This morning I awoke at 4:00 from a horrible -- and all too real -- dream. I suppose it wasn't all that horrible, but it was disconcerting and it's stuck with me all day. I had a baby, a boy I think. I was with my parents (not my "real-life" parents, my dream parents) and we were shopping. Suddenly I started having severe abdominal pain. The closest store was a K-Mart (of all places!) and we went inside. I realized I was giving birth, but what came out didn't seem like a baby, so I wrapped it in a shirt and put it in a bin. Then I had second thoughts; I unwrapped the shirt and sure enough there was a baby inside. I was afraid to lift it (him?) because it seemed so scrawny and fragile. My parents were very supportive and helped get some baby clothes and gear, and we headed home. By then the baby had plumped up a bit and looked much healthier.
Just a few minutes after we got home (again, not my "real-life" home, much more rustic than mine), a lady knocked at the door and came in. She wanted to know how many kids I had. I didn't know what to say! I kept thinking how ridiculous it was that my other kids were 35, 27, and 23 and I'd just had a baby. It turned out the woman was offering me a job with the US Marshalls. Around that time, I started to think it would be a good idea to get myself and the baby checked out at the hospital -- and get a birth certificate. The last thing I remember, just before I awoke, was trying to find something to dress the baby in and talking my father into taking a different car to the hospital. (We had been out earlier in a pick-up truck, and it had been very painful getting in and out!) And then I woke up.
I'm not sure why this is bothering me. It was just a dream, after all. But it was so real that I couldn't decide, when I woke up, whether I was relieved or disappointed that I hadn't actually had a baby. I was just starting to warm up to the idea.
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