Declaration of Independence

I’m used to having pretty intense, bizarre dreams that have more layers and complexities than Angelina Jolie has tattoos…or things to talk to her shrink about…or children.  There’s the one where I am shopping in the thrift store where everyone is making fun of me, only to be running down the street naked later because I got locked out of my apartment and all my clothes are in my ex's convertible Beetle.  Or the one where clones  invade earth and they are chronic liars.  Or being in my high school that really isn’t my high school  at all (um, three glass towers and an elevator that shoots out of the sky??) and trying to remember my schedule and where I sit and what books to grab and what the hell my locker combo is.  Or the one where I’m in college, living in the dorms and rooming with this weird young kid (I’m my age) who’s never there and trying to find my way to the south side of campus – which is actually a huge cruise ship.  Usually, I can just shake them off.  This morning I awoke after one such dream to some cold hard truth – in the form of 4 year old projectile vomit and the damn dog licking herself.

Harsh reality:  I am not going to be in a bar where an old high school friend (Derek making a cameo) introduces me to his nice, attractive, seemingly mild cousin. Even though I know I'll never be in that bar, one part rings true...I WILL probably favor the sarcastic, emotionally unavailable man instead.  Which means, that I’ll never be roaming through the streets of my hybrid Chicago/Evanston – a common backdrop from my dreams – with the mild cousin (who’s actually really nice and goofy and smart where it matters and funny…kind of like Grayson on Cougar Town) after all, and won’t realize that he truly IS my type if I had great taste in men.  We won’t pop into a quaint store the sells colorful three-wick homemade candles (or was that fruity fudge logs with candles in them?) and teas made from potatoes and carrots.  He won’t take my hand and walk with me across the street.  And I’ll never find out that he’s actually astrologically appropriate.  Sigh.

Pleasant reality:  Same dream.  I won’t be living in a split ranch with my father and grandfather and have an impromptu party of the mild cousin, four girls from high school and a bar I used to work at, the other sarcastic jerk that was hitting on me and a few other really random people.  Every single bathroom won’t be disgustingly clogged and I won’t be walking around topless.  I won’t be left with a mess of a house in the morning and no working coffee maker (but TONS of leftovers from the school cafeteria) and my uncle and dad coming home from partying at 8 in the morning and realizing that I am late to get the kids to school.

On one hand, it sucks that I won’t meet the my Graysonish cousin, who of course is too good to be true…but’s awfully nice knowing that I won’t be walking around topless in the midst of horrid bathrooms.  I think it’s a push. 

I declare these truths to be self-evident.