Nightmare

Just crawled out of bed a moment ago…started the coffee; brushed my teeth. It had been the first time I had gotten sound sleep in my own bed in a couple days, and despite my excitement at having my own sheets, scents, and pillows to swim in, I somehow generated a nightmare the likes of which I’ve never experienced before. I’d like to prelude the specifics with the ambient feelings of the dream, as the feelings were quite unique in comparison to other dreams, and consisted of the most acute degree of horrible I could ever hope to summon. There are some dreams that are frightening; and some that are a bit sad– but none before that have married the sort of screeching fear, sinking depression, and fathomless despair which accompanied this particular dream.

The world was ending…but not in any charming way, or in one that might promote any sort of human rebirth– it was ending in the most complete and terrible fashion conceivable. Like that episode of the Twilight Zone, for some irrevocable reason that I knew in the dream, but never consciously thought of, the earth was slowly drifting closer to the sun, stretching out days, and setting an indefinite yet looming expiration date on all life. Days stretched long beyond their hours, and nightly darkness was merely a light dim, like twilight or an overcast day– and as each day passed in this long, epic dream, the days stretched longer still, and the nights brightened further. The heat continued climbing, and all around me my friends and loved ones were coping with the coming end in their own unique ways, myself included.

The terrible fear that would accompany this is understandable, as is the sadness that comes from seeing it in the eyes of everyone one has ever known, but the aspect of despair that rises bitterly with the awareness of complete earthly devastation merits a bit of explanation. It is one thing to slide off into death’s loving arms alone, leaving the rest of the beautiful world behind you…but sliding off to one’s fate with the rest of the planet, leaving behind no laughter, no excitement, no trace or hope of human happiness to come, no grass with which to be buried in, no potential places to haunt, no hope of having any trace of ones self reinvested in the world in any form….is unimaginably awful, when simply experienced in the hopeless taken for granted sense that accompanied my dream.

I read this despair in my grandmothers eyes as we stood looking at her scorched garden; the one comfort to the elderly– that their blood may live on and be happy– washed clean out of her face, leaving behind a blank and sickly white expression. My grandfather was in a similar state, but carried on in his usual way, trying to talk constructively and encouragingly, through a transparently terrified expression. I helped them prepare things for a bit, and wandered off without thinking, finding myself soon after in one of my old suburban paradises. I was with some friends who were looting and exploring the houses, as there was no longer any reason not to do anything they wanted. This I realized, but the impending dread prevented me from wanting to do anything at all, beyond curling up in a ball and crying, so I just watched with a sort of confused and weak curiosity as they laughed nervously, and rummaged through stranger’s garages under the wrongly eerie brightness of the misplaced sun. I left them behind and continued on in the overly bright light, taking long final-glances at all the familiar faces and places. More transpired, though I can’t recall what, despite just recently waking…leaving no definite line between the dream, and the waking reality I presently abide in.