Sunday, February 18, 2007
Dreamin' Obvious Prophet
I have been taking Cipro the heavy duty antibiotic and my sleeping patterns are screwed up. It seems like I am not getting to that deep resting point past R.E.M. so I wake up a lot during the night and remember dreams. Last night or early this morning I heard this huge thud below the house and cats screaming. I also remember a dream that was odd and fun. So come listen to a story from man named Jed, or a man using the pseudonym of Jed anyhow.
We live in an old house here in the tiny city of Knoxville that has an alley that runs the length of the block for parking and garbage pickup. It is just like hundreds of other blocks here in town, full of houses that were built in the post war boom by Americans for Americans from wood stock from the wild west or the deep south before we used up all the good pine trees. They are fine houses built to withstand this part of the earths weather and ground conditions. The houses are showing their years of half ass remodels, rentals and investors who turn them for a quick dollar. The house I rent has foundation holes that are used to vent the radon gas and moisture from the crawl space to keep it from seeping into the living quarters. I keep them open for that reason, but they lack a screen part that was kicked out years ago. The alley seems to harbor many cats and my open crawl space seems to host a warm place for them to sleep as the weather has been very cold for the past month.
This morning I awake from a light sleep to a huge thud and the cry of two maybe three cat voices. I tried to focus in on the sounds and tell if it was cat sex or cat pain, but I can't tell the difference. It was 18 degrees Fahrenheit so I did not go outside and down under to see. I did turn on the hot water to make sure the water heater was still attached to the plumbing. Yes, it was that big of a thud. I also turned the heat blower on to make sure the cage fan worked and did not have a feline obstruction. Their cries lasted perhaps two minutes. I guessed in my sleepy thoughts that is perhaps the time it takes to make a litter of kittens or die from a busted cat spleen (that is if they have spleens). My thoughts drifted from there to the comedy it is that life starts and ends in just the matter of a few seconds.
The dark cold commotion must have set me up for a guilt and shame drenched dream where I prevail somehow in bald Britney stardom. I have been feeling so very guilty because between the rent, the massive heat bills, food and transportation I have less than enough to cover all the cost around here. The little fees built into contracts at banks, utilities and most other services are eating at me because not only am I behind, I am nickel and dimed to death. These little fees utterly eat my lunch. This past year I made just enough to kick us out of a decent IRS refund using the Earned Income Credit. Yep, I am living the middle class American dream over here! So from time to time I soap box about the crappy dealings that every company uses and calls fair and ethical. To me they seem to copy the national mind set that you are only late because you are holding your money to glean the mega interest and dividends from your investments. The notion that the economy is great makes me bitter as well, because they take all the overhead cost of food and fuel out of the numbers. I came across my antibiotic by way of a plea from my wife as she took her daughter into the clinic. The Doc said the whole famn damily was a cesspool of bacteria and mercifully gave a double script. Most likely she told him how I am determined to die if I can't make enough to live around here and would never go to see a Doctor unless a truck had to scoop me from the streets of our fair city. Yea, get me started in the clever billing scams these folks pull, but hey it is all legal because they write the damn laws with their paid in full congress people and lobbyist. Come April we will either have cats to give away or stinky carcases to find and bury...life, beautiful life!
Anyway, to the dream, the dream of winners losing and losers winning. I was watching Fox on T.V. in this dream, and the contest box was flashing to call with an answer to a quiz on one of their shows. I think it was a mixed mash of Family Guy-Simpsons-King of the Hill-American Dad, and I guess the answer was Roger-Ladybird-Brian-Santa's Helper or some such shit. I won! Me?...win?...there has to be a catch. The catch call was a few moments later when someone from Fox called to say I was disqualified because I owed the Fox network ninety cents from some cable deal way back when. I don't think I have ever skipped out on a cable bill/deal. So I got really pissed off and told them I did not want their damn prize and fuck them and their ninety cent bogus fee. A little later a reporter from the Times in New York city came to my house to find the man who had the nuts to shirk a gnat and swallow a camel as he put it. I rose in this dream to some sort of Lech Walesa status and got my fifteen in the media. I felt good waking up after that dream! I still questioned if this April will bring life or death under my house.
What will I need for the future, a shovel or a whelping box? Knowing what tools are needed is a big part of not making matters worse.
:: posted by Tennessee Jed, 3:23 PM
5 Comments:
Dreams can be so disorienting. You know I feel for you. Try to hang in there!
We'll probably need both, Jed. That is the way of things. Death, Life, Good, Evil, it's all the same. It just matters how you look at it. ;)
Shirk a Gnat and Swallow A Camel needs to be a blog title (or a double-bill concert).
As for dreams, i had one a week or so ago about a boss who recently refused to hire me, saying i could be 'dangerous', and in the dream i strangled said boss. does that indeed make me dangerous?
As for dreams, i had one a week or so ago about a boss who recently refused to hire me, saying i could be 'dangerous', and in the dream i strangled said boss. does that indeed make me dangerous?
I get birth and death visiting simultaneously at times...it's confusing. You are so damn right! Cat sex and cat pain do sound the same.
What kind of a country is this when we can send soldiers and jets to a desert across the ocean and we can't even get simple medications for ourselves? Damn all nickels and dimes, I know just what you mean -- the state of New Jersey made me pay $175 for a certificate that qualifies me to ... drum roll ... EARN A CERTIFICATE.
Yowling cats mean only one thing. You'll be seeing lil ones in a month or two. The thud was probably caused by two Toms fighting, and one of them knocked something over.
Yowling cats mean only one thing. You'll be seeing lil ones in a month or two. The thud was probably caused by two Toms fighting, and one of them knocked something over.
