friday celebrity-letter blogging

dear david lynch,

i had the same dream two nights in a row this week. when it starts out, i'm in the brookline trader joe's. i have a friend with me; he isn't human. he appears to be a cross between e.t., an ewok, and glomer from the punky brewster cartoon. he speaks very eloquent english, though, and i think he's older than me. anyway, we turn the corner of the last frozen-foods aisle expecting to find the produce section, but instead we walk into a large, offset wing that neither of us has ever seen before. it has hardwood floors and shelving with a dark finish, maybe red mahogany. it turns out that trader joe's has begun selling small pets, like gerbils and fish, and this section is where they're being housed. i decide to get a mouse and spend an interminable amount of time picking out toys and food and yummy yogurt-drop treats for it, and i wind up abandoning all of the food in my carriage in favor of my new pet and his paraphernalia. strangely, they don't sell enclosures or terrariums or anything of that nature, but i'm not concerned because i remember that i have a lovely habitrail at home. the trader joe's pet specialist tucks my mouse into a cardboard box, about 8"l x 6"w x 6"h. i am very happy, and i like to think the mouse is, too. my companion offers no clues as to his mood, but he is exceedingly polite and offers to carry the cedar shavings.

we arrive at a house, presumably my house. it seems very familiar, but i don't know if this is because it's a place i've actually been in before or not. it might be a place i saw in a movie. it's white and separated from the main street by a large, hilly lawn and a dirt road, in that order. a screened-in porch stretches across the entire front of the house, and there's only one other house in sight. it's to the left of mine, if you are facing mine, and is about a hundred yards away. it's summer and sunny. the street is silent aside from the sounds of my feet moving gravel and the leaves brushing against one another in the nearby maple trees. there's no driveway, but the dirt road is very wide, so we park in it on the side closest to the house. i guess i don't plan on staying long, because i leave the mouse and the bag holding his food and accessories on the ground next to the driver's-side door of the car and run indoors. my furry companion does not accompany me, choosing instead to stand with his hands/paws behind his back on the grass across the road from the house and stare fixedly at a dandelion. i go into a room toward the back of the house--i can't remember what i do once i'm in there, but, curiously, i do not go in with any intention of finding the habitrail--and as i'm coming out i see the neighbor's large pickup truck driving past through the front windows. my stomach knots; at this point in the dream i know that everything is about to start barreling downhill and i begin asking myself to wake up, but i never listen. dream me tries to take a deep breath as she runs out the front door, aware-that-we-are-dreaming me says, "please stop this now," and me me ignores all of us and lets the scene unfold, knowing exactly what we are all about to find.

the cardboard box is on its side in the road, open and dusty and torn on one end. e.t.-wok-er is still standing on his patch of grass, quiet and placid. the mouse is lying on his left side at the place where the road meets the grass in front of the house, gasping and paddling his tiny feet, his bruising and internal bleeding beginning to make him look bloated and distorted. i pick him up carefully and hold him in my hands, and then i freeze. he has tiny human eyes, and they are expressing a pain so intense that i can feel it radiating from his body up my arms and into my chest. from across the road, e.t.-wok-er says sedately, "i told him to run. he could have run away, but he didn't want to leave you. he loved you that much."

dream me can't move or blink or close her mouth. me me suggests calmly that i probably ought to find something heavy to finish the mouse off with. aware-that-we-are-dreaming me shrieks, "OH MY GOD WAKE UP WAKE UP WAKE UP!!!!!!"

and that time i listen. i sit up in bed, trembling and sweaty, and press both my hands over my face for about fifteen minutes, trying not to cry.

what do you think that means, mr. lynch? i figured if anyone would have a theory, it would be you. you've employed a lot of perturbing dream sequences in your work over the years. have you studied dream theory, or do you just go with your gut? i don't have or want a mouse, but i had one when i was a freshman in college. i stole him from the biology prep lab. he lived for a while, and then he died, just like anything else. i don't think he suffered, but it's hard to say. could i be experiencing residual guilt? i mean, i experience a lot of guilt. it could be about anything. i just wondered, you know, if you ever have odd, horrifying dreams that leave you distressed and heartbroken, and if you have any suggestions as to how to not have them anymore. would you recommend transcendental meditation? does incorporating your nightmares into your work hasten the exorcism? i'm really only asking because the last recurring dream i had appeared at varying intervals for about twelve years, and i couldn't handle that with this one. any advice you can give me would be tremendously appreciated.

your shaken fan,

juniper


p.s. i'll still watch inland empire if you don't have anything to say about this, so please don't worry or make something up. that won't help anyone.

p.p.s. is your coffee fairly traded?