Because I'm trying to spend every free moment working on the novel, it's the first thing I think about when I wake up.
So last night, I had a very vivid dream about being woken up by a noise in the house.
It seemed normal and natural, because at 1:30 AM, I HAD ACTUALLY awoken to a strange BUMP in the night.
For real. It was no dream. A loud noise coming from downstairs woke me.
I sat up, heard another loud thump. Then another. I wasn't frightened though, because I recognized the sound immediately. It was our dwarf rabbit, Earl, thumping his back paw. He does this when he's particularly pissed off about something. And when he does it in his cage (with a plastic bottom that reverberates quite loudly off the tile floor), you can hear it, quite loud, through the entire house.
I figured that Earl had run out of food so I went downstairs to check on him.
He had plenty of water, pellets and hay (he even had half a tortilla chip - a treat we'd given him before bedtime). So he wasn't annoyed about the food situation. I reached into his cage and petted him, thinking maybe he was lonely. But then he thumped a couple more times.
I thought maybe he was thumping to alert us of something (a common reason why rabbits thump is to warn other rabbits of danger), so I peered out into the back yard - nothing. Then I went to the front to check the front yard and our quite elaborate Halloween decorations (always leery of vandals) - everything there was fine.
Earl thumped one more time. I told him to knock it off, got a glass of water, gave him a small handful of Cheerios, then went back up to bed.
He ceased the thumping and I went back to sleep.
Some time later is when I had the nightmare. In the dream, I woke to a strange noise. I, naturally, assumed it was Earl "voicing" his displeasure to the rest of the house. I sat up, shook my head and then threw the covers back, thinking I might as well head downstairs and continue work on my novel. I was annoyed to be woken, but didn't feel tired - so was actually feeling pleased with the thought of having some time to work on the book.
As I walked over to my dresser and leaned down to pull out a pair of pajama bottoms from the bottom shelf, I saw a shadowy figure standing quietly and motionlessly in our bedroom doorway.
I shook my head and did a double-take. It was a dark, very tall figure, obviously not Alexander coming in from his room. My heart leapt into my throat.
There was someone in our house!
I scrambled to grab the mag lite that I keep on my side of the bed.
"Get out!" I tried to scream at the dark figure, and at the same time I tried calling out to Francine to call 911; but my voice was breaking, I could barely push any words out. I lunged toward the door with the mag-lite raised high, ready to strike, and the figure turned around and quickly started moving down the stairs. I began to chase him.
As he moved down the steps, he moved through a beam of moonlight coming in from outside. That's when I saw the unique black with white smudge pattern of the robes he was wearing and realized the figure walking through our upstairs was the grim reaper from our front lawn Halloween decorations.
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| The Grim Reaper who stands at the front left side of our yard this Halloween |
That's when I woke up for real.
Wow! Strange dream. But still pretty cool.
I still find it interesting that I wasn't as afraid of some strange dark figure that broke into our house (remember, I was prepared to chase after him and whack him with my mag-lite) as I was of an inanimate lawn decoration stalking through the house. The fact it was a "monster" is what scared me so much I woke from the dream.
For the record, this morning, once the sun came up, I went outside to check to make sure the grim reaper was still standing where I left him. He was. So I took the picture posted here.
After I snapped the shot, I could have sworn that he offered me a wry grin and a quick wink.
But then again, my imagination often gets the best of me.
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