what dreams may come

my therapist recently advised me to pay better attention to my dreams, which have always been very detailed and entertaining (except when they have been nightmares, like the one with the fireball thrower dressed in a medieval monk's robe, the tsunami crushing me underwater, the kidnappers of me while i am on a swing in front of a big white victorian).

today i remembered just moments ago a dream i had this morning. about the guy i always see on the subway, the one i think is a snappy dresser who never ever seems bored by the times or the new yorker.

in waking life i see him now all the time, at least twice a week. we never make eye contact. and my fondness seems to have ebbed some. nevertheless in my dream someone fixed us up, but as friends explicity. it was to be an introduction of two people to be friends herewith. there was awareness of his being married. in the dream, i think i was too accounted for. and it struck me as decidedly odd to be set up on a friends date with this guy, that it would be disengenuous given my hankering for him. the other day, someone i was interviewing about gender and identity (the person is transgendered), said that people tend to be friends with members of the same gender, that cross-gender friendships don't really work or take. of course, her comment made me wonder, well i have genuine friends who are male--is that some indication of arrested development in other manner? are they not really friends? anyway, that's for me and my therapist to discuss suckers, but the notion of it was at play in the dream.

another time, years ago, a friend of mine (a male) said that whenever a woman and man go out together it is a date, no matter if they delude themselves into thinking otherwise. i mean, too, assuming both parties are straight. i wonder about that. i never felt with him at all on a date.

so, back to the dream, meantime outside it was snowing and it was so high, that it reached up beyond my windows. suddenly it all melted and everything was dry (including my bed which was inside in the dream but at the same time submerged by snow). and then i woke up and called in sick because i have been feeling sick since last night.

ruh roh

well, reader, i texted a guy i met some weeks back and we went out last night.

here is a little something i learned: sometimes when you kiss someone and you are a little drunk you think they are an exceptionally good kisser. then when you kiss them again, and you are not drunk, you realize that simply putting your lips on another person's and jostling your head about like you did when you were 7 against a mirror and pretending to kiss based on what you saw on the love boat is not kissing at all. but you cannot say, 'hey, try kissing, not just mashing your face into mine.'

that would be rude.

one fine day

a fella in a bar slipped me a note, it said something like 'you're incredible. call me if it doesn't work out,' at the time i was on a date with someone else.

anyway, it didn't work out but i never called that note slipper. i was reminded of it today when i went to get a sandwich for lunch because in line with me was this salt-and-pepper haired gent who lives in my residential 'hood and works in my professional 'hood. i see him on the subway often. i see him in the sandwich line often. he is quite handsome and has a fantastic smile line making a quarter-arc descending from the corner of his nose to the corner of his mouth. he is fashionable but in a discrete manner. today he was wearing a black coat and an olive colored scarf. his trousers were checkered in greens and browns, but tastefully. he is always reading the newspaper or new yorker magazine. he is unobtrusive. his fingers are slender.

his partner looks like him. she is slender in figure, has short hair, the same angular face and lines in her skin. they have a child, at least one, and this i know because one day i was with a friend of mine who saw him and said hello. their children are in nursery school together or some such. i saw him at a book conference and my friend told me what he does for a living, and it is not so far afield from what i do.

so, all of which is to say that i had a great temptation to write a note and slip it in his pocket:

'call me if it doesn't work out.'

that would be a bit bold. but exciting. and then i could never make eye contact again, perhaps. perhaps. perhaps.

they might be giants

or jets. see, i was at a hotel overnight on saturday in new jersey for a family function. don't be so curious! doesn't matter what kind of function! jeez!

anyway, when we arrived, there were red retractable barriers set up (those kinds of nylon barriers they set up to designate the queue to buy movie tickets, assuming you don't buy them online in advance). and there were some folks waiting behind the barrier. we asked if they were waiting for people in particular. they said yes, the jets football team, whose members were staying in the hotel on the night before a game so that, i suppose, they don't stay up late at home watching stupid television or playing monopoly or drinking beers at a strip club.

for the family function we had to dress up. i bought a real purty red dress that i want to wear again. it is a bit sexy, imho. do you know what that means? imho. anyway, high heels, lipstick, the whole shebang. what if a jet were to see me and falls in love? right there in a hotel in jersey? with me? i saw some jets waiting by the elevator. but they paid me no mind. or maybe they fell in love from afar and were too shy to say so. it could happen, imho.

i was debating texting a fella tonight who i met a couple of weeks ago in a bar. he is from another country and has been in this here one for 8 years or maybe it's fewer but not a lot fewer. he kept saying rather raunchy things over and over, as if he'd read an english language phrase book about things to say to a gal if you are trying to get her to get, in the words of the deejay from the singles event noted in the previous post, 'freaky.'

because this is a family joint, i won't tell exactly what he said. instead, like how 'freakin' comes to replace a certain curse in adjectival form, or 'sugar' replaces another curse (but really, does it? ever? and is it believable even a little?) i will sub in other words for what he said.

over and over he said in my ear:

i really want to tie your shoes. (it does lose something in translation, i think, right?)

i want to tie your shoes. oh, i want to tie your shoes.

but again. and again. until i was laughing because it seemed like he had memorized those dirty lines. i think he was a little flummoxed as to why i was laughing. well, i wasn't exactly laughing, more like a chuckle here or there. a giggle. and my giggle is my wiggle. sometimes, imho.

also, he wanted me to go to webster hall with him, kept repeating it like a mantra, and could not for the life of him understand why that did not appeal. for those of you who don't know, webster hall is a club which, i would guess, plays thumping techno music way too loud. i would guess they sell a lot of mixed fruity drinks or long island ice teas. also that most of the women there have silicone nails. i have been there for special events--a reading, a concert, but a typical club night ain't my thang thang.

anyway, i said i'd call him. and i did several days later. when we chatted, he didn't use the 'tie my shoes' phrase but his intonation of what he did say was the same, virutally affectless, memorized from a phrase book and i rather could not imagine suddenly actually ever seeing him again. what could we talk about? oh, he guessed i was 26. that was sweet. and he had some skills that don't involve conversational know how. so the question remains unanswered and well may remain that way as tonight i am supposed to be working, imho.