I had two dreams this morning that were slightly related, and their common thread was that I had two quasi-separate lives.  Two apartments, two sets of friends, two cars. . .and it was getting to be a bit much to deal with, so I was attempting to merge them all and simplify my existence.

One of my apartments (I never did go to the other, I just knew that it existed) was a large studio on the top floor of a hundred-year-old, three-story mansion (where I used to live in real life).  The building was being renovated in a very unusual way.  The construction company had cut the top two stories off of the house and placed them in the yard, then rebuilt the entire rest of the house cheaply, while they renovated the part that was in the yard.  The plan was to fix up the unattached section, then reattach it somehow by demolishing what they’d done to the original house.  Totally bizarre, and from the street, it looked like there were two big houses on the lot.  The unattached half still had our stuff that was in storage inside, so I and the other tenants made a bunch of trips back and forth between the two buildings looking for whatever we needed.

There were people from the neighborhood crawling all over the unattached building, so they could look inside and see what the beautiful house looked like.  There were even people who wanted to rent units in that section not realizing that it was only a temporary structure.  I had a few friends over, and we were starting to get annoyed by all the people running around on the roof, and up the stairways.

Then the dream changed, and I was in a movie theater.  It was a very large room that was laid out in a square, with three movie screens, each on a different wall, with three separate areas of bench seats, each of which faced the nearest screen.  You entered at the back of the room and sat wherever you wanted.  I asked one of the ushers how that worked.  Three movies at the same time?  One movie over three screens?  He said that it depended.  Sometimes, they’d use only one screen.  If it was an especially popular movie, they’d use all three simultaneously.  Occasionally, they’d rent the space out for parties, and use the screens to show videos or display images from the party itself.

I sat on my bench, and a blonde girl a few years younger than I came over and started talking.  She must have made the assumption that I was Jewish, because she immediately started speaking in Hebrew.  I told her that I didn’t speak Hebrew, and that if she spoke English we’d have a much better conversation.  She agreed, and switched to English.  We ended up talking for a really long time, and having this great connection.  She invited me to come sit up near the front with her family (older sister, parents, and grandparents), but for some reason I chose to stay where I was.  The usher had seen us talking, and walked over toward me, his hand raised above his head, ready to give a congratulatory high-five.  “Duuude,” he said, “it looks like the Hebrew found a Shebrew!“  I cracked up laughing, and then the lights went out and the movie started.  The dream fast-forwarded a bit, and now the movie was over, and the lights had come on.  I walked over to my new friend, put my hand on her arm and said, “Hey, I’ll come meet you in a second.  I have something to do really quick, but I’ll be right back.”

Her mom overheard me and came running over to us, shocked at what she had heard.  “You can’t do that!  You’re not going to eat my daughter! What a terrible thing to say!”

I laughed.  “No, no. . .I said I’m going to MEET her.  Big difference.”

She looked relieved, and even laughed a little to ease the tension.

That’s the point at which the dream ended, and I woke up.

* * * * *

For the record, I’ve never heard of a ‘Shebrew’ before, and I thought it was really hilarious that it appeared in my brain.  Turns out to be an actual slang term. . .I’ll let you look it up on your own and see for yourself, though.  I hope it’s not considered offensive, and that’s why I’m not going to name this entry ‘Shebrew.’

Incidentally, the name “Mr. Duality” is taken from a hilarious song by the group The Bobs.  I wasn’t able to find a version of it online, but maybe you’ll have better luck scrounging than I did.  It’s a cool and funny song, and the singer sort of raps the lyrics in a nerdy, rubato way.  “My personality. . .h’has a plurality, and that’swhytheycallmeMisterDuality.”

In other news, it was thirty years ago today that Mount St. Helens erupted.  I’ve written about this before, so if you click on the picture below, that’ll take you to the entry, if you’re interested.