Dream XXV

I was attending some kind of strange art school, where creativity was more important than results. The night we all arrived, I made up cards of all the people I wanted to play music or otherwise create with; I had drawn little faces, lacking mouths, of all these people. I would draw in the mouths after playing with each of them.

I met two fellow students on a bridge that night, who were getting ready to play some music. I asked if I could join, and showed that I had brought my clarinet, but warned them that I could only play a couple of notes.

The one student said that was fine, and suggested that, since he was going to play the E string on his violin, and the other student was going to play the F key on her accordian, I could play the G string on my clarinet.

Seemingly without warning, we were suddenly under control of Chinese communists, who were allied with the Empire from the Star Wars films. We were in a huge, depressing hall, where we were going to receive our art assignments.Suddenly, the lady who was in charge of our group told us with some alarm that it was time for many of us (including my group) to go down a couple of flights of stairs to the music center. She had several odd percussion instruments (reseambling wooden finger cymbals) for those of us who couldn't play an instrument, but I decided to bring my clarinet. While going downstairs, I assembled my clarinet. The mouthpiece was large, greenish and made of thin latex, and I had difficulty getting it attached to the rest of the instrument.

Again, without warning, a large contingent of Empire troops attacked us, using flying machines and tanks. We all scattered and fought back, and eventually, we defeated the invaders and fled to a nearby water theme park, where we would be safe. We rode the rides endlessly, and as evening fell, we started drinking beer.

Later, in one of the common rooms at the park, I took out my cards and began drawing mouths on the people I had fought beside. That, to me, was as valid as creating art with them. Some people chuckled at me as I did this. I drew in the mouths of James Lileks and his daughter, who were at the table with me, along with the violin-playing student. We all noted how the alcohol wasn't having any effect on us, though our speech and movement were becoming slurred. We were telling our stories in a sort of round-robin fashion, but then Mr. Lileks decided he was too tired to move from where he was sitting, and said we should just go around him. I was the first one next to him, so I stepped past. "The saga will continue in this direction," I said, phrased in the manner of a theme-park sign, and everyone laughed.