Hey! Little Girl (Bizarro Dream no. 20407)

Hey! Little Girl (Bizarro Dream no. 20407)


I'm walking along at a carnival, state fair or some sort of temporary place of gathering for the purpose of amusement, when I am struck in the back with a fist. I turn around to find this nine year old girl, dirty-faced in a purple coat. (I've been hit in public by children before. The latest episode was in a super market, where this child of about 3 or 4 let go of his mother's hand, walked over and hit me in the leg. His mother says to me, "sorry." At that moment I saw this child's future.) Anyway, back to the dream; next thing I know I am holding this kid up against a bulletin board type of kiosk relaying to her rather harshly that she shouldn't go around randomly assaulting people. I knew she didn't have parents (near by at least – in dreams you just know things) so I threatened to take her to the cops.

Of course she begged and pleaded for me not to, she apologized profusely, as children… as young female children do, so I relented and went about my business. I had a day at the fair, which I don't remember much of, just the random people you see doing random things. At the end of the day, on my way out of this place of amusement, I see dirty little purple coated child with the dyed blonde tips of her curly hair, talking to the cops, or some sort of venue security and she's pointing in MY direction.

In dreams you just know things, and I knew she was telling the cops that I'd molested her. Because I raised a daughter, I know what adults tell children about such things and I knew it would only be a matter of time before the self-righteous wrath of these rental cops would come upon me. So, like any guilty-till-proven-innocent accused child-molester in a crowded venue would, I turned my head away from the pointing fingers and began moving in the opposite direction, hoping to lose myself in the crowd.

Too late!

Security guards are worse than cops for so many reasons that I won't go into right now. At some point I am confronted by a man in an Army uniform (second time this week I've encountered "military" men in my dreams). I'm heading towards one of the exits when I am confronted face-to-face by this guy. "You want to talk to me?" I ask. And we have a seat at a picnic table. He's wearing eagles on his collar and I ask him if he's a colonel. He tells me he used to be in the army and he shows me that the army shirt he's wearing is from a thrift shop. (He'd left the price tag on it.) For some reason I respect his authority nonetheless and I begin telling him "what had happened."

A crowd is gathering around. I get about a quarter of the way through my account and this guy loses interest. I know he believes me, but I want to finish my story. He leaves the table and I begin shouting at him. Things kind of get stupid at this point, by which I mean, I start thinking of "creative" (imagine a Geico commercial) ways of telling my story. I line up three Destiny's Child wanna-bees and ask them to back me up with vocal harmony while I continue to tell my tale. No one wants to hear it though.

I wake up thinking, No good deed goes unpunished.