A TOTAL NIGHTMARE

I was never so glad to wake from a dream as I was last night. I was blind drunk--more so than I can ever remember being, even in my beer- and wine-swilling younger days. Yes I can't remember drinking in the dream, only the after-effects. I was on a big campus somewhere--a USC or a UCLA, that big, but unknown to me.

First thing I remember of the dream was arriving back, with Ellie, at the room we had been assigned and realizing that I had lost my wallet. "You must have left it in the laundry room," she said. And indeed, in my state of near-oblivion, I did remember having taken it from my pocket for some reason in the laundry room. I had a clear image of it: the wallet I use every day, just in the past few days with a corner of paper--a credit card receipt, perhaps--sticking out at an angle from one of the pockets.

Ellie wanted to come with me to help me find the wallet, but I insisted, no, I was perfectly capable of finding it by mistake and set out to retrace our steps. But soon, of course, I was completely lost in the maze of unfamiliar campus buildings. In a daze of confusion, I got sidetracked from the main artery and into a labyrinth of corridors and hallways, of which I remember nothing.

Eventually, looking through the space of one of the cavernous spaces, I thought to catch a glimpse of the main artery through a glass door at the other end. Imagining I might be able to find the laundry room if I could only get re-oriented, I headed, still drunk, towards that door, and found myself threading through row upon row of baby cribs, dozens of them, lined up neatly, with proud dads and even a few grandfathers watching me with disapproval.

I did eventually emerge onto the main campus--but never did find that wallet.

The wallet, of course, I thought as I recalled the dream this morning, is the control center of my entire practical life; it is the keeper of my identity, my driver's license, my credit cards, my money. Who am I without it? I am reduced to pure spirit and emotion. But what are all those babies doing, with their disapproving fathers? Reminding me of my age, perhaps, and the less admirable actions of my life. Am I drunk because I want to forget them? Or because I am released from such responsibilities?

An interesting--and disturbing!--dream...