Dream

I had a dream that left me a little disturbed and a lot baffled.

Normally my dreams include people and places I'm familiar with, but often in odd combinations. You know, a friend from high school joins you for Thanksgiving at your parents house. Only you haven't seen your parents in 15 years, they don't even celebrate Thanksgiving, it isn't their house, and the friend from high school still looks 17 even though you're both 44 now. That kinda stuff. Those dreams don't disturb or baffle me, but last night's did. Here's the dream.

SCENE 1
I am my current age, 44, but I am working at the men's clothing store in the mall where I worked when I was 24. My boss is the same man who was my boss then, only he hasn't aged 20 years as I have.

I find a wallet in the store and open it to see if it contains ID. A man in his 50s sees me with his wallet and thanks me for finding it. I look at his photo ID and understanding the wallet belongs to him, I give it to him, smile and say "No problem".

This causes me to think that perhaps I should remove my wallet and keys from my pockets for fear of loosing them in the busy store. I reach over the sales counter and place my wallet and keys inside a drawer adjacent to the cash register. I see the credit card processor spitting out a charge receipt for $1,561.13 which I think to myself as a 'really good sale'.

As I'm leaning over the counter I feel a hand on top of my head, with its fingers extending down my forehead. Obviously the body connected to this hand is behind me. Instinctively I reach up and remove the hand by the wrist and say "Excuse me???"

But before I can even turn around to confront the invader of my personal space, the man wraps his arms around my arms and torso and begin to squeeze me. Its kind of like a bear hug, only he's behind me. I try to free myself, but he is taller and stronger than me so I stop. Where is the employee who entered the sale into the credit card terminal???

"Please remove yourself from me right now" I say politely but firmly. Out of my peripheral vision I see an African American woman witnessing the situation with a concerned look on her face. I don't know if she is my attacker's wife/girlfriend or if they've ever seen each other before or not.

The man does not release me so I say louder and more firmly "I said take your hands off of me right now!" He presses his body up against mine and says "Now you're gonna get to feel my hot breath on your neck". Under very different circumstances, this would be a real turn-on. But in this circumstance, it is not, so I struggle again to free myself but am unable to get loose.

"If you don't get off me NOW" I shout, "I'm going to yell for help." Instead of letting go, the man begins grinding his pelvis against my ass, and I can feel that he is getting excited by this. Again, under different circumstances I would be like "Yeah!" But in this situation, I call for help.

"SECURITY! SECURITY! HELP - I'M BEING ASSAULTED! SOMEONE DIAL 911 RIGHT AWAY!" I yelled at the top of my voice. Calling for security was just a tactic to scare my attacker, as I knew our store had no security guard. But I could see shoppers in the store retrieve their cell phones from their pockets and purses, and I assumed they were calling the police for me. I figured the 911 dispatcher would contact the mall security who would surely come to my rescue before the police could, coming from somewhere else.

Meanwhile, the woman I could see from my peripheral vision is still standing there, next to my attacker, looking concerned, but doing and saying absolutely nothing. I wasn't really frightened, but was more annoyed than anything else.

I try one more time with the man. "The police will be here any minute, so you'd better get off me before I press charges." The man doesn't let go, and continues to grind himself against my ass, while holding my arms and torso tightly.

SCENE 2
The sleazy store manager (my boss) is standing next to me, and the police officer, my attacker, and the African American witness are standing opposite of us. This is the first time I've seen my attacker, as he was always behind me. He looks like a linebacker, and I feel much better about why I was unable to free myself from his grip. Obviously the woman is with him.

My boss has suggested that I not press charges since I "wasn't hurt", and I ascertain it is because my boss was the employee who rang up the $1,561.13 sale and that my attacker was the purchaser of all that merchandise.

I say to my boss "I am pressing charges. This man assaulted me. I asked him, then demanded he let me go, but he wouldn't. I am pressing charges."

My attacker is smiling the whole time, and then begins to chuckle at my words. I feel obliged to continue validating my actions to my sleazy boss. "If I witnessed him assaulting a customer of this store, I would surely have tried to intervene and then would have called the police. I'm sure you wouldn't try to dissuade the customer from pressing charges."

I look at the police officer and restate my position. "I AM pressing charges."

Despite my refusal to give in, my attacker continues smiling, looking up at the ceiling, down at the floor, and chuckles again. I am imagining that he is a minor league football player and believes the team's lawyer will get the charges dropped. I don't want that to happen so I go in for the kill.

Looking directly at my attacker I say "I see your erection has gone down, now that the police officer is here."

Then, looking at the officer I say "I don't know if this affects the way he'll be charged or not, but you should know that he had an erection while assaulting me, and really seemed to be enjoying it."

With that, the officer handcuffs my attacker and reads him his Miranda rights. End of dream.

What a crazy dream, eh? Knowing that the content of dreams usually comes from fragments of one's life, what baffles me is where this dream came from?

I'm never concerned about my personal safety or being attacked or assaulted, so why was this the central theme of the dream?

I don't recall ever being truly fearful of being injured by my attacker. I wasn't afraid, I was annoyed. That seems odd.

And what's up with that woman with the concerned look on her face who witness my attack but never said a word, either during or afterward? Was she mute?

I don't know, but I'm certainly not going to obsess over it. It was a dream. It wasn't very pleasant, but its over.

Especially for my friend Tony G, I leave you with today's Crush.

Crush du Jour: Alex Baresi