Pandemic dreamin' on such a summer's day

Dream #1

Short version: I invited some people to stay at my place during lockdown, and they brought along a heretofore unknown chimpanzee.

Hilarity did not ensue.

In fact, I found myself saying stuff like,

"Of course I adore your monkey and I want him to be comfortable here but I just don't feel this is the best environment for him"

and ...

"No, I am not being uptight about this; it's just that I need to get some work done, and that's difficult to do with Bonzo swinging around the apartment all the time"

and ...

"I'm sorry, I assumed his name was Bonzo. No offense intended."

Dream #2

More Toronto freeway dreams. There has been more than one, but I can't recall the others at the moment. This time I was trying to dodge road crews, potholes, and bicycles (!) on the Gardiner Expressway.

In this dream, I had to periodically pull to the side of the roadway at some sort of weigh station or sentry booth. Then I had tell someone (the freeway gods?) a joke or funny story. Each time I tried to do so, however, someone just before me had told the same joke or had told a better joke, so I had to keep moving on. Author's note: I blame hashtag games of Twitter.

The big existential crisis of the dream was when I decided to stay on the Gardiner to get to my destination, somewhere northwest of the city, instead of taking a crosstown route to the 401 MacDonald-Cartier Freeway.

Author's note: Sadly, there is no crosstown route like this in Toronto. Quiet Flows the Don Valley Parkway does not count.

I don't know why, other than it being "the road not taken," but this decision caused me a great deal of anxiety. So much so that the anxiety woke me up.

Oh, and somewhere in the midst of this, I had to drive in reverse for several miles so that I could look through the contents of hundreds of Amazon boxes that had been spilled in the roadway.

At this point in the pandemic, my dreams are little more than thinly veiled yearnings for purpose, attention, guidance, road trips, and shopping.

Dream #3

Author's note: The US-Canada border has been closed to non-essential travel since late March; this is expected to continue until at least late August. Oddly, you can still fly to the US from Toronto's Pearson International Airport. (The commuter airport, Billy Bishop/Toronto Islands, appears to be completely shut down, save for the occasional traffic or weather helicopter.) But upon return from your travels, you are supposed to self-quarantine for 14 days until you're sure you're not sick with the 'rona.

I'm in the waiting area of a small commuter airport flying to a work-related conference in the USA. I'm really looking forward to the trip.

I'm carrying with me a small suitcase and my Mac desktop computer (27" monitor) under one arm (as one does, surely). No case for the Mac, just tucked under my arm and dragging it along to use while I'm at the conference. I suddenly realize I've brought it to the airport but forgotten the power cord, the speakers, the keyboard, the mouse, etc. However, I figure I'll sort it out and buy those when I get to my destination.

Suddenly my Mom and sister join me. They're going with me to the conference where we're going to meet my brother and his wife. We go to board at Gate 2, but the numbers are not sequential, 5, 7, 3, 1, 4, 6, 2, so it takes us a while to find the gate.

Instead of using a "jet bridge" to access the plane, we have to take a tram, which will carry us to the plane at midfield. Suddenly, one of my work colleagues shows up for the flight as well.

"I didn't know you were coming to this conference!"

"Yes, I am, but I don't have a place to stay."

Suddenly, I realize that my Mom and sister don't have hotel rooms either. "We'll figure it out when we get there," I say.

Finally, we are on the tram, and I open my suitcase, which is more like a briefcase or satchel. I look at my Mom in a panic. "I've forgotten my passport! I don't have my permanent residence card! I can't get on this flight. I can't get into the US without my passport and can't get back into Canada without my permanent residence card."

I stopped short of standing up, the shot panning out, and yelling, "I'm a man without a country!" but, give that the border is closed and there's no end in sight to all this meshugas, that is the subtext in my thinking these days.

I realized I would not "figure this out later," but I woke up before I had to take any action, such as bolting from the tram or, upon arrival in the US, proclaiming my ignorance when I got to Customs and Immigration. Surely I, an American citizen, does not need a passport to enter my own country when a Canadian driver's license should suffice as ID, I would say in my best Karen/Kyle imitation.

I'm an anxious traveler at the best of times--fine once on the plane, fine when I get to my destination, but getting ready to leave for the airport or leave the airport for the hotel, or home-train-hotel, or home-bus-hotel, or home-car-hotel, or everything in reverse, presents me with a host of unknowns that, frankly, puts me on the edge of a psychic abyss.

So forget two weeks of quarantine: The first trip anywhere after this pandemic is going to require my immediate hospitalization upon arrival for nervous exhaustion.