Dream XXXVI

I was with a couple of orphans and we went to a rich old lady’s house to see if we could get a handout. A small blonde girl opened the door and told us the old lady would not be seeing us. The girl was very sad about this, but could do nothing.

I had a sudden idea and told her to put on her uniform, and lead us to a place where we could be overheard. When we were led to the foot of a stairway, I said in a very loud voice, “Oh, you mean this isn’t the theatre?” hoping to convince the old lady that I thought her performance as a curmudgeon was just that—a performance.

She was delighted to hear this flattery and came down to us, promising to take us to the real theatre, which was next door.

There, we saw a play based on our experiences as traveling orphans. The part of the old lady was played by a real bull, who was dark-brown and could talk. He also had oven mitts on his hands.

At the same time, Lou Reed’s wife kept coming to me with questions from Mr. Reed. One asked which yellow fruit had the scent I preferred. Others dealt with peculiar questions of distance, to which I replied that there was a series of small lenses, each with an “X” factor, that could be used to judge these distances. She said he was insistent, though, that I provide the answers. Every time I saw him, though, he was mourning the death of a different fellow musician and friend.

The audience in the theatre, as well as the actors on stage, were very indulgent of these many interruptions in the performance. The bull, in fact, seemed to regard me as a potential actor in some future production.