I am having nightmares again. Car crash dreams, to be specific. The most recent one featured me driving along in my car with the kids when suddenly the road pleated in front of me. There was a white picket fence to the left of me, where the parking lot maitre d’ stood in his Sergeant Pepper’s braided uniform, disapproving of me. To the right, the road fell away down a steep embankment. Naturally, that was where the car went. I was thrown out of the car and saw the sky behind my legs in their jeans before I plummeted to the ground. I was covered in dirt and leaves and blood. Everything I had hurt. And I was afraid to look into the car to see what happened to the kids. I dialed Brent on my phone, which was suddenly made of flesh instead of plastic and metal. He answered, knew it was me, and hung up. I was trying to dial again, hoping it had been some kind of horrible mistake, the fleshy phone hiding the buttons under folds of skin, everything bloody and miserable and frightening, when I woke up.

So. I don’t particularly enjoy driving under normal circumstances. I am beginning to be afraid of it entirely. The helpful online Dream Doctor says, “Dreams of car accidents, as a rule, should not be considered literally precognitive,” but you can never be too careful. Besides, my unconscious probably knows more than I do.

Which means, since I object to living life in fear, that I get to drive anyway. (Syd and T.R., were they reading this, would roll their eyes. They would point out that I really don’t have a lot of choice about the driving thing since they go to school so darn far away. Yeah, well. Sometimes necessity is useful.) Think good thoughts for me and the other crazies on the road.