DREAMLAND

Even My Dreams Are Political

By Vincent Romano

9/3/97: I was hanging out in a department store with a friend, who suggested to me that even though the Pentagon seemed like an impenetrable fortress, it could be disrupted in a small way. I went there and, after walking through the front doors, placed an obstacle in the floor to block the passage and escaped through the bathroom window. It only cost $40 to remove, but the guards got really angry and pursued me.

After hiding under a counter at the department store, I went home but had to stay on the run. They followed me up and down the hills, and I lost them by hiding behind a car in my neighbor's driveway. Then I went to a concert and used the crowd to hide. They found me and I bolted out the back steps, with the agents just five feet behind.

Finally, I found myself in a large field where thousands of citizens had assembled The U.S. tyrant called for me to come forward, as it would be much easier for me if I would just surrender to the FBI. I thought I'd have a better chance of evading detection by standing near the dictator, because they wouldn't look for me that close to him. It was very stressful to creep toward him, because I'd been on the run for a week, feeling alone and hounded and disbelieving that they'd be driven into such a ferocious frenzy over what was hardly more than a prank. Yet I was glad that my demonstration of defiance had achieved something!

12/28/97: I had a powerful visual of my own knee decomposing, cracking and falling to shreds.

12/20/97: Claire reported that I was talking in my sleep: "What's the problem?" I yelled. "What?" Claire said. "Do you have a heart condition?" I inquired. "Yes," Claire said. I paused and replied, "Is it an issue of priorities?"

1/15/98: I was concealed and looking at a small regiment of troops in a southern Mexican hamlet. They had captured a similarly sized group of Zapatista rebels, who were standing in a river up to their waist. Instead of shooting them outright or telling them to surrender their weapons, the Mexican Army soldiers trained their guns on them in silence.

There were five lines of Zapatistas. The first walked forward three paces, then turned to face the second line, and at the Army captain's count of three, they fired point blank at their comrades in a grisly, forced, mass double suicide. This repeated itself with the third and fourth lines, and then the army soldiers simply chased down the fifth line of Zapatistas in the water themselves.

I was horrified and sick to my stomach, feeling as if I'd just witnessed a war crime that might have happened or even was happening concurrently. As they did this, I observed a bald, bearded British man rationalize this proceeding: "Our violence is as the violence within our families, our nation, our world and the universe."

2/8/98 A group of Beverly Hills 90210-type rich kids attending a high school in southern California agreed on (or imposed) a game among themselves that allowed three strikes, anyone could attack you at any time, but it had to be done in a creative way.

They all got on a bus and drove to a club in Nevada they had rented for the weekend. One guy walked into a chimney-like rock chasm and had a rock dropped on his head. A fat kid was surrounded by three others in a swimming pool and didn't answer their question to their satisfaction, so they drowned him. A nerdy guy was asked what year his tie was made; he said 1929, but the correct answer was the 19th century, so they stapled him to a bulletin board in a hallway and sliced his throat.

The bus was half-full on the ride back to California, and an adult chaperone wondered where the rest were. The kids gave a glib response, and she remarked, "It's so wonderful that you all are so close as a class and stick together." As I began to gain some consciousness, I semi-realized this was a dream and thought to myself, "Look at these fucking rich kids. They have nothing to do, so these are the things they do to fill their time."

2/14/98: U.S. Secretary of Defense William Cohen was visiting a U.S. aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf, trying to keep the soldiers pepped and motivated. However, they were getting the idea that the United States wasn't going to attack Iraq, due to new diplomatic initiatives. One seaman confided to Cohen that if there was no strike by the next day, he and others might desert. [I have no idea how one might do this on an aircraft carrier.] Cohen had told the men about the seeds of peace that were in the works, but was trying to keep them ready anyway.

After that conversation, Cohen addressed the crew in a grand speech: He was convinced the bombing should begin right away! The men hurrahed and busied themselves for the attack.

Observing this, I felt sorrow and sought to explain the hypocrisy of the U.S. position to the seaman, but they couldn't hear me.

7/13/98: I was attending the wedding of two of my friends. In the middle of the exchange of vows, the priest turned to a large video screen mounted in the wall. Before he would consecrate the two, he indicated that their vows would have to include assents to the value of U.S. nuclear weapons, and proceeded to run propaganda films. I wanted to object from where I sat in the back, but was silent, and walked out of the church in disgust.

9/7/98: I happened to be aboard "Navy One" (a submarine version of Air Force One) with Bill Clinton, who had just become the last President of the Unites States by authorizing a full nuclear response to a Russian threat. The danger had been imagined, but it did trigger a massive Russian counterattack that wiped out the USA. Three times I asked him why he did it; Clinton only responded by shrugging his shoulders and saying he had to do it.

The sub surfaced some time after the dust had settled and came to inspect a coastline. I observed how the land was ravaged, and then wept to see Claire's corpse float past the porthole. However, some ditzy women on board (for Presidential entertainment?) didn't comprehend the danger, because Clinton had never explained to them the reality of what he did. They giddily moved to open the door, and both Clinton and I screamed, "No, don't!" They ignored us, thus breaking the sub's seal of protection and allowing radiation to enter. Bill and I looked glumly at each other, realizing that the end was now complete. The ignorance he had fostered now came back to haunt him finally, invalidating this last privilege of his office ‹ the safety of the boat.

9/7/98: A large number of children were marching with protest signs. Suddenly, police swarmed around their line and began beating them mercilessly. I watched helplessly from the sidewalk, nauseous.

9/19/98: The end of the world was imminent because of the Y2K bug, so everyone was preparing. I was in Rome watching people hoist giant glass jars, about six feet tall, three feet in diameter and filled with lemonade, over the walls of the Colosseum.

The streets suddenly were filled with ferocious, oversized black dogs that raced toward the people. They stopped their advance, but remained poised to attack. One group, rushing their effort to move the lemonade, gave a one-two-three heave and tossed the jar to another group on the wall above. They caught it, but gravity snatched its awkward weight out of their hands and it shattered into a thousand pieces on the ground ‹ a piercing sound in a vacuum of tense silence.

As if a spell over the dogs was released, they snapped awake and began to ravage the area, while people fled in every direction. I scrambled behind a column in fear for my life.

11/6/99: I was in Iraq with Voices of the Wilderness folks and met with Saddam Hussein. I never spoke anything from my conscience to him, and was ashamed after we left.

1/24/00: Phil Anselmo (lead singer of Pantera) stood in front of a garden and shouted into his microphone, "How many of you vegetables want to see PANTERA?!" Rows of pumpkins and tomatoes bounced up and down in supplication and approval. All the veggies had little faces on their skin. "What about you cucumbers?" he growled, and they leaped too!

5/14/00: Future humans took me and others to the end of time to study us. They wanted to observe our reactions so they could build better spaceships.

6/6/00: The World Bank was in White Plains, and someone blew it up. Unfortunately, I was nearby, and seven of my teeth were knocked out. They were hanging on a string from my gums and would grind every time I closed my mouth. It was horrendously painful and I could feel it quite viscerally. I woke up feeling as ill as if it were real.

6/9/00: Claire and I were hanging around a Björk concert at a club, and Claire spotted signs that Björk was still present the next day. We went to the back of the theater and knocked. Björk opened it and let us in, no problem, and sat us at a round table with a checkered cloth in a loft of the club. While she ate, we chatted.

The three of us left to walk around the city. We met up with Claire's brother, who was going to witness New York State's mass execution of 17 people, but we boycotted it. Claire's parents drove up and took us around, and I showed them the house in which I grew up. Björk kissed me on the cheek.

1/25/01: I observed a man building a statue out of cinnamon raisin buns to impress girls.

2/28/01: Claire reported my unconscious outburst: "Which Jew was it?" I repeated this, paused, then yelled the answer to my own question (?): "Jesus Christ!"

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Reprinted from OFF-Line #20, Spring 2002. States the editor's note: "OFF-Line is free, like all things should be, but we accept donations gratefully. Comments, submissions, angry threats: Claire E. Cocco and Vincent J. Romano, 35 Barker Avenue #4G, White Plains, NY 10601."