Strange Dream

I will start today by relaying what happened to start my day. I had a strange dream that thrust upon me many negative emotions and feeling type stuff. Let me set the scene from what I recall, its a room with long tables with chairs set up. Every chair has in front of it a white booklet on the table. It is an examination of knowledge for a group. The feeling initially was that this was a professional endeavour, but later it was mostly casual acquaintances who were present. There were TVs in the corners of the room with baseball highlights playing. It is here we begin:

Everyone filed in nervously and sat behind a paper booklet. I was one of the last ones in and had to sit at the back. I have no clue where we came from or any recall of the room outside of the TV suspended in the corner in front of me and the table directly in front of me, the rest is a blur. The table itself was white and felt like patio furniture. There were empty spots on either side of me, I think I was the only one at my table and one of two in my row, there was a girl sitting a few spots down to my left.

I must have been represented by my subconscious as a university age individual because the woman supervising us appeared to be in her late twenties and appeared older to me, like an authority figure, despite her lack of years, all things considered. We all had writing utensils and answer sheets that consisted of numbers beside a blank space. We were to read the question booklet and fill in the corresponding blank with the answer. I'm not sure if the TV played into the exam or it was just there but I know I kept referring to it. There were twenty questions and I seemed to be having no difficulty in answering them.

The lady with the authority was coming around and collecting the unused question booklets, which if I recall was common practice during such testing situations. She half smiled at me when she picked up the paper next to me and moved into the oblivion surrounding me. I began to become aware that there was a crowd gathering behind me with an air of anxious impatientness. I've been in this situation in reality where I am the last one writing and everyone wants to leave but I am holding them up. It makes me uncomfortable and anxious. I looked down at my sheet and only one blank space was staring up at me. I was on the final question. I began to relax and noticed the girl to my left was still there. She wrote something hurriedly and handed the paper to the passing adjudicator and joined the others at the back. Before I really saw her clearly, the woman in charge then descended upon me.

She asked me if I had much left, I said I was on the last one. She looked confused and asked me what question booklet I had, I replied it was here when I sat down. There had been no prior instruction, simply the command to begin so I had thought nothing of the questions. She snatched it from my grasp and examined the front of the booklet carefully as her brow knitted down into an expression of frustration and annoyance. She admonished me for having the Oilers version of the test when I should have been writing the Flames version! I told her I did what was given to me and she shuffled through papers and in her hands with a straight mouth, her lips pressed together in anger. I started to feel like I was in trouble, heat rising to my face like when you get pulled over by the police without doing anything wrong. Doubt begins to flood your mind and you scramble for an explanation to the situation you are seeing in front of you. I could hear the shuffling of feet behind me and hushed whispers floating through the mass.

The now furious lady beside me pulled out a mobile device and started writing an email, spelling out the contents for all to hear. She said I was a cheater and that "they" were going to hear about this. I again pleaded with her that I had simply done what was asked of me. My logic was sound and her case was imagined and at last something changed in her face and she acquiesced. She laid my answer paper back down, she had grabbed it off the table at some point that I don't recall, maybe when I was looking at the impatient gathering of my peers behind me? The paper was different now, scrunched up and damaged, not my clean, hand written answers any longer but an abomination of its former self. Only one blank looked back at me, number twenty. 

I asked for my question booklet back to finish the quiz. She laughed at me and said, "fat chance cheater" before walking away. How could I answer the question when I didn't know what the question was? Feelings overwhelmed me which I believe are akin to the ones in the common dream of showing up for a test and not knowing any of the answers. This was co-mingled with a strong feeling of frustration and anger. How was I a cheater? I started to get up to follow her to plead for the question page and renounce her stupidity when a firm hand pushed me back in my seat and said time is almost up. Panic gripped me now, what could I write, there was a sense that this one answer was laden with heavy importance. As if my very reputation or even life depended on it. I stared up at the TV screen, my eyes wouldn't focus and it appeared only as a window into a blurred world. I put my writing instrument down in defeat, shoulders dropped and I was allowed to stand. I got up and the crowd that had been behind me cowing me was just gone. 

I was suddenly outside on a large patio with many raised tables and umbrellas. I saw faces I recognized but couldn't name. The other writers of the test. They were in a jubilant and celebratory mood. I was crushed on the inside, wreaking of failure, a defeated soul. I slowly trudged into the mass. A particularly annoying person from my deep past suddenly appeared with a smile and asked how I did? I just brushed past her, looking for safety or comfort somewhere on this patio. Nothing was in sight, I doubled back down the next row of tables and saw somewhere that felt like I belonged.

Phil was there among some others, a chair was cleared for me, just before I said anything to him he pulled out a phone that was ringing cheerily. He answered and it was his uncle Al, he exclaimed that he's aced it and was very excited about everything as he trod off to find a more private setting to better participate in the conversation at hand. An older woman across from me that was like a real life version of Mallory Archer stared at me. She assured me it would be fine and I felt comforted in a very slight way. Still crushed down in spirit by the overwhelming weight of what had just befallen me. It was then that I simply woke up.

Weird dream eh? No real point to it, just a situation designed by my subconscious to make me feel certain unpleasant emotions. It was semi-lucid (hence the recall) so I was lucky enough to feel everything. I enjoy the experience and none of it has transferred over to reality that I can see but that sense of dread and doom I felt is concerning. Makes me wonder what the dream means? Do dreams have to have meaning assigned to them? Why don't you share your thoughts in the comments. Chances are it would just be me and you reading them. Anyways, time to really kick off the day.