I had a restless sleep, frequently waking up. I had a series of short, seemingly unrelated dreams in between waking up. These are the vignettes I can remember.

I’m in a poorly lit small apartment. It is cluttered with things that are either from the 70’s or it IS the 70’s. I’m there for work, I’m with someone else. We move through the apartment and come to focus on the area around the small TV that is on a low table in front of an old dirty chair. Also on the table is a bundle of new, clean plastic tubes, like drinking straws but heavier and longer. I pick them up and start fitting them into the various bullet holes in the table, the nearby wall, and the chair. There are a lot of them, and they are all leaning the same direction out of their respective holes, like quills on a porcupine. I wake up.

I’m in a large crowd of people. Everyone is wearing subdued colors, navy blue, grey, lots of golf shirts and cargo pants, male and female alike. We are waiting for something. Soon the crowd starts moving, first being corralled toward a ramp then into a large building. As I approach the ramp, like those before me, I’m handed a bulky navy blue life vest and told to keep it on at all times.  There is no water in sight.

Even if I wished to comply with the instruction, there was no space in the jostling of the crowd to figure out the straps and adjustments, or even to pull the bulky device over my head. The narrow passage empties into an auditorium like space, I find myself about 3rd row back on the balcony. As I survey the scene, I notice most people have abandoned their life vests entirely, some are still holding them, and only a few have actually put them on.

As I look further, past the seating, I see a large deck or stage. On one side is a wave pool of sorts. It looks like swim lanes, but it is running water moving down a slope. There are people snowboarding down it. On the other side is a forest scene, with a sharp drop off the side of what would be stage left from where I stand. Suspended over the drop are two barrel, that have bars allowing us to see inside. The barrels are facing each other. I leave my seat and make my way up the walkway to the space between these two scenes.

As I get to the front of the stage, there are a few people standing around watching what is going on. In the wave pool there are folks learning to snowboard, and others who seem quite proficient at it. On the other side, there are two women who have been put into the barrels and are suspended above the drop facing each other. They don’t seem to be distressed to be there. One of them is someone I know well, and I’m puzzled as to why she would possibly be present, let alone suspended where she is.

As the crowd gathers, an announcer indicates it’s time to get them into the spirit of things, and two nozzles lower down and take aim at the face level of each barrel. Again, the women don’t seem concerned. The nozzles open and spray large quantities of what is announced to be beer, directly into the faces of the women. They laugh and drink what they can from the geysers aimed at them.

As this occurs, the announcer comes back on saying we are now going to hear how these lucky ladies got selected for this honour. A scene appears in the forested area of the stage, it almost seems like we are watching on a screen, it’s a bit fuzzy, and has a sepia tone to it. The woman I know is the subject, she is in a clearing with some other people, they all have long board skateboards. They are laughing and talking, then start boarding between the trees. In a voiceover with someone who nominated her for this, a male voice describes how she is the light of his life, and such a gentle soul. There is music, and lots of slo-motion footage of them boarding through the forest. I wake up.

I have a handful of tiny figurines of people. I’m walking around with a kid and we are discussing where they should go. We walk to a play area outside, and try to glue the figurines to the playground equipment, but they won’t stay, it just isn’t right.

We go indoors and find a matchbox car mat that has roads printed on it. We glue the little figurines in standing positions hand to hand along the edge of the road. One of the figurines is missing her foot and won’t stand up properly. I wake up.