Dreams from the 357th Night

I’m wandering around with the dog. There are snow-covered mountains in the distance, but no snow underfoot on the road. My next door neighbors seem to pop out of nowhere and tell me a gingerbread-looking house down a little road toward a stream is where their vet is. “He’s super nice,” Dawn says. “But a little expensive,” adds Jeff. My dog takes off toward a tennis court presumably to go after a ball. Odd, considering she really isn’t a ball chaser. I’m supposed to meet some people I went to grad school with only I’m not sure exactly where…or who. After asking some random person that for some reason looked like he had a lot of information to share, I head down a different path and end up at a beach front hotel. The dog is nowhere be found at this point, but I seem unconcerned about it. When I’m tired and want to sleep, I look through the tattered backpack I’m carrying and realize I’ve forgotten my toothbrush and facial moisturizer. A young, black woman with long eyelashes offers to sell me a toothbrush for $30 and I tell her I’d rather have stinky breath. “Suit yourself,” she says. “Your gums will recede and you’ll lose all your teeth.” She turns heel and walks away with a Costco-sized set of multi-colored toothbrushes, her pleated, black skirt swishing.

I wake up in real life when my dog jumps up on the bed and plops down on my left foot.