i feel like i blended several dreams last night-- one that i won't talk about because it was oddly violating & awful. i didn't feel awful when i woke up, but just sort of surprised at how vulgar & obscene & morally, like... bad it was. i've never had a dream treat me so terribly before, but i guess i'm also remembering my dreams much more lately than i ever have before

anyway, the others were both better & more interesting. i'm not sure if they were connected or not, but i can't really imagine how they would be. in one, i [though not at all the same 'i' as real world me] led a lot of people through a forest/jungle/something else, maybe, looking for what i think was a camp i had previously help them set up-- the first camp i had ever set up. it was supposed to be one for somewhat permanent residence, and we waded though bamboo [if memory serves me], as i tried to prove something i can't remember

we found it, and it was so interestingly carved out of this little bamboo grove. we found a pool we'd made before, and took turns jumping in-- competing for the best jump and enjoying ourselves thoroughly. i remember the pride & satisfaction i felt that i'd been able to help lead them here-- been able to help create & facilitate that joy

in another dream, there was what seemed like if a skate bowl was also a freeway for skateboard travel? i learned to skate on it, laughably easily able to stand, though having a much harder time slowing down as i skated. my dad was there, and told me how to slow myself down & had a friend help explain, and i made my way through, going faster than i should & slowing down awkwardly & trying to learn to balance

i'm not sure why my dad was there, nor do i really want to know, but it's interesting. an interesting night of dreams all around

i started the dream deep in this feeling of having lost someone-- not really unhappy but sort of empty, like there was this film of guilt & discomfort covering me, in the same way abandoned houses in movies always have furniture covered in plastic. i lived in a an apartment alone with big windows & an exposed brick wall, which isn't important, but i remember clearly.

i made the decision to find the parents of my ex-partner [i have this feeling we didn't break up-- the way my body felt in the dream, it was like i'd been the reason they died or something], not wanting to engage with them at all, but just to see them again, maybe in some public space where they never would've known i was there. i needed the comfort of knowing their daily life for even a moment.

i found them in this sort of incredible hotel-mansion thing... there were hundreds of people walking through the lobbies, among all the great pillars & gold trim & fancy paintings i think i'd somehow found this sweater they'd given me [i get the feeling i got it from them that day, but i don't know how i would've in the timeline of this story]-- a sort of bright blue like the default color for links-- and was wearing it. it was soft and heavy against me.

i was walking through, looking for them, and i caught sight of their father, and felt immediately at peace, so i just walked right past, ready to leave. he spotted me and seemed unsure that it was me, but when i sped up & he realized i was wearing that sweater, he knew it was and started to follow me. we went on this sort of low speed & surreal chase, and it was this odd sensation where the dream felt cut like a movie-- moving back & forth between shots of me and him, the two of us at a sort of slowed speed, weaving through crowds and different rooms [this hotel had an endless amount of lobbies, it seems].

slowly, the rooms started to turn into what seemed like art museum exhibits, but with maybe 50 pieces in every room, statues and sculptures of different kinds in rows throughout each one. i mainly noticed metal & glass & melted plastic ones, and especially so as i started to float and kind of fly through each room, still weaving between people & pieces and kind of melting into everything around me.

i'm not super sure what happened, but i know at some point he caught up to me and we ended up talking, and i know the sort of shame i felt, not even at how my relationship with my partner had ended [i still don't know how], but in how i had abandoned them, came looking for them, and ran again.

we were in their modern apartment, sort of sterile but with art here & there and some cool-colored furniture. the mom asked me quietly at one point "we don't have to take you back home, do we?" and i responded, telling her "you know i don't have a home anymore," feeling that my only home in life had been with them