what dreams may come.

Currently Listening To: Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground by The White Stripes

Swooning Over: Noble Sprayberry's article "Faith, Family and Football", an article in American Profile about QB Kurt Warner and his wife Brenda. The whole article is great. Love this part: "At the end of a line dance, they [Kurt and Brenda] danced the rest of the night together until Brenda dropped a bombshell as he walked her to her car. "Before you leave, I want you to know something," she said. "I'm divorced, and I have two kids." She assumed she would never see him again. Instead, Kurt showed up the next morning at her door holding a rose and ready to meet her children."

Happy Monday friends! :) I have several topics I hope to cram into this one post. I'll start with some funny.

I went to The Market this weekend. The Market is essentially a Farmer's Market - live music, tons of vendors selling produce, baked goods, art, jewelery, funnel cakes, and so on. After walking around for a bit, Chase and I sat down and listened to a bluegrass band play. At the same time Chase put his foot down on the ground, into a large puddle of water and said, "I really hope that's not dog pee," I noticed a very special vendor. As soon as I read their sign, I began rummaging for my phone mumbling, "Must blog. Must blog. Must blog." Can you read the banner?

They sell hamburgers, hot dogs, bbq ... and possum. Aside from that, err, oddity, The Market was so fun. I can't believe I haven't been before. The only sad thing is that so many people take their cute puffy dogs with them. My cute dog was at home.

Biscuit loves her family. Loves car rides. She's friendly with strangers. She's just so happy and hyper sometimes crowds send her into overdrive. She's also hit or miss with other dogs. And most people don't seem to like it if your dog growls at their dog. :) I'm still learning about her personality. We walk in the neighborhood and she does great (most likely because she's on a leash ... so I can pull her away from other dogs). But some dogs make her more snippy than others. No Market trips for Biscuit, but I don't think she minds.

Have I mentioned I'm smitten with my dog? I love her to pieces. Let us devote this portion of the blog to her cuteness. This first picture was taken last week. She was relaxing after a taxing day of chasing her tennis ball, chasing a yellow butterfly through the yard, and eating:

This next pic was taken last weekend, when my brother came over. Biscuit is wild about Chase. She seems to be especially crazy about sweet guys.* She always dances around until Chase picks her up and pets her. That weekend, she randomly tried to sit on his head:

My dad said, "Next time she does that, give her a treat."

Also this weekend, I put away the hot mess of a rough draft I've been working on (which shall henceforth be referred to as "The Thing") and went to see The Punch Brothers with my brother (whom I did not punch). The Punch Brothers were fantastic. Some background info: Nickel Creek is my favorite band ever of all time and always. As you might know, Nickel Creek is currently on a break** while all the members set out on new adventures. The Punch Brothers is the band where Chris Thile managed to land, mandolin in tow.

I shall take a girly moment and confess I have a little bit of a crush on Chris Thile (the spiky haired mandolin player in the video below). He has been a long time crush, actually. Even more than John Schneider, the original Bo Duke. Even more than Conan O'Brien. (Don't judge me.) Chris Thile is easy to gush over, don't you think? He acts nerdy, quirky, and funny. On Friday night, he was wearing black skinny jeans, a t-shirt, and a white jacket. He called his look "Brooklyn formal." So cute. Also, he's so talented it's just ridiculous. They are all talented. All those guys are amazing musicians in their own right, with or without Chris Thile. I can't even compare them to Nickel Creek and never felt the desire to. The vibe is totally different in a good way. The PB's mostly did their own music on Saturday night, as well as some new songs from a forthcoming CD. They also covered Radiohead, Ralph Stanley, The White Stripes and The Carter Family. One of my favorite things about bluegrass is how unpretentious it is. Every style fits. Everybody fits.

The concert was at Sewanee College, a little private school near Nashville. I had heard Sewanee was a beautiful campus. My brother says it was modeled after Oxford.*** Unless I'm mistaken (and I might be?), professors wear robes to class. (Robes like the professors at Oxford wear, not like bath robes.) That said, I was not expecting the campus to be so pretty. I went to a little private school too but it was not pretty like Sewanee. The only thing I remember about the church on my college campus is that the Jesus on the stained glass window looked like George Michael. The church on Sewanee's campus looks like a cathedral. Light was shimmering through all the stained glass when we walked past, landing in pretty broken patterns on the grass.

The full moon was also shining when we left the concert. Leaves were blowing across the sidewalks. Students were walking around, having brilliant conversations about whatever brilliant people talk about. The bells in the cathedral started ringing ...

... And when the bells started ringing my brother immediately started walking like the hunchback of Notre Dame. We are nothing if not classy. Did I mention my brother parked approximately one thousand miles from the auditorium? Even though there were parking places right up front? Why do guys do that?

Anyway. Beautiful school. Inspiring concert. When I see concerts like that, I always leave ready to write something beautiful. The Thing is not beautiful yet. It is the roughest rough draft I've ever written, but I'm having fun :)

Also this weekend, mom and I visited an apple farm. There is a bakery attached to this farm where they sell fried apple pies, apple fritters, apple cider doughnuts. It is an oasis of apple goodness. I bought a delicious treat that looked like a thick, long cigar. The outside was flaky pastry. The inside was full of apple filling and apple chunks. To say I inhaled my apple cigar would be an understatement. I will definitely be visiting again. They sell apple flavored slushies too but I wasn't brave enough to try one of those. Maybe next time.

We left the apple farm and wound up at a used book store. I bought a fairly new young adult fantasy novel that came out earlier this year. The author didn't have a website, but she did have a MySpace. On her MySpace, she says there are four people who frequent her dreams. One is an old woman who tells her what decision to make. One is an old man who burps and farts when she's making a bad decision (I'm not making this up). One is just a looming presence or something like that. And ... I don't remember the fourth. She dreams of all these people/things on a frequent basis. I've had a few recurring dreams in my time, but none that interesting.

For example, this weekend, I dreamed I was singing "Ice Ice Baby" with my two best friends at Pizza Hut.

I told my brother and he said, "That could easily happen." Sadly true.

Then he said, "You should write on your blog about the Big Lots dream."

So:

Once, I dreamed I saw Voldemort in Big Lots.

I walked in the store, rounded an aisle, and there stood He Who Shall Not Be Named buying Cheese Nips. Black robe and everything. It sounds funny in retrospect, but I ran out of the store. The dream ended then. I guess even The Dark Lord can't pass up a bargain.

The only recurring dreams I've had are truly bizarre. For awhile, I kept dreaming my teeth were falling out. Sometimes I dream I can't talk, especially when it's something important I'm trying to say.

Every now and then, I dream I'm running toward Westminster Abby (or some ginormous cathedral that looks like it). It's daylight and the world around me is quiet. I can't hear people, or traffic, or noise. All I can hear are leaves blowing. I'm walking really fast, trying to keep up with a group of people in front of me, trying to get to the doors before they close. Everything around me starts to get blurry around the edges, blurry and black and white, and rushed. I always get to the door just before it shuts and fall inside breathless. Then I wake up. This dream tends to come around whenever I'm dealing with major anxiety.

Incidentally, the dream reminds me of a summer I battled anxiety pretty hard core. I went to London in college and, from the minute I got there, I was paranoid about being left behind by the rest of my group. I was so focused on keeping up with them (I walk slow) that I missed out on many cool things. I thought if I lost the group, I would never find my way back to my flat. Eventually, that stupid relentless fear**** is what propelled me to head out alone in the city, go see some stuff I wanted to see. I got lost on purpose one day, then found my way back again. I survived.

It took my personal fear-induced daytrip to realize how limited my view of the city had been by following everybody else around. I stopped looking at the ground and started looking at the buildings. I started getting off at new tube stops, just to see where I ended up. I started going off by myself more and more and more. It was my first taste of freedom, in many ways, and I started thriving on it. By the last week, wandering around by myself was no big deal. On my last day, a lady stopped me in the street and asked for directions. I was able to give them. Somehow, while I was wandering around very aimlessly, I managed to look like I belonged. Funny how that works. Sometimes getting lost is a good thing.

I hope you find time to get lost this week. Hope you find something beautiful when you do :)

Have you ever had a recurring dream? Have you ever actually eaten possum? *shivers* BTW, if you saw Whip It this weekend, let me know your thoughts. I'm excited to see it.

* I realize the desire to make a pet/owner reference on this point might be easy, but please refrain ;)

** Some might actually say they are "broken up." I prefer to use the Ross & Rachel terminology because I like to think, deep down in my heart of hearts, Nickel Creek, much like Frosty the Snowman, will be back again someday.

*** Or Cambridge or something. I don't remember exactly what he told me.

**** A song called "For the Moments I Feel Faint" was also responsible. :)