Yesterday, on the day after my thirtieth birthday, I woke up expecting it to be like any other day. Well, not like any other day--I had planned, among other things, to give two weeks' notice at my job and get on with the rest of my life. Like any other morning, though, after hearing the alarm's shrill cries, I hit the snooze button and snuggled deeper under the covers, sneaking a cold foot into Cole's territory to warm up. I found a warm leg, which felt a little hairy...and a mite thick for the female leg I'm used to. With a furrowed brow, I explored more with my foot, poking here and there with a toe. Not finding the usual pajama pants, or the uber soft, from years of washing, Notre Dame shirt, my heart started to race. I opened my eyes, but that didn't help much, considering the room was pitch black. This couldn't be my bedroom in my house; some measure of ambient light always managed to sneak into our room. This room was darker than dark, and now I noticed that the person slumbering next to me was also snoring noisily, ferrying a large amount of phlegm back and forth between nose and throat. That definitely not being a Cole trait, the alarm that originated in my chest migrated down into my stomach as unmitigated fear. I jumped out of bed and ran into the side of what seemed to be a canvas structure. Not being able to see anything, I couldn't locate a door.
It was at this point I realized my body was not my own. I hesitantly explored my new earthly shell: slender and bony as a twig, my form sheathed in a thick, rough fabric that reached to the floor. I shivered and felt my tiny chest tense from the cold. Miniature slippers encased my feet. Most startling was the soft, downy beard that covered my face and neck.
At that moment a voice growled at me from the darkness, repeating wearily: "Get back to bed. You're havin' another one of your nightmares. The year is 1768. This is the great city of London. I am Philip Astley, and I've just staged the first modern circus. You, my dear, are my bearded woman."
I stood in what I now realized was a tent and tried to process this information. 1768? London? Hadn't I heard my alarm just minutes earlier? Where was Cole? Again, 1768?
I decided it couldn't be true. My eyes had now adjusted to the dark, and I shouldered my way out of the tent into the chilly morning. It was early dawn, and cold, and I shivered again. Trying to gather my dressing gown closer to my body, I found a small tome tucked in a pocket. A book of poetry by Croatian poet Ivan Gundulic. The slim volume bore an embossed date of 1630 and a vaguely medieval design. Carefully opening the book, I peered at the first page, realizing that I could read Croatian! Maybe, if this was all really happening, it wouldn't be so bad after all. I noticed rudimentary markers on some pages with notations in my hand. Did I read Croation poetry as part of my act as the bearded woman? Stroking my newly-acquired and full, untrimmed beard, I pondered the question.
But not for long. At that moment, Richard Nixon, the 37th President of the United States, streaked past wearing nothing but his God-given birthday suit, waving grubby hands formed into peace signs, shouting, "I AM NOT A CROOK!" As fast as he appeared, he disappeared into the mist. I now noticed that the tent out of which I had stepped was one of hundreds, possibly thousands, spread out in what appeared to be a grassy field. In the distance I spied a large, striped tent with smoke lazily curling up from its pointed top. Still not believing that this could be real, I began walking in the direction of the big top. I found myself stroking my beard as I would a baby blanket, as a kind of comfort. I stopped for a moment and inspected the ends of the beard, searching for split ends. To my delight, every end was tattered and split to the extreme. I could have spent hours on the task at hand, but at that moment I heard strains of one of my favorite songs in the entire world. Someone was playing Ten Years Gone.
Casting my beard aside, I ran as fast as I could in my rustic slippers in the tent's direction. The music increased in volume and just as I burst into the big top, a man began singing. It was Jimmy Page, English guitarist and member of Led Zeppelin! Performing a solo rendition of Ten Years Gone, he stood alone in the center of the tent, illuminated by only a few stubby wax candles and the morning light that now filtered through small holes in the tent's canvas. I wondered where everybody else was. I was alone in the tent with Jimmy. I sat down on the hard packed dirt and listened, all the while caressing my downy facial hair. He played and played, just for me, leaving out those few Zeppelin songs that I loathe but playing every song that I love.
Eventually I must have fallen asleep, because when I awoke I was back in my bed. My hand immediately flew to my face for a good beard-pull, but all I found was smooth skin. I sighed, smiled, turned over and went back to sleep, wondering who I would be, and who I would meet, this time.
{Sadly, I didn't actually dream this dream while asleep, but I did dream it up a few years ago in response to a challenge by Kendra to engage in some creative writing. That was back when we were posting regulary to our LiveJournals. I recently went back and looked at my 5+ years of archives on that site, realizing that I've got a lot of history there.}
