December 15, 2021
The dream scene was a party I was attending as a child, in an expansive plaza along the riverfront. People ate and drank and talked in a leisurely, carefree manner. Miles and miles across the water, whose volume moved swiftly like a river, but appeared wider like a bay or lake, was the bordering land. It was far too distant for any of us to be able to see with our naked eyes, but still it was visible; its great geographical landmarks and tiny cities jeweling everything. And even the people were visible, their bodies and faces and movements.
We should not have been able to see everything so clearly.
A storm started on that other shore. Horrific lightning and thunder, winds that tore land away, rains and snow that drowned valleys in white and mud sludge, breaking foundations and levees and bedrock, washing hundreds of thousands of people into the water, dissolving hills and mountains.
We should not have been able to see everything so clearly.
Our party was great. The food was delicious, and as we learned more about one another, we watched our neighboring country’s sudden and rapid dissolution by weather.
Then a monster emerged from that faraway land, burst from the crumbling mountains and cities. We watched it devour devastated cities and its people in terrible gulps until we thought it was sated and peaceful.
It was almost time for fireworks at our party. Hooray!
The monster climbed the last mountain left to our neighboring country, a volcano with a crown split in half. It perched on the rim and dove high in an arc into the moving waters between us.
And swam toward us.
We should not have been able to see everything so clearly.
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