What woke me up at 3am with a headache and sent me stumbling downstairs in search of Cheez-Its and orange juice.

We were about to announce the candidate for new senior minister at church [which just happened in real life and I’m on the ministerial search committee so it was a big moment] and I was in the wrong room trying to finish writing the announcement. Also I realized I had a baby and had left him somewhere but I wasn’t sure where. Someone told me it was time so I ran into a room that looked like a high school gym, where people were crowded around a makeshift stage. I knew I was supposed to be on the stage with the rest of my committee, but none of them were there. Instead, a young Black guy wearing an outfit that was a cross between JROTC and marching band uniform was prancing across the stage with a fake rifle performing sort of a made-up color guard routine, but all by himself. A teenage girl with big black glasses and afro puffs was yelling at him that he was doing it all wrong and it was disrespectful. Then our interim senior minister Rev. Terasa, asked if there were any nominations for senior minister from the floor. I looked around, shocked, because this was not how it was supposed to happen. Suddenly the crowd included a bunch of kids from my high school. There were murmurs in the crowd and it was clear someone was coming up with a nomination from the floor. I was still stunned, trying to protest, but unable to get anyone to hear or pay attention to me. Then a young Asian man with wire-rimmed glasses bounced up to Rev. Terasa and handed her a piece of paper as he smiled at the crowd. Rev. Terasa look at the paper and shouted, “We have our nominee and it is Pete Buttigieg!” However, the person who then emerged from the crowd and started walking to the stage did not look like this:

The real Pete Buttigieg

He looked like this:

From Wikipedia: “Jefferson Davis “J.D.” Hogg, known as Boss Hogg, is a fictional character featured in the American television series The Dukes of Hazzard. He was the greedy, unethical commissioner of Hazzard County.”

I was mortified that this guy was apparently going to be our new minister, but everyone else was cheering wildly.

In the next scene of my dream, I was asleep in my childhood bedroom, but next to my mom. I woke up, having just heard that the new minister was going to be Pete Buttigieg/Boss Hogg. I muttered, “it’s not true, it can’t be true,” and my mom, even though she seemed to be still asleep, opened her eyes wide and hissed, “IT’S TRUE!” in a really scary way.

Across the bedroom my dad was slumped in a chair, fast asleep but still wearing a khaki suit and a red polka dot tie. I wondered where Zeke was, because he was supposed to be asleep in another bed in the room, but he wasn’t. I reached for a sweatshirt to put on because I was cold, but the shirts I kept trying to wear were Zeke’s pajama shirts. They didn’t fit.

I looked out the window and noticed that Zeke had climbed up to the height of the second story window by stepping on a tree and then onto some latticework or an arbor. He was sucking on a lollipop and wearing a baseball cap. I was alarmed. “It’s the middle of the night! Why are you outside climbing a tree?”

He looked at me and grinned slyly and said, “I have the day off tomorrow.” I ran downstairs and out the front door and retrieved him from the tree.

And then I woke up, head and heart both pounding, used the bathroom, and headed downstairs (in real life) for a snack. While writing this I have finished the box of Cheez-Its (it was almost empty anyway) and my glass of Tropicana (no pulp).

Yesterday a family member sent me this article from National Geographic explaining why people are having dreams like this during a pandemic. Apparently I’m not the only one and there’s science behind it all. But I really hope this isn’t going to be a recurring 3am activity for the rest of the quarantine. I really hope not.