Outside on a scaffold of our property i release a stray (non-pet) rat into our neighbor’s treehouse platform. It’s a caring gesture, but I don’t know if the neighbors would think so — it’s so high up I don’t they’d see. I realize that I had one of our younger pet rats on my shoulder (Jumby or maybe Fergus) and he must’ve leapt off somewhere along the way. I have to trespass onto the tall redwood treehouse platforms and jump down. I have to trace my steps back through a complicated series of cuboid spaces. This is a bit of a hackers domain: abandoned for it’s original industrial purpose then accessed and gradually claimed by a community of unaffiliated fringedwellers. I establish that little Jumby must’ve jumped off somewhere inside the safe zone of a complex of shipping containers; I don’t have to fear he is lost or in any real danger.
In front, ambling out on the sidewalk, I spot my homeslice friends Lauren and Mickey about to surprise me on my return trip from Australia. I approach from behind them (which unintentionally seems to interrupt their plans) and show them a few spots nearby that I now know. One place is off the street is a courtyard with a big tree. It’s much like the large unusual fig at Santa Rita Hot springs which I visited yesterday, but also like a picture I have of Lauren looking into a small green alley in San Francisco (from her 21st birthday trip, when I first arrived).
Riding a favorite bicycle in urban back alleys, somewhat Melbourne-ian. Magical tools are carried in the panniers but I don’t need to use them. My wife turns into a possum-rat and hides in a few of the lively clubs in this part of town. The vibe is an unlikely combination of Australia, Europe, New York, and cities in Baja Sur, Mexico. I locate my wife in a trendy wood-paneled place that could be a country whiskey bar. She has cartoonified herself flat inside a book, her back backed up to the spine.
By chance I run into my friend Dara, who’s very happy to see me. She’s completely dolled up in colorful goth makeup (looks a little more girlish than usual, not quite the Dara I know) and an all-black Victorian / Gothic Lolita outfit. She asks about my travels; I mention that no one asked about it when I posted about going to South America — it’s been long enough that I can’t remember if I really went, out if it was some prank that didn’t work out. In the course of talking we discover the country of the Bahamas is a place she, my wife, and I all have a connection to (partially true IRL). We express an enthusiasm for maybe one day visiting together.
I’m introduced to a nervous single woman who lives at a monument usually guarded by fog, in the center of a roundabout near a scenic vista. I happen to previously have found it myself, not knowing it was hidden on purpose. She has recently had a fence put up, as the fog patterns have changed. She reminds me of many people I might typically know through Facebook. My impression is she mainly just works on the monument while she lives there as an artist residency, and only socializes online.
I’m passing through a ritzy suburb (possibly military officers) when I chance upon a home I visited long ago. It’s an idiosyncratic burrow home dug into the desert sand, partially open, by an artist who made it for himself as an experiment in minimal living space. My Uncle John toured it as a possible place to live and I got to tag along, years back when I was probably a kid. (This seems like a real event as far as I thought in the dream.) I get invited in by the current owners and I point out the things I notice changed. It’s an astonishing use of space for somewhere that should only be enough room for 3-4 next to each other, especially the clever kitchen. The earthen dwelling seems to expand the longer I’m inside — I comment asking about this to the retired woman who lives there. But I think she starts hitting on me, which presents it’s own problems. I have to politely let her down once I notice her eyes, which have been rendered in low-poly texture like on a PlayStation One. I remember the name of this dusty house, or perhaps the (real) community it was built in: Kayenta.
