memory | hope
At 2:30AM I had a couple of mugs of coffee mixed with cocoa, and fell into that stingray just-below-the-surface sleep around 3. I woke at 7 with this dream fading away...
The mall, vague, up to the Disney furniture store: recliners in Dalmatian patterns, or with character faces grinning from the backs, arrayed in the court in the sidewalk sale tradition. The pink and magenta Cruella chair? No, not for me, perhaps I’ll save up for a Winnie-the-Pooh, or something similarly masculine. All the good stores are gone, there are only dollar stores filled with garage sale junk I wouldn’t pay a dollar for, and the food courts. The bookstore has become so specialized, it’s like one of those ritzy Rodeo Drive boutiques in Pretty Woman, each coffee-table volume on its own little display. Even the Dunkin Donuts is closed, as testified by the signs out front: "Maybe if you had come in more often and tipped the cashiers, we’d still be open". This bitter signage both amuses and depresses me. A few doors down is the unnamed Starbucks-type coffee shop, so I wander in. Very elegant, filled with more cushy chairs, sans cartoon faces. At the counter, I decide against the zwieback (pronounced "biscotti" but my dreams aren’t caught up sufficiently with my experience to render biscotti in the dreamscape), in favor of 2 rich peanut butter "cookies" that seem to hold all but their square shape in common with Reese’s peanut butter egg confections. Can I get a large mocha java? The preparation of the coffee involves mashing more confection-looking things. While I wait, the store’s gorilla mascot drops from the ceiling beams to perch on top of the counter. One brush of his hand against mine, and I realize, fun-fur or no, this is a real gorilla, a very BIG gorilla. "Would you care to step back, that way?" Which way, the corner? No. OK, I guess cornering myself in proximity to a gorilla IS a bad idea. No, more that other way, the direction of all the chairs and couches and love seats… It is understood that a waitress will bring me my snack.
I can’t sit next to or across from another patron, but dammit, there are no seats with tables in front of them. As I trudge through the store, my legs grow weak, I feel like Johnny Depp on nitrous oxide in Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas, all bendy at the knees. (In retrospect, I think this sensation was a side effect of the normal sleep paralysis as described in some writeup involving sleepwalking, which I can no longer locate.) In the first pass I thought the conference room was reserved, but now I see patrons there, and I find an unoccupied love seat with an iron framed, textured glass-topped coffee table. The waitress, looking an awful lot like Elizabeth Shue in Adventures in Babysitting or perhaps a younger, softer Geena Davis, brings my coffee and cookies, and hovers patiently. Oh, I must be supposed to tip... A couple of dollar bills later, she seats herself next to me and smiles a lurid smile (as lurid as Ms. Shue might muster, anyway), tucks up her checkered skirt to flash me, drizzles drops of mocha and a dollop of whipped cream on her pelvis, smooth as any exotic dancer’s. Dammit! I fight to stay asleep, but no such luck.
Analysis: The chairs represent attitudes about romantic relationships: fun in a childlike way, but with a serious investment aspect as well; further, symbolic of sexual orientation/identity and partner-choosing strategy. There is a casual surface appeal in the pink/femdom, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable in it. I reject both the cheap junk and the expensive, useless goods in the various stores. The Dunkin Donuts and the Starbucks, places to obtain yummy nourishment and "coffee"/stimulation, seem to represent loves past (named) and future (unnamed), respectively, revealing conflicted feelings about my own historical "patronage"/support, and further implying choices between economy and the cost of quality. This issue is echoed yet again in the choice between hard, dry, crumbly biscotti and salty/sweet/rich/moist confections, with more of the same symbolism in the choice of strong java, blended with the sweetness of cocoa. The gorilla is a masculine symbol, representing mixed attraction/fascination and danger. The owner at the counter is a practical guide, warning me to keep a safe distance from the "gorilla"; he motions me toward the soft, plushy, supportive symbols instead. Maybe I'm overanalyzing my weakness at the knees en route to choosing a "seat"; I do hope so! The seated patrons have already made their purchases and found seats, i.e. they're already committed to relationships, where I don't care to intrude; I seek a seat all my own, symbolizing a partner both available and loyal. Elizabeth Shue is simple wish-fulfillment; I think my inner screenwriter ran out of symbolism right about there, so it just plugged in blatant imagery while I came back to full consciousness. Roll credits...
I could go on and on: the passivity of being tended by the waitress, the bizarre identification of Pooh as a masculine character, the difficulty of finding an unoccupied spot, the living gorilla vs. the inanimate seats... but I'll just leave some room for some other noders' inner symbols. =)