clean.


Listen to the dream I had last night:

There were these woods in a remote location and "they" (whoever they are?) had sent a team of specialists - wildlife biologists - really smart people that know their stuff - down to scope the area, take wildlife information, record data about the remote forest, things like that. Sorta like the away team in Star Trek. Then "they" sent me down to see how these people were doing - collect their data to bring back to whomever was running this project.

I get there and everyone there is dumber. Like they can't hardly speak anymore. They can't recognize simple forest animals like owls or hedgehogs (yeah - in my dream I was really asking them about hedgehogs!) or trees. They don't have their knowledge or smarts anymore. It's like their brains have been wiped clean. They don't know anything anymore.

There are natives in charge - they are tall and all in white - (like nurses I think after I am fully awake and writing this down) and they herd the people around and won't let them leave the forest.... (Dad wears a wander-guard device he can't remove so he can't leave the nursing home - if he does alarms go off alerting the staff) I pretend like everything is o.k. and I go along with everything but the first moment I get, I sneak out and I run away. I am running down this dirt trail/road and I keep running thru the forest until I get to this town. I'm scared that this loss of your mind is contagious and I'm worried this town I found will have the same affliction...

I find a lady at a general store and I talk to her - she seems normal. Her mind is functioning and she can communicate with me on a normal level. I ask to use her phone. I go upstairs to her bedroom and I am trying to call my headquarters - I want to tell them what is happening and have them send in reinforcements to save the people trapped in the forest. We need to alert the army so we can prevent it from spreading!

I think the forest must have mold spores or some sort of pollutant in the air causing all these specialists to lose their minds. Someone has to be alerted! I can't reach anyone. I don't have the right phone numbers. I can't dial the phone correctly. I can't make anyone in the town understand what is happening. There is no one to help. There are no reinforcements coming.

The natives in the forest I escaped from come looking for me. I hide under the bed... isn't that the first place they will look? I want to find a new hiding spot but I can't because they have arrived....

and that is when I woke up.

Certainly no special dream dictionary needed to figure out what that dream is about! Dad and nursing homes and dementia and how I can't escape.... crazy how your brain processes stuff ain't it?

At least it's Thursday and tomorrow is Friday and I have my gangsta tint windows, sunroof and foglights to look forward to! Heck, maybe I'll put a goat in back and drive around just for the thrill of knowing that people can't see in and they don't know I have a goat in my car!