Dream-o-Meter: Shopping and the Ghost of Nanny

My dream (as far back as I can remember it):

Walking up the huge staircase to an elevated 7-train (although I was coming from somewhere Upper, Upper West-- Harlem?) And I had no shoes on. There was a group of tourists00 a blond family on the staircase speaking German or something and I thought they would look at my feet.

I was afraid of stepping on broken glass. The cement was sparkling. I got on the Uptown side and had to figure out how to get onto the Downtown platform. I thought I'd get off at 72nd Street, but after one stop I saw a flea market below-- more like a Jerusalem bazaar.

I saw a large, magenta, velvet bag and another made of brocade-velvet tapestry. I decided to get off the train.

Once in the bazaar, I had to step over two girls looking at a tray of rings in order to get the the bags. One ring was made of garnet and moonstone. Another was made of small green tiles.

Then Is aw a stand behind me where they were selling gold. I had some gold to trade in, but the man told me that he didn't have anything 14K. He was Middle Eastern. We were seated at a wooden table. The man said something about it being "Joseph-gold" which made sense to me, being in Jerusalem.

Then a woman came over to me-- a white American "soccer mom" type. She asked if she could leave her six year old son with me for half an hour. I asked her why she's be willing to leave him with me... a stranger! She said it's because I'm white and I had brushed my teeth and I looked "safe." I felt uncomfortable, but I said "okay." I asked her for her cell phone number just in case she never showed up again. She couldn't remember the number. She wrote something down on a paper (4... 9581?) but said another thing out loud as she wrote it. She seemed to have some weird math-equation way of remembering each of the following numbers. I gave her mine instead. I think I said "288887"

Then, the next thing I know, we were in "Epic" (or my conception of "Epic") but it had all of the clothing from "Scream" and my cousin Jail was working there. The store hadn't opened yet.

BigSis, LilSis, Aunt Nin, Jol and I were shopping there. It was like we had "first dibs" there while people outside the doors were pressed against the glass trying to get in. Jail's hair was dyed bright orange, like Nipkins.

I saw a beautiful pale-green sweater that I wanted. There weren't many on the rack, even though it was a new item and there were there with a hodge-podge of pale green sale skirts.

I finally found my size (after not being able to read the tags) but when I showed it to BigSis, she said it was three sizes smaller... Then when I wanted to try it on, the sweater was black. It fit me, but I couldn't find a green one, like the one I wanted, in my size.

By this time, the store was open and crowded and I couldn't get Jail's attention to go look in the stockroom for me.

Suddenly, there were so many people there that it became some sort of party. Some sweet sixteen or something for one of my cousins being held at the store! We were walking around, mingling. I bumped into Jol and Aunt Nin. Jol looked about 13 years old.

She said: "I'm glad it was you that my mom wanted to drop me off with in the bazaar. I didn't want to say anything though because it was embarrassing."

I seemed to know what she was talking about and laughed at the memory (like that time int he islands when someone thought she was my daughter?)

Then I bumped into Uncle R. He was upset. He kept saying something like:

"Last summer we saw you guys... We were relevant to you guys, right?"

It was as if he just came from a conversation of someone telling him otherwise.

Suddenly, he turned his head. Nanny appeared-- taller than him-- in a flash, over his shoulder. It scared me. She looked healthy and beautiful for the party, but was wearing glasses with brightly green tinted lenses. I tried to apologize to her and tell her how much we miss her. Everyone else walked away. She looked at me sadly.

I woke up.