If I had Oodles of Money

• I would become obsessed with shoes. I adore heels and would own a pair for every outfit in my wardrobe. It would be amazing.
• Every wall in my house would be lined with bookshelves full of the most delightful first edition books ever. People would travel from all over the world t0 see my collection.
• I would own a Kitchen Aid mixer. I have not, in seven years of domesticity, encountered a recipe that could only be prepared with this kitchen gadget, but I want one anyway. In buffed silver. Also, I’d have a special cabinet that popped up to counter height with the mixer already on it so I’d never have to lift that darned thing.
• I would eat at places like Hot & Hot Fish Club once a week.
• I would give money to my high school and college Alma Maters. And I would feel compelled to write letters to the administrative boards of each letting them know how I expect my donations to be used.
• I would own a house at the beach and one in the mountains. And I’d pay people to see after the upkeep of each.
• OMG I would have a gardener. He or she would prevent things like weeds that turn into trees and trees that become infested with beetles and fall on power lines. And my roses wouldn’t be choked out by weeds. Basically, this person’s so goal in life would be to assure that  I’d have no weeds.
• I would get my PhD in English and a Masters in Mathematics and probably another undergrad degree in Interior Design. And then I’d get a Masters or PhD in Architecture. After that I’d go for another undergraduate degree in Visual Arts. And then maybe Drama, just for fun.
• I would own a Wii and I would have Rock Band, and I would play the drums a lot so that one day I look less spastic doing it and maybe be able to throw down a challenge to The Boss without embarrassing myself too badly.
• I’d have already had three children. But if oodles just fell into my lap today, I’d adopt three. And promptly explode.
• I would have the time to make a quilt. Side Note on the Personality of Liz: I don’t like to follow directions. It doesn’t matter to me that I’ve never made a quilt before nor have anything but the vaguest idea of how one would go about doing that, and in fact that makes it even BETTER because then when the quilt I make turns out to be AWESOME it’s like I’ve invented the quilt all over again.
• I’m sure I’d save some and invest some. And tithe the appropriate amount.
• I’d have a lap pool in my back yard. I’d be svelte.
• I would buy a major publishing house. There should be no question what my first order of business would be.
• I’d start a foundation to benefit research for the cure of sleep. I am far too addicted to this and it is a waste of precious life. Though every now and then it’s awesome.
• I would surely have more worldly and fascinating things to blog about than what I’d do if I had oodles of cash.

The End.

 

Nightmares

There are some folks out there who are regularly plagued with nightmares. I’m not one of them. I could probably recount to you in space of a normal blog posting the entire list of all the nightmares I’ve experienced. I guess you could say that I’m fairly lucky to be a regular (as in, nightly) dreamer but to be only occasionally bothered by nightmares.

Sometimes I have a hard time falling asleep (rest assured, I’ve already started what promises to be a fascinating post on this subject) and I have to take a little melatonin to add to my natural levels that just aren’t enough to put me out at night. Last night was one of those nights.

Now, for those of you who’ve never had to take melatonin to get a little sleep, I’ll tell you it does some wonky things with one’s dreams. Not necessarily bad things, but definitely intensifies normal dreaming in vividness and clarity.

Last night just happened to be a particularly bad night to take dream-enhancing hormones as things started off badly. There was a massive spider on the floor in my very first dream of the evening. Not massive like tarantula massive, but black, poisonous looking, with hella-long legs. I don’t remember where I was or who I was with, but I remember that spider. And that spider decided it would be awesome to dance on my toes.

In the land of the wide awake and non-dreaming, my toes were twitching. I’ve never experienced twitching toes while awake, but the moment my eyes popped open and my feet started moving to kick away that spider, I knew something was different. My toes were moving without my specific permission. And they wouldn’t stop, so of course for at least three seconds, I believed there really was a large, poisonous spider dancing on the toes of my right foot. The panic that ensued kept me fully wide awake for a good long while, thus defeating the purpose of the melatonin altogether. Blurgh.

This is a running theme in the nightmares I’ve had in my lifetime – scary scary things doing fairly amusing activities  leaving me completely freaked out.

When I was little, I had a recurring nightmare that I was sitting in my dad’s lap. That wasn’t the nightmarish part, of course, it got that way later. All of a sudden I’d look up at Dad and instead of him, I’d find a skeleton in his place. And the skeleton would start to tickle me. Can you imagine how frightening this was for a five year old? Trust me, it was quite upsetting indeed. And it wasn’t one of those one time nightmares – it happened a few times at least, and the images are permanently ingrained into my brain. Very upsetting.

Now, my second nightmare of last night was also a little absurd, because it involved me being chased around a hospital by an elderly, demented man toting his own IV stand. This man couldn’t even run, much less hobble after me, but somehow he caught up. He almost fell over when I shoved his doughy chest, but he still seemed super menacing. My fear actually woke me up.

Maybe the reason why I don’t often haven nightmares is that I find truly ridiculous things to be frightening… I mean who is really scared of dancing spiders (except maybe Ron Weasley)? Or a skeleton who’s only threatening vice is to tickle me? And seriously, an old man with a moving speed similar to a snail’s should not be the most intimidating thing my subconscious mind can come up with. Surely.