I had a nightmare last night

I’m curious what the difference between a dream and a nightmare is. Kinda feels like the difference between pornography and erotic art, you’ll know when you see it.

I was in my hometown walking somewhere. I think I was walking to class, would’ve been a long walk I go to school almost 2000 miles from home. My partner pulled up beside me on the road and offered me a ride. We ended up going “downtown”, some megalopolis I’d never seen.

Having a car, we arrived somewhat faster than I would have had I chosen to walk the 10 miles I was intent on. There was so much free time before I had to be where I needed that we stopped at a party. I don’t like social situations without preparation. This is where we transition from normal dream to nightmare.

The attendees to the party was hundreds of nameless faces I’d accumulated over the years of working retail, each one oddly familiar but entirely unrecognizable. Among them however was every woman I’ve ever found myself romantically attached to over the years, and a few who I’d only ever hoped would be. Each one approached me and asked for a final kiss. It’s weird, I’m realizing as I type this that I didn’t recognize any of them until they kissed me, it was the sensation of their lips against mine that was most familiar, not their faces. One of the girls, one who’d I’d never dated but had attempted to repair their phone once upon a time, was upset and asked why I never gave it back. [Upon waking I realized it was because she quit working where I was before I could complete the repair, and I didn’t have her new phone number or social media profiles].

When too much time had been spent at this party full of past partners since parted, I found Joelle and told her we needed to go. Leaving the building was easy, but returning to our car proved itself impossible. Somehow we had managed to traverse 3 levels of undercity between leaving the car and attempting to return to it. It was now (compared to us) deep underground and we could not find the route there. We stumbled upon some extremely long playground slides which seemed to be fashioned into a quick-descent option, but they were adhered with ropes to an inflatable building and simply seemed too unsafe to attempt. I called Joelle down from the slide ladder, she landed upon the ground with a bounce. We began walking, I turned to speak to her and she’d vanished without a trace. All I remember from then on is running around the building, yelling “Joelle” in that nearly silent sorrowful scream we can only produce in nightmares, over and over, until Lili twitched, kicking me in the side, and waking me up.

---

I’m scared of cities. I have been for years. I lived in Houston for a hot minute and In the 9 years I spent there I’m pretty sure I only ever went downtown around 10-ish times. I’ve visited Chicago thrice in my life, and twice it has been the center of my nightmares. I’ve spent time in Cincinnati too. It’s a beautiful city which clearly cares about appearances. But I’d never want to live there. I’d never volunteer to spend time in downtown Cincy.

I lived in downtown Albuquerque for two years. I don’t know why I moved downtown. Ask my ex wife she probably had something to do with it. 400 square feet of hell. And I’m to understand that’s big compared to the ‘average’ NYC apt.

I’m an ape. I wasn’t built for concrete jungles.