It happened again – a dream from another world.
Although this dream was on a whole other level!
I wasn’t myself. Rather, I was a self that I have been trying to discipline my whole life
(Well, would be more accurate to say it is a self that I have been trying to annihilate my whole life; “my worst self” or “my demons” would be the common expression– Fire. Explosive. Violent. Angry.)
Let’s go check the guest wing of this huge-ass apartment of yours! Maybe you can host some students who have been living in camps like refugees!
– But I don’t have a “guest wing”… That was just a dream..
Surely you do! Do you remember that time when you spent the night there because your ex-lover had to spend the night at yours? Or the day you had a fancy dinner together with your old and new friends?
– Ah yes… I do remember those moments, true! OK .. Let’s check it out… Although sleeping is so comfortable and cozy and fun I don’t wanna get up yet..
Yesterday my watch died. That was very hurtful as they don’t make those anymore. And the new breed of “smart” watches feel so intrusive (demonic) to me…
Today, the watch in my water-room died. That was very shocking and destabilizing, because it was the one that told me the time of moon/sun cycles.
Both things happened ‘first thing in the morning’.
It’s been two months since I arrived in Utrecht after an abrupt lockdown in Jeddah for 7 months. It was (/is) so surreal to be back here. Suddenly, I was (mentally) sent back in time – the places, the memories, the scents, the scenes… Thoughts I thought I had ‘gotten over’ simply resurrected themselves out of things. Automatic behaviors that I forgot, suddenly were reflexive out of nothing.
“I knew this was bound to happen at some point, so I guess it’s okay!”
I missed the last bus, and I am a long way from home. After all these years, I still refuse to realize that cleaning up after running experiments is actually a consuming and demanding task!
It is a conflict though, it’s as if the absolute priority is discovering something ASAP and if I don’t then I’m not doing well. The reality is, (like life) it is a process. Which also often involves failed experiments followed by spending 2 hours of careful separation of waste, washing glassware several times with different solvents, and trying not to break overly expensive (and fragile) equipment while hastily trying to clean carefully!
After walking in the cold for a while to another bus stop, I see I have more than an hour before the night bus comes. I wouldn’t want to stand in this cold night a full hour, and that nearby hotel (with its warm lights, luxurious exterior, and the distant noise of chatter and laughter) looks like a promising shelter.
