Election Dreamscapes

2016: I’m awakened in the night by noises in my basement. I go downstairs and find a neighbor that I’ve feuded with over parking issues. He's standing beside an open door with tools in his hands, seems to be working on the door jamb. The doorway leads to the interior of his house. I ask, “What’s going on, what’s with the door?” “This door has always been here,” he says.

I know that I’ve killed a young black man. My sense is that the killing was justified, but know I’m being hunted. I’m at a large gathering in a ballroom. While standing behind a column, I hear people talking about the killing, unaware that the killer is in their midst. I walk out a side door into a rainy urban night, walk the streets and come to a parking lot. People are leaving; several motorists are backing up and heading for the exit. I’m looking for my car. An old girlfriend, a stanch progressive, materializes out of a dark alcove and points towards a car. It’s my car.

I’m sitting in a crowded bar downtown watching the election returns come in. It’s not going well for Trump. I notice that actress and comedian Sandra Bernhard is sitting at the table next to mine. She’s happy, and I comport myself like a professional, to show her that I can handle the distressing returns. In the next moment I’m in another room having sex with Bernhard. At the pinnacle of arousal, comedian Bill Maher walks in with an election update. While he talks, I feel that I am losing my erection. Maher and Bernhard go into another room to talk, I can hear their murmurs. She comes back, willing to continue, and I find my rhythm again.  

2020: My wife and I have rented a luxury sedan, and are preparing for a couples’ road trip with Joe and Jill Biden. I’m driving; she’s in the passenger seat. We pick Joe and Jill up, and they get in. The mood’s amiable, but there’s one more person we need to pick up. The place the person will be is the garage where I take my car for repairs. I pull into the parking lot and leave my wife, Jill, and Joe waiting while I go in to get the person who will travel with us. Inside the garage it’s noisy. I start to feel desperate that I won’t find the person I’m looking for. As I look in various stalls and bays, my sense is that the mechanics are amused, saying, “Looks like the big mucky-muck guest is a no-show.” Then I notice a closed office door. The door opens and out comes my conservative former brother-in-law. On the way out to the car I tell him, “Look, we’ve got to be respectful, we’re going to be riding with possibly the next president of the United States.”

He assures me that he will be respectful, but after we walk out of the garage and into sunlight, I turn and see that my former brother-in-law has morphed into President Donald Trump, dressed in his blue suit with a red tie. I’m elated. As we walk out to the car Trump says, as an aside, “I’ve got a woman flying in, so we’ll have to be back here at…” Once we get to the rented car, I see that Joe has moved into the driver’s seat, and Jill’s in the passenger seat. My wife has moved to the back seat. Joe has his arm slung over the steering wheel and a big smile on his face. As the dream ends, I’m not sure where Trump and I should sit.

2024: I’m with a group of people attempting to hide from an advancing hostile army. We climb on the roof of a small outbuilding, but soon realize we can be seen from there, and so climb down and enter the building. While looking for places to hide, a soldier enters, dressed in a World War II-era Soviet officers uniform.

“I can help you,” he says. He orders us down a long concrete pathway to where other people are assembled.

“May I ask a question?” I say. He nods. A woman’s voice speaks, but I realize it’s my voice.

“Do you have any work for us?”