I’ve had these reoccurring nightmares that I forget are reoccurring except that they happen over and over again (which is, in essence, what makes them reoccurring.) They aren’t a particular nightmare, it’s not like I’m always going into the cookie jar and being bit by a spider, but they have one character that continues to haunt my dreams and kill everyone I know. This big thing, which I will refer to in pronouns as “he”, wears a suit of brown armor, stands taller than anybody I know and likes to ride a motorcycle. He also likes to destroy everything in his path, and tends to find a way to be around me at places that have large groups of people I care about. He kills them all in a variety of ways -with fire, with his motorcycle, with his hand… oh, and he doesn’t really like me at all…

I don’t know what this means or who he is. I forgot how badly he haunted my dreams until two nights ago when I woke up because he had been there. All I remember was that my sister was a predominant figure in this last one, but I can’t recall why.

I did fall back to sleep about a half hour later, and the brown, robotic, destroyer man wasn’t in the next nightmare, but there was a second one that same morning. This time I was starting a new job, which happened to be in a desert-like office environment, and as my new group of co-workers began “showing me the ropes” water began to flood in from out of nowhere. “What’s that?” I asked, and I remember someone’s response was “Oh, it’s war games. People sign up and pay to kill each other. We should probably get you out of here before they really start killing, because you’re not signed up to play, and you don’t want to accidentally die.” And while getting out of there seemed like a good idea at the time, I coudn’t believe that there were people who wanted to play this game, people who wanted to test the limits of their lives. People who weren’t so much afraid of dying as they were of staying alive…well, at least that’s what I think I thought.

So, now, me and this other girl we’re in this open-air jeep with some guy whose driving us through streams of bullets and water and military style charades. I’m wearing a hat to cover my eyes, because I’m from the school of thought (at least in my dream) that if I can’t see it, then it must not really be happening. So we’re driving and all of a sudden a screen appears before us, and it starts to show pictures of all the players so that everyone involved in the game knows who to hunt down. And the first picture on the screen is of me, and it’s not the most flattering picture, and it says CODE NAME: SANTA CLOOSE. I have no idea why a girl like me would have a code name like that, but this was the name that I remember seeing. And then I screamed, “Holy shit, I am part of the game,” and I woke up in a cold sweat, with my faux fur/satin blanket combo on the floor, like it usually is every morning, and I couldn’t think straight for a minute or two. I tried to take it all in, and after two nightmares in one night, there was no way I could go back to sleep.

Two dreams, or nightmares, depending on if the glass is half empty or half full, in the same night. I know there’s some meaning behind all of this, and while I can think of what it might mean, I’m still trying to figure it all out. I don’t want to see the destroyer in any more of my dreams, and I have no desire to take part in any war games.

Where does this leave me? I’m really not sure…all that I know is that once again I am sitting on the floor of an airport waiting to board a flight to LA. Don’t ask. I mean ask, but until things happen I won’t tell you. I’m returning late tomorrow, or early Thursday, again depending on how you look at it all. And then I’ll be back in New York, at least for now, with lots of exciting news to share…maybe…or maybe just some more bad dreams. In a world where most things are good, how can sleep be so bad?