Dream #2

The second dream is a little easier to understand, I think. It began coming to me after I read the Glatt biography earlier this year (1997).

In the dream I am standing in front of several people, many of whom I do not know but feel I recognize. They are giving me instructions, very detailed, complex. There is urgency and anxiety in the voices and their faces. They look tired and spent, and I feel that I am a last resort.

Then I begin to recognize the faces in front of me: Martha Plimpton and Aryln Phoenix directly in front of me, Joaquin and Rain Phoenix just behind them. Keanu Reeves is on my left and behind him is Rob Reiner. In the small crowd I think I also see the face of Wil Wheaton, Ethan Hawke, and a man who I think is my image for John Phoenix.

After the instructions are given they present me with my charge: River. He looks sad as well, tired, and a little desperate. I understand that my job is to chaparone him, keep him out of trouble. I should take him to dinner and not let him out of my sight for 24 hours. My watch tells me it is early evening on the night of October 30th. My heart pounds, my blood races, and I understand what is at stake.

We drive away in my car, down a dirt road flanked by trees filled with Spanish moss. Dust flies around us and River insists the windows remain open. I cough and sneeze, but he is unaffected. He asks me a question that keeps me talking for quite some time. Then we are walking up stairs into a store that sells bathing suits and drums. I buy one of each for him, a big flat drum made of hides and painted in bright colors, and a red bathing suit with stripes of orange. We talk of going to a museum but end up rather walking into the restaurant. I know the owners and they allow us to enter through the back door and into the kitchen. I fear that too much attention will anger him, and my plan is to sneak him in and then find a table in the back and away from crowds.

I can tell he is bored with me and exasperated at having a nursemaid. He is rude to the owner who has asked for an autograph. River walks in, I follow him through a narrow hallway cramped with piles of linens and chairs. He chooses a table much as I had hoped, in the back and in a dark corner. We eat.

I attempt conversation with him, but he is sullen and a bit anxious. As we finish our food, he is recognized and there is an uproar. People from all over the restaurant descend on him, pushing napkins, menus, and deposit slips in his face, hoping for an autograph. I get the manager to remove most of the crowd, but a few remain - those annointed by River.

He and his new friends converge and whisper while I deal with the bill. I get the impression he's asking them to get him away from me. I have a problem with the waiter, and as we dicker over the bill, River disappears with the handful of boys and girls he has adopted for the moment. I run through the restaurant, searching each room, and blast out of the front doors only to see River in the back of truck with the others. As the truck accelerates away from me, he waves to me and the expression on his face says "I understand what you all are trying to do. But it has to happen this way." I see that he knows he is about to die.

I scream River's name into the blank street and awaken.

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This work © Jimmy Rose jimskins@hotmail.com

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