7. Some sorta Classical ruins turn pink as I move by them. In the garden stands the idea of a tree, and in that tree sits an eagle. It spreads its wings like an emblem.


6. I'm someone else entirely who meets the woman of her dreams in the back of a very long bus. She's hot but not Hollywood-hot. She wears large glasses and a long skirt. The pair of them grow increasingly passionate, though the people at the front of the bus can't quite see what's happening. Not-me hikes bus-woman's skirt and feels her shaved legs. Bus-woman suggests Not-me should feel how far up she shaves.

Later at some kind of recording studio their relationship deteriorates. I'm watching it now, no longer inhabiting the body of this other person. The relationship's end takes the form of a sitcom, complete with canned studio audience.

The Bus Woman departs, distraught, and the laugh track continues.


5. If I turn onto the rural road that runs largely hidden, I arrive at the house of the sinister yet friendly elderly couple. They welcome me like wholesome rural folk but something lies hidden there, something has happened there, something we must fear. Nothing is as it seems. I know if I enter this house I may never leave.

A child walks like a dog on all fours. Is he or she the guardian of secrets? I cannot say.

The old couple smile. They want me to come for supper. They terrify me.


4. I'm in North Devon but an alternate North Devon. A building with many wraparound balconies stands on the coast. People there drink Pepsi. I get advice on a medical appointment and head down the shore in a rubber raft.

Once ashore again, I find the office at the end of a lengthy driveway. Overgrown trees hang overhead and darken the way. I arrive a short time later at a tower of the sort where princesses are kept. I must climb the stairs to the top to find the office. There are no princesses, and no one is captive. I find old scribblers of the sort we once used in elementary school. I meet an elderly woman and a blue gumdrop creature.


3. I find myself on the boardwalk of a city that sits on both sides of the Atlantic. Near the causeway I find a twisted, sprawling lakeside house marked by the growth of too many additions. A cryptic cat sits on the stairs. An attractive nerd wants to have an affair with me. I do not know his name.


2. Someone rings me up and asks me if I want to do charity work at Disneyland. Once the work is over, I can hang in the park and see the various attractions. This sounds like it might be fun. I head on my bicycle and arrive at a private school where J. works. I head to my room, where I have to pick up an unidentified item.

I contact the Disney people from one of the old-fashioned phone booths in the lobby. They ask what sort of charity work I'd like to do, and I enthusiastically reply that I'd enjoy being Kermit the Frog. I'm met with a lengthy silence. When the corporate representative speaks again, I'm informed that they already have a Kermit, but they could use my services in the Enchanted Tea Room. I'm less than thrilled with this placement, but I accept.

I arrive at a mall food court, where I'm greeted by Mary Poppins' businesswoman twin. A door leads to a series of elevators, and my passage to the Magic Kingdom involves a bewildering series of movements, up and down, with frequent switching of elevators. At times, she abandons me. At one point, I share my elevator with a trained monkey. He wears one of those organ grinder monkey suits.

Finally I exit to find myself in an unidentified central Canadian city, the location of "Canada Disneyland." I ride a trolley and the guide tells me the city has been reduced to a quaint painting by the imagineers. Batman Wolves are everywhere, maintaining order. I occasionally catch them from the corner of my eye, savage police dogs in bat-cowls. They disappear when I try to look at them directly.

Disney's lawyer appear to have reached my dream, and we're now calling the park "Dizzyland." The Canadian version features a rough-looking castle made from local materials. The Haunted Mansion is located on a dead end off the Main Street. I ask for directions to the Enchanted Tea Room.

I'm told it's located in another time.


1. A chance meeting in the company of people I do not know. It's not the L. I first knew or last saw, but a contemporary version of my mind. L. turns and our eyes meet. I feel a thing I cannot express.

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.