Yellow Face

The last couple of weeks, when I leave for work at the ungodly hour of 6:15 a.m., it's been gray and overcast and occasionally even drizzly (I'm not complaining. I love this cool July weather we're having).

This morning was another story.

As I headed (east?) on Carson Street past the horribly designed Long Beach Town Center, I kept checking the car's clock, which, at that time, read 6:21 (yes, it takes me six minutes to get from my house to the LB Town Center. Shut up, there's a long light at Woodruff). It was so... bright! I was confused. Was I late? What time was it? (It doesn't help that last night I had a dream* that involved being in a house where all the clocks were set to the wrong time and I knew I needed to be somewhere at 2 p.m. and but I had no idea what time it was at that exact moment.) I was very confused.

What is this... light up in the sky? And the sky - blue? What the hell? 6:21 a.m. and I had sunglasses on and the visors down. Once I was on the freeway, I even had the little extender things on the visors out (blocking my rearview mirror a little, but the LIGHT!). I felt like Gollum, catching a sight of the sun for the first time in forever, frightened by it. Oh Yellow Face, go away and leaves us alone!

*The earlier portion of my dream: I was at a dinner party with a friend's mom and a bunch of other people I didn't know. Coincidentally, two of the other guests were flutists. One whipped out a toy flute, or maybe it was a penny whistle, and started playing a little funny melody in a military style. It's possible she was illustrating something she'd been discussing with one of the other guests I didn't know. We ate dinner, and then after dinner, another guest began playing that same melody (which I can't exactly get a handle on this morning), but this time in a slow, mysterious way. It sounded beautiful. In the dream I had goosebumps. It was kind of like "Arab Dance" from the Nutcracker - I wish I could remember that melody. I don't often dream about music I've never heard before.