Recurring Elephant Nightmare #3

As this is the third nightmare I've had (and remembered) about a rampaging elephant, I'm going to go ahead and call it a recurring theme.

In this dream, a mama elephant was stampeding through the neighborhood in Romeo where I grew up. She was looking for her lost babies, of which there were 4 or 5, all abnormally teeny for elephant babies. Mama was huge, probably an African Elephant due to her size, but even then on the large side. As in previous nightmares, I could feel the ground rumble at her approach before I heard her.

I was scrambling through the neighborhood looking for a subterranean nook in which to burrow so that I might avoid being flattened. I had determined that my parents' basement was not underground enough and was moving across Sisson in the direction of Croswell.

I ended up at my childhood friend Anna's house, trying to prepare their basement for the stampede with her mom. I kept changing my mind about where would be the safest place in their basement for me to be, and it always resulted in me running frantically around on the surface with my heart pounding.

Then, to my dismay, on one of these ventures to the surface I came across the wee elephant babes wandering around a field. I was suddenly conflicted, because I wanted to lead the babs back to their mama but there was no way I could do so without putting myself directly in the cross-hairs of the frantic behemoth, who would undoubtedly look upon me as a threat rather than an ally. To reunite the ele family would be to sacrifice myself under the mama's tremendous feet. And it would not necessarily save them, either, because as the rampage continued, police cars began showing up and I knew that even if I helped the babs back to their mama, she would not be allowed to live and would inevitably fall under the gunfire of an inept police force. She would die terrorized by humankind and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I tied the little ele babs loosely together with a long length of twine, like the way that preschool classes will walk through the hallway holding onto a rope to keep the kids all together. Holding one end of the twine, I started out towards North Salem Drive, the five little eles trailing behind me and trying to wander away. I woke up before Mama caught sight of me.

Shot

Another dream in which I am shot (or at least about to be). 

I had this dream shortly after the club shooting in Orlando in June 2016. I'm in a parking lot at night, having just left a venue. A dark-haired man shows up and I don't see the gun at first, but someone else does because they start screaming. I drop to the pavement between two cars in an attempt to hide. The gunman shoots two people, then somehow is right behind me. He drags me out into the middle of the parking lot so that everyone can see us. He has his arm around my throat and his gun is against my right eyebrow, the nose pointing down my face. I can hardly breathe, I'm so scared. I know there's no way that I'm going to get out of this alive so I'm just left in suspense, waiting for him to pull the trigger. I'm sobbing and begging and slobbering. I'm saying "Please, no, please," because I want him to turn the gun and shoot me in the temple, kill me quickly. I don't want him to shoot down my eyebrow because I'm afraid he's going to shoot my face off and I'll die slowly, drowning in my own blood. I don't remember what happened after that.

Nine White Horses

My friend Bel and I are sitting in the field behind my parents' house eating lunch. The weather is fair, there's no snow and it isn't cold but it isn't hot, either. Nine white horses trot out from the woods on either side of the field and group around us. Horses generally make me rather nervous and this is no exception, but I hold out the apple that I was in the middle of eating to the nearest horse and it eats it right out of my hand. Bel follows suit and we feed the remainder of our apples to the horses. The specificity of the dream - nine white horses - struck me as strange.