Dream: Mousesicles

Dream 20030402, 7:20 AM:

I’m in a house that reminds me somewhat of the Avenel house, but is different in several places, especially the kitchen and dining room area. Chris and I are here, and also a bunch of kids; I recognize Jason, but he is much younger than he really is now, and he has friends here with him.

The kids are sitting and chatting in the kitchen / dining room area, and Chris and I are trying to get ready for bed. I go into the bedroom, and Chris is already sitting up in bed reading. I start to undress, explaining to him that the kids are sitting in the dining room chatting, when I hear a loud noise. The kids are howling laughing at whatever it is. I pull on a robe and go into the kitchen, and see that Magellan has caught a little green budgerigar by the foot, and the poor little thing is flapping like mad. I reach down and grab Magellan’s jaws and pry the little bird’s foot out, scold the cat, and put the bird back in its cage. There are several cages here, and a number of different kinds of parrots. I tell the kids that they’re going to have to go, but they don’t seem to believe me, and stay sitting right where they are. I tell them that if there are any more problems, they’ll have to leave.

I go back into the bedroom, and start taking off my robe when I hear a loud mechanical noise from the kitchen. I tell Chris that I’ve got to go check on it, and put my robe back on. Chris in the dream seems almost more like John, but I can’t put my finger on the reason why. I go back into the kitchen, and see that the noise was from the blender; they were making some kind of blender drink. I don’t remember what it was, but they shouldn’t have been doing it. I tell them that if they keep making noise, I’ll put them all outside, lock the door, and call their parents to pick them up. I see a bottle, it looks like a Jack Daniels bottle, on the breakfast bar; it’s half full of something thick and red like tomato paste, with a white powdery layer like baking soda on top. I tell them not to mess with this stuff, don’t they know how expensive it is? It doesn’t seem like they’re drinking it, it seems like they’re doing some kind of experiment.

As I walk back toward the bedroom, I pass more of the bird cages; there are dozens of them now. There are parrots on top of some of the cages, and curled up together sleeping in several shelf areas. I lean over next to one of the birds and say “Hey, Baby!” and it replies the same. It’s a big-bodied dark green parrot, shaped almost more like a guinea hen’s body. I remember holding it in my hand, my hand cupping around under its chest. Hattie is here, too. I say something like “Sixteen!” to the bird, and it starts in on a whole sentence that sounds like it’s mimicking a movie line… “Sixteen! And only three months to me.” It rubs its head on Hattie’s face as it says this. It says it a couple of times. There is another parrot with a huge bill, and it reaches out like it’s going to bite, and I think Chris is out here now, and he tells me it’s going to bite me, but I explain that it just wants its beak rubbed, and I rub its beak in demonstration. It puts its tongue out through the side of its beak, and I rub that too, and the bird leans into it like a cat.

I’m not sure if I go back into the bedroom and then come out again after hearing the blender, or if the kids just run the blender again while I’m talking to the birds and I tell them to stop.

I walk over to another shelf, and see a bunch of different kinds standing there on the shelf; I think they’re sleeping. I look at them and talk to them all for a little bit, just low cooing whispers. I am trying to see if one of them wants to be picked up; I say, “Who’s my baby? Who’s my baby?” and I think that the red Macaw is going to wake up, but instead, a really ancient white bird comes out from the back, where it had been concealed by the others. He has an owl’s face but a parrot’s body, and is entirely white except for some rose and green feathers on his back. His feathers are very thin, like the hair of an old person, and he has an air of immense age about him. I pick him up gingerly and hold him. He has on a vest of some sort; it is made of interlaced ecru cotton threads in a lattice pattern, with some beads. There are printed labels on it, and I remember that one of them should indicate what kind of owl/parrot cross he is. I look at the labels for a minute, petting the bird, but don’t see the label I was looking for. There are a bunch of cages in one corner, and there is a sign that looks like it was taken from a grocery store department, with cutouts of different kinds of animals, and it says something about the fuzzy forest floor.

I take the bird outside. I’m in street clothes now instead of my bathrobe, although I don’t recall changing. We walk along down the left-hand side of a dark street, and I talk to the bird conversationally; he and I have been friends a long, long time. I think that he’s been with me longer than the other parrots. The street where we are walking seems like an old part of town, a little worn down but very comfortable. I see a pile of random scrap, concrete chunks and pieces of wood, and a little mouse darts over the edge; I ask the owl-parrot if he thinks he’s up for one last pounce, but when I turn over a board, we can’t see the mouse, and he doesn’t seem all that interested. I walk a little further down, and cross over to the right side of the street. I see a bird here, some sort of parrot again, and a cat pounces on it; it explodes in a flurry of flapping wings, and I lean over and grab the cat. The cat reminds me somewhat of Greysie, although it is stockier. I pick up the bird, and tell it that it shouldn’t allow itself to be bullied by cats; it has a wicked sharp beak if it will use it. The bird says, “I know, I just panic! I panic!” I don’t remember putting the bird down, but I don’t have it with me as we walk on.

There is a big box here on the side of the street, built in onto the sidewalk, kind of like how a big mail box would be. It’s a freezer, and I open it up, and there is nothing inside but leaves and dirt. I am pleased, because it doesn’t look like anyone’s even tried distubring it. I take out the plastic false bottom with the leaves, then another, and there is a little red flashing light that I can now see through a hole in the bottom; I take out a third plastic false bottom, and there is a tray with several rows of little frozen things that look like lollipops, but I know are frozen processed mice. Each one has a stick (the tail) sticking out, and the “lollipop” part is wrapped in brown paper. I call them mousesicles. I take one out, and hold it in my hand to warm it. I close up the freezer box, putting the false bottoms in one by one, including the one with the leaves. I decide that I need to lock it up, even though it hasn’t been bothered recently; I take a hasp and fold it so that I can put a padlock on it. I have an image in my mind of a push-button combination lock on the front door of the freezer, but then I think that maybe the lock has a combination on the padlock part.

I walk down the street with the owl-parrot on my shoulder and the cold mousesicle in my hand. After the mousesicle has started to thaw just enough that it’s no longer solid ice, I unwrap it and hold it up for him; he bites it, and I hear the ice crunching. It looks like a piece of sushi, just a little cube of raw red flesh. He munches on it as we walk. I wonder to myself if the tails are real, or if they’re made of something.

As we’re walking, a security guard says hello, and starts to walk along with us. I think that he’s the guard at my building, and he and I are old friends. We walk slowly, in no hurry, and chat a little bit. Far ahead, in the parking lot of a lighted store down the hill from us, I see a tall woman (or transvestite?) with an extremely long neck in a very fuzzy sweater; it makes her look like an ostrich. I turn to the security guard and say that I’d considered having an ostrich (po
inting to the lady) but had wasn’t sure if they were worth the trouble. We both laugh at that; I think that my having an ostrich would have been extra work for the security guy somehow.