Smoking
May 18th, 2008 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I met my mother on the side of a road, where she was smoking a cigarette. Later, I found my dad in a parking lot waiting for me to go into a party, also smoking a cigarette. His was very thin. I asked him why he was smoking, and he told me this cigarette was from a pack he had purchased when he was fourteen years old and had been working through very slowly for his whole life. I thought this was okay, but it was inconvenient to have to wait for him to finish.
(In real life, two of my roommates have recently taken up smoking.)
Three dream fragments with (seeming) absurdly naked symbolism
May 4th, 2008 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
Lisa (my boss in the Children’s Garden) told not me to talk for fifteen minutes. This frustrated me because I needed to talk with her before I left work, which I had to do in less than fifteen minutes to avoid being late to a meeting elsewhere.
Adrian and I searched for batteries in a grocery store.
Laura asked if I ate peanut butter more than once a day. I told her I didn’t, so she told me I could put more on the piece of bread I was preparing.
Changes for Brian
December 17th, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
Brian Lindvall had had his sex changed as a small child because his parents had wanted a boy instead of a girl. He had also had all his teeth removed.
A family going bald
December 5th, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I found out about a seminar at a branch of my school that sounded like it would help me in my life, and bicycled pretty far to get there. Once there, I got on a long line of people waiting to get into the seminar. I waited for a while, and maybe read a little bit about the offerings. I started to worry that the seminar would not actually be interesting, and approached a group of hip-enough looking people who, after a few awkward tries, I was able to ask if I should continue waiting to go to the seminar. They told me it probably wasn’t worth my time.
I started to walk back home, realizing once I was a ways away that I had left my more comfortable shoes (which I imagined as grey canvass sandals with good arch supports) in the building, and had only my flip flops to walk back in. This made me decide to take off my shoes entirely, and walk barefoot. Soon I realized that I didn’t actually know if I was going in the direction from which I had come, and also that it would take me much longer to walk than to bicycle.
I came across a family eating a meal on a patio close to the road, and asked them which way UW was. All of the members of the family seemed to be going bald. This made me wonder if possibly they were not a family, but a gathering of cancer patients. They pointed in the direction I had just come from, which meant I was walking the wrong way, but offered to give me a ride in their car, as they were planning to drive in that direction anyway. I noticed that the mother of the family was able to hide the thinning of her hair by putting it up in a complicated way.
We ended up sitting on bar stools at a counter somewhere. On the floor were one or two clock radios, unplugged and with blank screens. I noticed that the son of the family had his bare foot on top of my bare foot. I moved my foot.
Later, I was with Adrian and (I think) my mother. We were waiting for Alyssa (my roommate from Guatemala) and her boyfriend to come. Whoever else we were with left the room for a moment and I kissed Adrian suddenly. His face was extremely soft and smooth. He seemed a little shocked that I had kissed him so suddenly, so I told him I had done it because of his soft face.
Menace on the Train
November 30th, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I was riding a train. The person sitting next to me, possibly one of the guys who (in reality) hit on me while I was tabling yesterday, put his arm around me or something. I asked him not to do that, but he persisted. “I’m monogamous,” I told him, “with someone else. Who is in California.”
He teased me about how lame it was to be monogamous, and how what he was doing didn’t matter anyway. I explained my theory of monogamy to him, but then added, “and also, I don’t know you. You might be a threat to me.”
He escalated his advances, and I kept asking him to stop. Eventually I told him if he kept doing that I would ask to change seats. I became louder in my protests, until an elderly woman sitting in front of me noticed. When she turned around, he tried to get her support for what he was doing, which at that time involved his hand on my butt. She saw and said, “I wouldn’t want to get cancer on my butt.”
I tore myself out of the seat and away from him, but as I tried to relocate, a whole bunch of my socks appeared where I had been sitting. I realized they had fallen out of my bag and scrambled to pick them up, but the train stopped and I ended up getting out.
When I looked back at the train, the cars had been taken apart. One had been loaded onto a truck. I knew that my seat and baggage were in different cars. I ran towards the train, but missed it. I said “my train!” rather weakly to a bystander.
At this point, I realized that I was asleep and woke myself up enough to know that I didn’t really need to be on the train.
Instead, I found a seat on a nearby pillar, from which I could see a bunch of employees leaving a big box electronics store. They had lime green uniforms. I went inside the store with them a little bit and heard them say some insulting things about the store. I was a little bit shocked.
Kris your dreams are getting to me
November 22nd, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I was part of a murder ring. I killed two people in an office building without feeling much remorse. I didn’t know who they were or why I was killing them, just that I had to.
I realized my murdering was keeping me out of school, so I registered for some classes. I had trouble printing my schedule, which really had to be done on a huge sheet of paper. Later I realized I hadn’t attended any of them.
I entered the room adjacent to the one in which I had killed two people, without being recognized, although I knew I would be soon because I had looked into that room right before the murdering. I walked purposefully through the room, looking for Joel Bombardier, who was also part of the ring. I found him on an elevator, much shaken from his most recent kill, but prevented him from discussing it inside the building. He kissed me but I made him stop that also because of my monogamous relationship.
I tried to play a piano but the keyboard and the inner piano parts were in separate rooms.
The War
November 12th, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I was about to go to war with my rag-tag army for a cause I really believed in. In preparation, I had to help roll some large objects down the hill near Hyla on a sunny day.
Closer to the war’s beginning, I was making preparations in a house. I saw that Laura, also in our army, was wearing a cap she wears a lot, and decided that I could get away with wearing my hat, too. I realized, though, that I shouldn’t go to war in a skirt, and asked the other fighters to wait while I changed into some jeans. I took off the white leggings I was wearing to prevent them from being stained with blood. I wondered how cold it would be on the battlefield. I realized I had forgotten to tell Adrian I was going to war, but decided this was best for secrecy anyhow. I was afraid to die.
The war began at a reception in a book store. I carried a large butcher’s knife as my weapon. Many members of my community were at the reception, and I had trouble telling who was on my side. Someone threatened me with a bread knife and then offered me some fruit on a platter. I declined the fruit, knowing my hand would be cut off if I reached for it. Someone I recognized but could not place expressed surprise at my joining the army.
Later, I found myself on a train. I noticed that Thea and Sandra (someone I went to Guatemala with) had dyed their hair with identical pastel rainbows. I pointed out that they now had the same complexion, immediately realizing this was inaccurate because Sandra is Mexican.
Like the book of love
November 10th, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
Adrian and I were walking along a particular street somewhere when we noticed, to our left, a building that had been vacant / under construction for a while was being turned into a large art store. We wandered in, looking at huge rolls of colorful butcher paper, and were invited in further by someone helping to construct the store.
As we wandered in further, it turned into a large import store much like Cost Plus, but called something different and probably in Montreal. I had, earlier, been asking Adrian about a problem he was having, and he indicated that it came from the pencil he used working incorrectly (“scritch-scratching”) all the time. I had suggested that he purchase a new pencil, using a metaphor that equated him to a little girl using a dysfunctional Hello Kitty pencil. Buying a pencil became our objective in the store.
He soon found one, with very tiny, hard lead. This would solve the problem perfectly. He said something admiring about my ability to solve his problems, and reinvoked the little girl metaphor.
We decided we also needed contact paper, and found some with a backing that was bright yellow with black stripes.
Adrian paused by a hardware section, just to browse. Bored, I jumped onto his back. He crouched over to examine a particular metal object on the hardware shelf and I extended my foot to the floor to balance myself on his back. When he stood up again and, still carrying me, walked through an aisle with a store employee in it I wondered if we were breaking a rule.
We got in line at the checkout counter. The checker was speaking French. A little girl went up to ask him a question, and her mother asked, “Are you going to call him Guillome?” The girl looked embarrassed and started naming off articles in French. Her family spoke in a mixture of French and Spanish that confused me. Then she asked a question of the checker. I noticed that many of the signs in the store were in French.
On our way out, we found an open box of mini donuts like the kind made by a group of people with special needs on Bainbridge, but smaller. We considered taking the whole box but decided just to take two. I ate one and started to eat the other, but then remembered and gave it to Adrian.
Leaving, we found ourselves walking down Erikson, on Bainbridge. I struggled to take Adrian’s hand and once he understood he took mine. I was happy.
We entered the cohousing woods, where many people were hanging out, some asleep, after a wedding that had taken place. I could tell it was a wedding because there was a girl wearing a tiara. It turned out that my neighbor Jeremy was marrying his fourth or fifth bride. I joked about him creating a harem. He nodded and said he was only really attracted to two of them, but that the others had really sexy hair.
We emerged from the woods in a group of people and I could no longer find Adrian, so after some somewhat panicked searching, I contented myself to walk alone in front of everyone else. A smaller and cuter version of Lizzie Sivitz ran up to me and hugged me. She was wearing the same sweatshirt as me – the blue polarfleece one I sleep in. Hers had an Apple logo on it. Mine did not have the piece of fabric with bugs on it that actually covers the Gap logo. We posed in our matching sweatshirts.
Sean Fraga came up and posed with us also. He was also wearing a Gap sweatshirt, but it was grey. We also all had matching computers.
My mother came outside and told me something about setting up a network out there. I told her I was just using the computer to pose.
This is my first actual sex dream
January 14th, 2007 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I was having sex with someone who I think was interested in becoming a Peace Camp counselor (who does not actually exist). It was really good but we had to stop short for some reason.
Later we were about to start again in my bed at school when he asked if there was that rule against having sex when your roommate was in the room at UW. I realized then that Emily was in the room and got really embarrassed.
I called Adrian and he was pretty drunk. He picked up the phone saying enthusiastically, “It’s Cam!” He explained when I asked that “cam” was a word he and Eric used, and that it had a very important meaning. Adrian was putting up a canopy, which I could see, until he turned into Ariadne. My mother teased Ari about having had some “special water” before trying to put up the canopy.
A bunch of people who were at first Adrian’s friends were preparing to sleep over in the six beds in my room. Leah was gone for the night, and someone would probably share Emily’s bed. The boy from Peace Camp would sleep in my bed. I wondered why Adrian wasn’t sleeping over, but realized that he was the only one of his friends not going back to Washington before school started.
Soon the people were Alex’s friends instead. Leaving my room briefly, I saw a note on the door to Leah from Emily that explained that her bed was taken by some of the many people staying in the room, and that she herself would like to leave to go visit a friend in a nearby city, but could not because we were already so far over our limit of guests per person. I told her it was fine with me if she left and she did.
We were almost ready to go to sleep but a bunch of adults kept stopping by to talk to us. One was Cheryl, from the Mountaineers, who explained that her job (which I think was being a custodian in McCarty) now paid her so much that she was able to give a ton of money to the Democrats, and had probably in some way helped to fund our sleep over. After she left I asked Jenny Estill, who had become one of my guests, if she had recognized her. Jenny and the next adult to stop by confirmed that she was totally insane.
I was worried about all the adults stopping by because someone was bound to notice how far over the limit of guests per person we were.
At least there were plates
December 25th, 2006 by Ariana Rose Taylor-Stanley; no comments
I had returned, at the beginning of the quarter, to Bainbridge High School instead of the University of Washington.
Having finished my classes at 10:20 (true of my actual class schedule for next quarter twice a week), I went to investigate what else was going on in the school. There was a talent show being rehearsed in a gymnasium down my Commodore that was much larger than BHS’s real gym. I knew Alex Walton’s roommate Ari was going to be singing in it, and there were many, many large and well-rehearsed musical groups entering from all angles in uniform.
Someone asked me about the homunculus and I told them where it was in the brain. They were impressed with my knowledge. Joe Reynolds appeared and told me the plural of homunculus was actually homunculi. He had no shirt on. A large, familiar topless girl embraced him, facing away from me. We looked together into an art room where an art teacher stood behind two naked models, holding them together by the butt cheeks.
I stood at the entrance to the gym stage as Koura Mackey’s play, which began with someone important dying and her character needing to take his place took the stage with much encouragement from Brent Peterson. She had lost part of her very elaborate costume and ad-libbed lines to explain its absence, although I couldn’t detect anything missing.
I realized that most people were watching the rehearsal from outside and that I should probably not be where I was, so I left for the main part of the school to eat lunch.
On the way, Rose asked me if I thought the crew would be there that summer. I was confused, and she clarified that she had actually said “crow”, referring to a crow Joe and I had rescued years ago. She told me that she had done the first half of the rescuing job. I told her I hoped no more crows would need rescuing.
Then I saw Ben Amy, in an ROTC jacket, and stroked his arm to get his attention, but ended up mostly stroking the arm of someone in a brighter green jacket that I did not know. Jeff Pritchard noticed this, and laughed to Ben about how I had fucked up.
I started to get food, but realized I had left my Husky card, which is used to purchase food at UW, in my locker, the location of which I didn’t even know. I also needed someone to sit with besides Ben, who was sitting with Jeff apparently.
As I went outside to look for my Husky card, I saw Sean Fraga and went over to greet him. As I approached, Katie Allen ran away in fear. She explained that on an assignment we had done together, she had gotten credit for the one problem we had disagreed on, indicating that I didn’t know anything. When she calmed down I said sarcastically that yes, I always got every problem wrong on everything and it had been a welcome relief to get that one assignment mostly right.
Sean talked about really liking Yale a little. Someone came out of the cafeteria and gave him something with apples and raisins in it that he had ordered. He also had a plate with hash-browns. I started to realize that all the food was on real, reusable plates. Somehow, Bainbridge had finally switched to reusable plates, and earlier than expected.
I went back inside to get my meal, requesting hash-browns, which the server gave me two of and told me would cost five dollars, and apple sauce in lieu of Sean’s apple dish that had looked so good. But when I looked at my plate, it had many different egg-dishes on it. I tried to refuse them but it was too late. They also put my apple sauce on a small paper plate on top of the rest of the food, as the UW dining halls sometimes do, which I refused too late.
I realized that I still didn’t have my Husky card, and would not be able to pay.