Tag: Chicken John

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Dream Journal

Throwing Knives at Me

Chicken John needs my help to pull a trick in some deal he’s trying to pull off. He’s allowed me back into his circle of trust for this purpose. It’s the friend group I had a decade ago. He doesn’t realize that I don’t care about the social pressure anymore, and that when I’m asked what I think of the deal I’ll just tell the truth. He gets publicly furious at me and starts throwing knives towards me — he’s somehow allowed to do that, since no one will stop him. The knives land point-on, pinging into wood and vibrating with their impact. One lands above my head, another clatters off a low wall. I grab one, not sure what I mean to do (perhaps use it as evidence) but it feels more dangerous to run with it than have something to defend myself with.

This dream wakes me up early and I have to get myself back to sleep. The next few dreams share a similar setting, without any of the plot elements.

Chicken is living at a remote rural compound which is a former hardware store. It’s large and feels like it’s open air, though not having a roof doesn’t seem to matter. It’s down a straight hilled slope and a concrete drive, as if the land was cleared long ago. It’s big enough that various aisles feel abandoned even with the scattered projects and improvements people have done. I sense that there are frequent visitors but few besides Chicken that will commit to living there. It seems like he’s still operating like it’s ten years ago and the transformative power of the art will just carry through on whatever big project he wants to do.

The same area becomes a Mormon church — no Chicken, no rural art colony. I’m part of a team which conspires to steal a ritually important object from the church. This is actually a set-up conspired with the church leadership to boost congregation morale and brief that the object (a book, a breastplate?) actually is mystical. We’re a bunch of urban occult-y weirdoes so we seem perfect for the task. My school friend Robby T. is one of the churchgoers, which makes sense because he was Mormon. The heist does work, but we end up hiding the object within the big church, in one of the windows, facing the non-usual direction. This feels almost like a prank, since the churchgoers don’t recognize it that way.

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Dream Journal

Two Events at the Whybrary, Directions to Lizard Milk Lab

Remembering the occasion when I signed up for a fundraiser of pesto dinner during the pandemic (pesto spaghetti is still one of my favorite meals and has been since I discovered it at she 4). It was served at the Whybrary — perhaps even my first time there. A folding wall separated it into an audience area and backstage.

What reminded me is that I’m at a Dr. Hal Show at the same space, current era. I’m getting to hang out on couches with my friend Laurie O. who happened to also come to the show also; we were friends together in 8th grade. The couches face each other and we each spread out lengthwise, heads to feet. I lean my arm over onto her couch when it gets tippy in order to balance it. The host, Chicken John, notices me do this and immediately ends the show. It’s as if he can tolerate no more of me enjoying my life and being helpful in his presence. Or existing perhaps.

Looking through the front window of a house like Mickey’s to observe a person using a computer with their back to the window. The computer and all the accessories are color themed purple. Sounds like the 90s which is when I meet Mickey. I ring the doorbell there and soon realize (before they arrive at the door) that I have the wrong address here — 3068, when the cream carton i found it on shows 4068. I quickly have to explain my mistake, keeping up a momentary charade of letting them explain the directions to 4068 when I do already know.

When I get to address it’s inside a development organized like a ring. Businesses and labs face the inside. In the center of what looks like a corral, its wooden posts wiggling in the ground. The address is some sort of lab, making a kind of experimental milk. Curved terrariums line the front. Maybe it’s lizard milk? If there was more, I don’t remember.

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Dream Journal

Rocking the Boat (in the boat’s attic)

On a big art boat built by a community overtime. I’m on the second story in a communal attic, being shown the work still needs doing, when chicken John comes up all blustery. He’s not visibly upset to see me, reassuringly. But as he’s talking he does start exaggeratedly thumping himself against the sides of the bus-like space to emphasize some point he’s making. As this attic is well above the center of gravity, the whole thing starts rocking side-to-side rather alarmingly. Obviously it doesn’t tilt over but as this is my first time visiting that’s certainly not apparent to me. Causing me to appear startled seems to be Chicken’s modus operandi.

His bite’s still not gone.

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Dream Journal

The Old Hostel, a New Boat

Early in the morning I have two thematically-linked dreams that I think I’ll remember — but they’re missing now, overwritten. They were from first light perhaps 6AM (when I put on my eye mask that helps provide darkness. They feel like fruit which has been torn from the branch and had the scars crust over.

A visit the the Financial District of our town with it’s smooth asphalt roads for fancy expensive electric cars. I don’t go here often but my wife and I met here, at the old hostel. Strange to visit now. It hasn’t changed, really, but I have. Though it does have a different name — “Desert Inn ” — but the vibe of everyone there is so startlingly familiar. There’s such a strong nostalgic pain as I look over the young people socializing around the pool and courtyard. The same types of people; the kind of person I was once, in my early twenties. It’s the openness and energy, a kind of power without knowing you have power. I notice my old mentor Chicken John leaning against a wall nearby the entrance, waiting on some of his boat crew.

I haven’t seen his new boat, a big sailing ship he’s been aggressively working on for months (if social media is to be believed). I follow him onto the tall ship. This has been his new project since after we separated. He likes to keep busy. Though feigning for a moment to treat with respect, he quickly finds an excuse to demand something from his crew of lackeys — the kind of person I used to be — and leaves me as if I’m not there. The status quo. Fine for me, as I go about investigating the more interesting nooks and crannies. I end up on the lower deck of the white-painted hull, and then in an outer room that could be a sunlit dining hall with a roof of gauzy plastic sheeting. I realize the ship isn’t on water, or even docked, but set into the center of a grassy disused common. I recognized his cleverness, managing to convince some functionaries to have it permanently parked as if it were the town’s, when it’s really his private property. It looks like just any other strange vintage ship turned into a building, if you can believe it.

I head away and find a jumble of rocks artfully rolled up against what acts like a gate at the end of the common. Mossy and landscaped, I jump from tip to tip on each rock’s point… upon recollection, not unlike how I visited Point Emery in the East Bay for sunset yesterday. Although in the dream, I also do this on a bicycle.

There’s an extended sequence where I care for Chris Farley (or a very Farley-like figure). He’s a great guy but a terrible mess of a life, drugs but also personal choices, and it’s an intense job. I do this perhaps twice. I realize I won’t know how to relate this to someone who’s not done something similar. Here, writing now, I suppose I really don’t. Seemed important to remember at the time.

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Dream Journal

Cleaning Up After Burning Man

I volunteer to clean up after Burning Man. It’s a camp I used to belong to, people I used to be friends with who I haven’t seen in years. Now I’m idly cataloging the junk left behind — piecing together the stories of what happened at the week-long party. Specifically I recall searching under flip-up style Murphy beds that are semi-permanent and remain in desert for the year (an unusual change since everything used to be completely leave-no-trace). Sponsorship in the camp is by Ritual Coffee, naturally. I still drink Ritual to this day.

Perhaps an object I find, perhaps a different dream: a golden metal orb with triangular holes lining its surface. Thin tetrahedral slices which fit exactly through the holes, as if it were a 3D puzzle to be assembled through the tiny gates. But it seems too elegant and precious to be a toy.

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Dream Journal

Encouraging A Young Girl’s Campground Waterfall Recitation

I’m in a house with my brother Patrick. The house is built with half walls, quarter walls. It’s modernist but neglected, and we are guests without a host. Reminds me of darkened apartments from other dreams, places I’ve lived where I’ve discovered unused rooms. Patrick takes up the task of picking a new animal to represent the Inca Empire, to replace the llama.

I’m later flying around the neighborhood, skipping along a narrow brick wall at the edge of a religious building’s property. Idly I fantasize of visiting each and all of the different denominations nearby. Reminds me of my childhood street in Eureka, California between ages 4 and 8.

I fly back to a campsite where we recently stayed, just off the road. I have to retrieve three items my group left behind because they “couldn’t pack it all” without my help. I have a view through pillars at the edge of the camp, and spot my mentor and his young daughter approaching. Unseen, I wait behind a waterfall window between pillars. The daughter begins a classical poetic recitation to an audience. I’m able to crouch/slide onto the floor in front of her mid-performance, giving her a reassuring nod and encouragement that steers her performance toward success. I can’t tell if her dad was withholding this kind of approval until the end, but I’m able to swoop in and give guidance she was lacking.

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Dream Journal

The Justice of Salvador Balthazar

Attending a movie night with a big projected screen in a great hall. Without warning, a large heavy object crashes down near the front. It hurts one girl who happened to be in center of aisle, and I’m the first to offer her assistance. She limps away though a side chamber, and it feels good to help, but odd that no one else seemed to think they should try.

On the street, I run into my former mentor dressed as a fireman. Tell him about how I recently saw him as a fireman in a dream (whoa, meta). Interaction goes well and it seems we’re both left with a positive impression. I wonder what he’ll tell his wife.

Salvador Balthazar is a historical character from the days of American revolution. He shows up to collect on justice for a reformed character. Brock Samson (from the show the Venture Bros) has to adjudicate. He’s surreptitiously tied himself to the handle of a giant-sized brown cart, waiting for an opportune moment to cut it off, launching over a high wall. He’s then able to attack Salvador, having made his ruling.

I wait for everyone involved to come through my front door. I have to delete episodes of Star Trek Voyager, worried they are corrupted and won’t obey computer commands, but I’m pleasantly surprised that it’s no trouble. My wife walks in behind everyone else and asks me “what happened here?”

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Dream Journal

Documenting Early Space Ecosystem

I have let several rats stay in our house while we’re away. When we return, we collect as many as we can — a cute disorderly pile of all different ages, since they unexpectedly bred. We now have a huge new assortment of genetic diversity, though not all of it good. Some even have exposed parts of their skulls, jawlines sticking through flesh. I spot one youngster in the center who already appears mummified.

Outside I film a bunch of short clips documenting the early 1960s ecosystem of space — all the different planes and support craft, the flight patterns, surprising new noises, ground facilities. Finally I spot an aircraft that has a steep trajectory, going higher than the others, and you can see it break an unseen barrier in the sky. Gauzy ripples spread out as if on the surface of a plastic greenhouse tent.

I’m standing near a gate in a chainlink fence when I suddenly notice my old boss Chicken John approaching. He’s grumbling to himself and basically ignores me. He starts barking instructions to his assistant (maybe Jimmy). There’s something nefarious in the tone of what I overhear and I start to suspect he’s planning to burn down his bar/grocery store, The Odeon. I begin to record audio on my phone, uncertain what I’d want to do with it if I were right.

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Dream Journal

Nightmare Picking Out Clothes

My wife is in the cab of our semitruck parked on 24th Street in our neighborhood, trying to start it up. It’s cargo is filled with furniture and things, could be a resale company or perhaps a home. As I watch from a distance safe to give directions, it quickly spins out of control, circling into stuff nearby and jumping the sidewalk.

Visiting a docked boat restaurant when I discover it’s owned by someone I know and watch on YouTube. His first name is Eduardo. In the adjoining walled sideyard, he raises livestock fowl. I count and observe groups of birds of various ages before I realize how many there are. The number I recall is 2000! He sets up to broadcast a YouTube video of eight hours of ducks marching in a huge circle — at which point I sneak out, to avoid explaining why I myself am not going to watch ducks marching that long.

On my way off the boat I encounter Chicken John, who is located behind me while I wait for the bathroom. I take the initiative and, in such a way that we don’t have to acknowledge how we know each other, I give him a hug. This cleverly avoids any possible awkwardness.

Some time later I’m in a long group cabin. Two rows of squares are taped on the floor to mark out individual sleeping areas. There’s a vibe similar to in the movie “Midsommar”, kind of culty, and the sun barely sets. Before bed my wife asks for me to fetch the teardrop-shaped blue shoes from the window ledge. Exasperated, I eventually find what she meant, though they’re neither shaped like teardrops or blue.

I awake feeling as if I’ve barely slept. A group gathering is about to begin up the hill from cabin, visible beyond an open wall. Everyone else has already left. There are vague instructions to “dress comfortably and nice” but they pointedly don’t tell us what the event will actually entail. Quickly, I feel overwhelmed –by the number of decisions so early, and the knowledge that everyone is already waiting for me to show up. It’s a feeling that I’ve failed before I’ve begun. Why would anyone force you into a situation like this as soon as you woke up? I wake up myself then, convulsing and dry-crying against one of the pillows in bed.

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Dream Journal

Not So Far from Home

A feeling like being in a house across the street from my house where I grew up, yet far away from home, like on a road trip. Inside, this narrow open house is a special rest stop worthy of a pilgrimage. They sell sodas there, a long row of flat pallets with dozens of rare varieties. I’m looking for my childhood favorite Cherry Coke and I’ve searched the whole length with no luck. Finally a kid slightly older than me gives me a single can and I’m delighted; I don’t know where to drink it though.

I need a ride to get home — despite looking out the window and seeing my house two doors down. Later I wake up along a roadside under a comfy camping bed, naked as it’s also comfy, as many cars pass by on the busy road and I still have to find a ride.

Later I’m getting off a bus, not expecting it, walking down the bus doorsteps and see my old boss Chicken John right outside to greet me. Someone has set us up to meet again, an act of reconciliation. Looking him in the eye as if to forgive him.