Bacon Killer

I had a dream about a week ago that I must write down. I figured my blog would be a good place since I haven't posted in it in FOREVER (my mom still faithfully checks it though, bless her), and the only other option is my journal which would require many pages.

Before I launch into the actual dream, I have to preface it with a real-life short story because without this, the dream makes even less sense, if that is possible.

Last Sunday, a couple of guys from my ward invited my roommates and I over for lunch, followed by, "You can come help make it if you want!" Not really about what we wanted after that, but we liked the guys, so we were willing to help out. The chef will remain unnamed because, though I am sure he will not ever read this post, my luck has ALWAYS been that when I talk about someone, they hear about it. I would hate to be even grapevine responsible for his next girlfriend or fiance losing faith in his cooking abilities, so we will kindly call him Bob.

The menu included fancy eggs over rice, bacon, and orange juice with cinnamon rolls for dessert (The orange juice was not under the eggs, but in a glass). I chopped peppers and cried over the onions that Bob chopped and then hovered over Bob while he sauted them both. At some point, I noticed that the microwave was running, so I glanced inside. To my horror, the slowly nuking content was BACON. I think I said something subtle, like "Uh, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?"

Bob said, "Speeding things up."

I think I just stared at him, open mouthed. Then I snatched his man card out of his hand and launched into a speech about how NO ONE microwaves bacon, how nasty microwaves make everything taste, and how NO ONE microwaves bacon. Then I sprang over to the microwave and punched the off button with the air of one saving a child from eating drain-o.

I said, "I will cook it, it won't take long!"

About then, I looked down at Bob's man card in my hand and when I realized it was pretty much shredded, I tried something super lame, like, "But we can totally microwave it if you want..."

That is really all you need to know from that incident to understand the dream. Let me just say that to Bob's credit, he still fed me that delicious meal. Good thing I have some time before I get married to a man to practice treating man cards with more respect.

SO! The dream.

The setting was a family reunion with my Papa's side. It began with some kind of competition between all the girl cousins my age while the rest of the family acted as audience, key members being the judges. For one of the tasks, we were on stage and our goal was to pretend to be pregnant and be exceptionally funny. I did my best. I thought my performance was really good, but everyone cheered a great deal for one of my cousins which I thougth wasn't very fair considering she has actually been pregnant.

The next task was to ride a horse around an indoor arena. One at a time, my cousins took their turn in the arena while the rest of us waited on stage. Finally, it was my turn. I approached the gate to the arena and spoke with the horse woman standing there. She informed me that I had to wait because the horses had to "warm up." So, I peered into the arena. Apparently, the warm up involved both horses pulling a big rake through waist high sand. The horses were also as high as my waist, so you can imagine this was quite the task for them.

I didn't want to offend the women, who was obviously a professional, so I said, "Wow, that's... impressive." She looked at me seriously and said proudly, "My horses are very strong."

The wait dragged on and on, so I turned away from the arena and there stood Jon Jon, a friend of mine from Anasazi who had recently gotten married. He looked like he was on death's door... sickly, skinny, pale. He was even balding.

I said, "Hi Jon... uh, how's it going?"

He sighed and said, "Oh man, Kathryn. Marriage is way harder than I thought it would be. There just isn't enough food. Ever."

I can't remember what I said, probably something compassionate. It seemed to me that this encounter had taken about 20 minutes, though, so I was anxious to see if it was my turn in the horse arena yet. I turned back to the gate and the whole scene inside had changed.

There were no horses in sight, the arena floor had been covered in fake green grass and there were lots of booths set up with flowers all around them. All the family was inside, milling about. I got the feeling that I wasn't going to get my turn on the horse and I was getting pretty frustrated.

I went inside and found my cousin sitting on the grass doing a craft. She wouldn't look at me as I approached. I could tell she was super upset.

"Hey, cousin. I feel like something happened, like you are upset about something. I dont' really know what it is, though...."

Finally, she glared up at me and said pointedly, "Oh. You know."

I just stood there gaping at her. I opened my mouth to say something else to her and one of my aunts pulled me aside and said, "You really don't know why she is upset?"

I shrugged with wide-eyed frustration.

She looked at me with pity and said, patting my arm, "It was the bacon."

Something in me sank deep into the pit of my stomache. It was the feeling of being caught enslaved by my past. I made my way back outside the arena. I was surprised to find Jon Jon still there. Always a pal for listening to my venting, Jon stood there looking sickly while I started to complain about how upset my cousin was and how unjust it all was when suddenly I stopped and stared at him. "Wait... I WASN'T THE ONE WHO MICROWAVED THE BACON." Jon looked bewildered and I turned on my heel to go back into the arena and redeem myself.

And then I woke up.

Bottom line. Don't microwave bacon. You will have nightmares about it.