the antipodes and the magical flower

chicken & rice, broccoli, a cup of pinon cocoa

Probably a series of dreams with similar subjects, but all mish mashed in my brain. First part a fragment of something larger.

Througout, there is the feeling that there is a civil war or some sort of insurrection ongoing...

Driving through NW NM with a guy who looks like Mr.. Honeymooner from the restaurant. We get off the highway and take a "shortcut," which is debateable. It's a dirt road, but as he points out, it is incredibly smooth and you can still drive very fast on it without rattling to death. At some point he needs to go to the bathroom and we pull over next to a giant ditch or muddy, empty resevoir. He is in his undies, backs himself up to the edge, drops his drawers and means to crap out over the edge. But he loses his balance and tumbles down the side and lands in the sludgey pool of mud at the bottom, submerging himself up to the neck. He drags himself back up the side, cursing a streak. We get back in the El Camino we're driving (there are 3 of us: me, him, and maybe a little brother?) and head on down the road. Of course, just around the turn is a giant rest stop/community center place. He was unaware. At this point, he has turned into my father, I think. We go into the building, down into a wet basement where there are lockerroom type facilities. [I've been here before, I think in a dream about a wedding] There is some danger, some intrigue I can't recall.

---

We can't find the prophetic plants like we used to. The one most dear to us, a small, silver Hens & Chicks, is dead. It lays in its planter, a long root like raffia trails from its base. Perhaps is has been pulled up? But when I say prophetic plants, I mean they they themselves are prophets; they speak with mouths, answer questions, give warnings. I find a planter (these planters are like the giant bowls Josh has in back) that has a very promising crop. Flat, paddle-like succulents with thin fingers all along the ridges tipped with bead-like ends. (A type of Euphorbia (probably) that I've seen, though these were short, rather than tall like the actual plant is, and the real plant may be more 3 dimensional than these flat guys.) It's planted in a circle, like Stonehenge. Maybe not ready to speak yet, but very close.

My group is studying the Antipodes, which in my dream is a particular place, loosely Central Asia. We're hanging about in the lockerroom areas again, ostensibly the building I was in before. Milling about in a dressing room, I go through a woman's purse and find a box of tampons. Bored shitless, I take one and try to cajole my fellows into a game of tampon tag. They are amused or bemused but little interested. I recieve regular flashes of a plywood jigsaw cut-out of a yellow plant, probably a Hens & Chicks, maybe a foot tall, sitting in one of the planters. Then back to the dressing room. I submerge the tampon in water, feel it inflate in my fingers. I squeeze it out a bit, hold it by the string, and smack somebody with it. Still little interest in my game. People are studying the Antipodes. There may be a test.

We are arranged in a circle of folding chairs on a porch. Customer Mark from the restaurant, in his blue and white Hawaiian shirt, is leading the class. He's asking what some defining features of the Antipodes are. I smack a butch woman in a green shirt next to me with the largely-dry tampon. She is unamused. Everyone raises their hand, including me. I review in my head that "Antipodes" means "anti-foot," and that the inhabitants live on horseback instead of on the ground. Sonya Erb from highschool is next to Mark and whispers an answer in his ear, which he then repeats to the class, something about skinning and eating reptiles. I think it's a good point, but mine would've been better. I tag Mark with the tampon, he tells me to shut up. I act like I'm having a good time, but secretly my feelings are really hurt.