I’m on the balcony. I’m assuming you call it the balcony. It is oval shaped and I can look over cautiously to see the frozen deck on the lower level. I don’t really have a name for it as I’ve not witnessed the architecture before. The level I look at is ice. I think people are walking on it, but their movements blur. My sight registers them more clearly as the war planes loudly zip over the ship. WWII shows itself. I think?
Shock and the fear of dying soothes itself over me. The lower level-the ice rink I will call it quickly cracks. Wait. No it’s more than that; it is breaking. Gaping holes show themselves as they swallow the people into the freezing ocean waters. People are beyond frantic in attempts to save their lives, while my peripheral view sees others jumping the balcony to rescue. Standing out is a big man and he jumps fast feet first – and the hole created as his feet hit the ice explodes into a watery ice demon. He pops up like a buoy and the last my memory is him attempting to pull himself out, with no rescue in his arms.
I’m speed walking behind two men around the balcony as we enter what I believe would normally be called the control room; but it presents as a classroom. A solid, dark wooden desk beside the door and a row of chairs/benches lined up behind it.
But if you have ever ridden a train, replace the seats with the old school mini looking pews where you would sit facing one another. But these are single seats. Arranged one behind the other which gives it the classroom feel. I wish I could draw, the words I need to provide a mental picture don’t seem to be available.
One man and I walk to the back. I sit in/on the last bench as he chooses the one in front of me. The other man is at the heavy desk using an old handheld phone to call for help.
It’s not the land line you think of when we were children.
It’s this one. From my grandparents house that I saw sitting in their basement over my childhood as a collective keepsake. I assume he can’t reach anyone based on his uptight body language. He swiftly turns and walks toward the other man and I. Down this aisle on a mission.
He positions his body between the seats of this other man and I, angrily seeking to find something. He grabs a brown paper bag from under my seat.
Out of absolutely nowhere, I find myself now in a huge open field running with someone trying to hide from the bombs being dropped from the war planes crossing overhead. There are no clear faces on these people, but this stranger is also a male. We are not a couple, but two people helping each other not get blown to bits and pieces. I can’t explain how I know this, I just know.
Some crazy mini type helicopter shows up and drops a seat. You know. The kind of seat attached to the humongous swing ride at the big fairs. No joke. While I believe I’m questioning it’s arrival, I have no hesitation to hitch a seat. From the moment we begin to swing off to safety, BAM! I am back on the ship in my seat.
I don’t recall the seconds or minutes in between scenes. There is no concept of what this bigger man is saying. He, I believe, has a weapon (gun?) and an emergency radio. Mind you, the chaos of the ship sinking from the middle into the death grip of an icy ocean continues in the background. While I’m inside, I’m seemingly outside watching the horror and heartbreak.
The larger man pulls out the radio-and suddenly both men are fighting over it. It has no battery. The burly guy is quite suddenly in control and forcing us to walk back toward the death hole.
I can’t say I even blinked. Now, I have ran back through this seating area to the other door, jumped over a balcony railing, and I am struggling to run down this path. A narrow one through overgrown dry grass. Just ahead of me I can see a road. A paved road with a turn; but I’m exhausted and not sure I will make it while I keep checking behind me to see if I am being followed.
My eyes open, and I’m laying in my current time, in my present bed, clueless as to what or why I just went through this dream. I’m not breathless from running, but my heart is pounding. I lie there awhile confused and honestly, unable to unsee and understand what in the world I just dreamed.
That had to be a week or so ago.
Sometime last night, I was meant to return to this dream. The same dream! It played out almost identically to the first one. First, let me say I don’t know how our minds do this. Take us back to a previous state of dreaming that we know nothing of. That is weird enough. As it played out I knew what was coming. But one thing did change.
I am back in the office/classroom area. But this time, while the angry big guy is pretending to call for help on my grandparents old phone I look at the other man. I reach under my seat and carefully take the emergency radio out of the brown paper bag. There’s no clarity on how I kept it hidden.
The “bad guy” comes down that aisle, grabs that paper bag from under my seat only to find it empty. I don’t think there was a fight. It’s a blank spot-
But I have turned to run to the other balcony. This time, I have that radio and I think I can hear music playing. I fly over the railing and yep-I’m there on that path. The one with overgrown, brown crunchy weeds. The pavement is also there, just beyond.
As I charge ahead I feel the weakness from before. The one that says I have no more strength to keep going. This time I’m pushing the button and screaming, “Help! The Lindenburgh is down! The Lindenburgh is down! Help! People are dying!”
And I woke up. Heart pounding, and this time in a panic attack. And quite freaked out realizing I had relived this dream. That has no sense to it, but stuck with me enough I’m having some psychological reaction. I couldn’t go back to sleep. Crazy that I my dream I replaced the H with and L for the name of the ship. Even though the real disaster was in the air. Ships don’t sink from the middle. In ice. Do they?
If dreams have meaning, what in the world is going in my dreamworld?
https://sammiscribbles.wordpress.com/2022/07/09/weekend-writing-prompt-267-return/
Nut House Central 