The Dream

Have you ever had one of those dreams? It starts out innocently normal. You are outside your house. As you enjoy the cool day, you are doing something you might on a regular basis. But somewhere in the pit of your stomach you begin to feel anxiety. At first you pass it off as the food you ate. Maybe your stomach is cramping up from a combination of lunch and over exertion. As the feeling grows up through your stomach and into your mind, though, you begin to think other wise. The sensation will not stop and only gets stronger until you finally realize that something is very wrong. This is the turning point of the dream.

All of the sudden the sky grows dark. A once nice spring day has become a cold wintery night. Contemplating going into the house, you feel a chill run up your body. A look to the left and to the right does not produce any results or resolve the issue. It is time to go inside. But, before you have a chance to do the rational thing, your impulses introduce you to an illogical solution. “Go across the street,” your impulses tell you. You look towards the street. It is what you might expect from a street. You shrug, the immediate anxiety rolling to the back of your mind. “Why not,” you say. You step through the damp grass—probably from a recent rain. The feeling of a wet smooth surface against your flesh sends chills up your spine. You ease your toe onto the pavement as that uneasy feeling begins to take over again. Each step on the pavement raises the volume of anxiety, until you are no longer sure about what you’re doing. Leaving the road you hesitantly look at the landscape in front of you.

At this point during the dream you see, for the first time, something to be afraid of. An open field and dark forest lay in front of you personifying your feeling of dread. You immediately stop and look back towards your home. But all you see is more field. The road has disappeared; the forest surrounds you. Goose bumps crawl up your spine and you begin to feel lethargic. Behind you the darkness creeps up from the forest. As it gets closer you run the other direction as fast as you can. The forest doesn’t seem to get any closer but the darkness continues to gain speed towards you. Then your feet fall out from under you and you hit the ground with your face. The darkness washes over you like a flood of water and you wake up.