cold, water


I dreamed about getting a text message from Matt reading, "Going to the
hospital."

Later:

I was in a long, narrow living room with wood paneling on most of the
walls. The wall above the couch (which was old, and made of a very
scratchy fabric) was metal and coverd with magnetic poetry and papers,
like a fridge door. I wrote three or four sentences; I don't remember
any of them, but one was about my sister. Matt came into the room and
read them, and laughed. He was moving to put his arm around me when a
huge wasp flew into the room and came straight for me. I shrieked and
ran across the room, thinking as I did that I was sounding and acting
just like Heather -- whiny and helpless. The wasp was angry with me
because I had killed it's mate (in my last car, in the back window,
there sat for several years the dried mummified corpse of a wasp that
had died there in the heat of summer; this was that wasp's mate).

Later:

A man in his mid-40's was in his backyard by the swimming pool; I was
his teenage daughter, and followed. The air was almost cold; it was
early morning and the sun hadn't quite reached through the trees, so
there were shadow's everywhere. My father was going to install a
lifeguard seat on the edge of the swimming pool; I was there to keep him
company, but not to actually help. I got in the pool at the shallow end
while he did something in the grass. I didn't do more than dunk down
and get myself wet; I know the water was incredibly cold, but it didn't
feel cold. There was a large metal coffee can at the edge of the pool,
and as I watched, a very wet raccoon climbed out and ambled off towards
the trees. I laughed and pointed it out to my father.

Then I was inside the house with the same man and his daughter (who was
a separate person now; she had very long, thick, super-curly hair, and I
never saw her face because she was always looking down). He was sitting
watching her read, and getting increasingly agitated. I noticed he was
missing the final joints of both thumbs, and quietly asked him about it.
He told me that yes, he lost them in an accident at home several years
ago, while trying to put in a lifeguard seat in the pool. I realized
then that he was a time traveler, and this was his future self whiel his
present self was outside about to lose some finger joints.

We sat there, watching his daughter read, and then he asked me to please
take her upstairs to her room to play. She was about to protest when we
heard his wife/her mother start screaming outside. The future-father
pushed his daughter out of the room as the present-father came stumbling
in with both hands held out in front of him, dripping wet, with a look
of numbness on his face. I knew he wasn't in pain, because of shock.
There was no blood, and his hands were completely white, and freezing to
the touch. He mumbeled, "So cold . . . so cold." His wife followed him
into the house (I never actually saw her, but I knew she was there) with
his thumb parts in a white handkerchief, also with no blood.