I don’t know *what* is up with Kelly’s upstairs neighbor, but HeOrShe was walking around all effing night. I’m not talking about sporadically, either, but constantly. Every few minutes, between one o’clock and five o’clock in the morning, HeOrShe would tromp around from the living room to the bedroom, or from the bedroom to the kitchen, or from the kitchen to the living room. Around five o’clock, I gave up even attempting to sleep anymore. If HeOrShe has OCD or autism or something, I’m going to feel like a huge a-hole, but oh my effing GAWD I was tired today.

Luckily in the couple hours that I did manage to sleep, I had two really cool dreams.

All I remember about the first one is that my mom, my stepdad, Kelly and I went camping somewhere. Oh, how I wish I could remember more.

In the second dream, my brother and I were driving around in an undetermined town, which I think was Yakima, but didn’t look the way it actually looks. Anyway, we were driving early in the morning, and the road we were on went past a high outcropping of rock, on top of which was a large synagogue. It looked like an ancient monastery, with many levels and no glass windows. As we passed it, I gestured up the hill toward it and said, “Hey, have you ever been up to that synagogue?”

“Yeah, once, but not for a long time.”

“I’ve only been there once too.” I hit the brakes, turned the wheel sharply and barely made the turn to the hillside road. “Let’s go now.”

On the way up, we came to a strip mall that was done in the style of a church, or more precisely, a church that had been built in the style of the 1980’s. The walls of all the buildings were cement painted chocolate brown, and the windows of all the stores were made of large, randomly-shaped pieces of red, yellow, or purple stained glass.

My brother was hungry, and wanted to stop at the mini-mart and get a danish, so we stopped and went inside. We found that the lights were off, but there were three or four employees inside, and the shelves were stocked. My brother went in search of the danishes, and I found a matchbook on the counter which said in large black letters on an olive-green background,
“INCREASE YOUR SPIRITUALITY. LEARN A NEW LANGUAGE!”

I turned it over, and on the back it said, “Such as. . .” and listed three obscure dialects of Chinese, Cambodian, and Hindi, respectively. By this time, my brother had found a danish, and he went to the checkout counter. The cashier was a young boy of about thirteen, who appeared to be from India, although he had no accent. He was reading something, but looked up at my brother and said, “Oh. . .we don’t open until Christmas, actually.” (This dream took place in the present, which is March as I’m writing this.) My brother looked at him, then turned to me, set the danish on the counter, and we both silently walked out of the mini-mart.

We never did make it to the synagogue.

* * * * * * *

To me it seems pretty obvious what this dream is about. I need and crave more spirituality in my life, but I (and my brother) always seem to allow the trivial daily stuff to get in the way, and distract me from the Path. I’m sure it’s no accident that it was a synagogue, either. The last time I went to church with my mom, the main theme of the pastor’s sermon was, “We think too much.” I thought to myself, “THAT’S the message? ‘We THINK too much’? Tell that to the Jewish people, who analyze and dissect every word of every line of scripture, and still maintain deep and thoughtful faith.” I couldn’t bring myself to go back to church there again.

Oh. Uhh. . .I’m an Episcopal preacher’s kid, by the way. Don’t think I’ve mentioned that here before, but it’s true.

So.

Thoughts?