I was on the beach with some people, and suddenly we had this crazy idea to put someone in a huge basket that hung from the sky (it was like a hot-air balloon basket except no balloon) and slingshot her. I volunteered to do the pulling. Now we were apparently in Manila Bay, although it wasn't dirty or anything. I pulled the basket so far that when I let go, I was in the water in what seemed like Batangas.
I was pretty near the shore so I swam towards it. On the way I saw lots of what looked like whales swimming underneath the water. It must have been late afternoon by this point, and the sunlight was getting softer and softer. Sadly, as I got closer to shore I discovered that the entire shoreline had been fenced off, with signs saying something like it was a private beach. Oddly, as I tracked the shore hoping to find an opening (I think I was getting tired of treading water—I've never been good at it IRL), I came across two or three groups of people (also in twos or threes) enjoying themselves.
When I came across the third group of strangers, I decided to ask for directions. "Excuse me, do you know where I can find some place to land?" I asked them.
They told me I shouldn't be landing there, and invited me to follow them as they swam back to Manila instead. I agreed. But first we made a stop at an unfenced area of the shoreline. It looked like a deserted resort that had lay untouched for decades. I can't remember what we did there anymore, but I do remember that when we headed back to the waterline to prepare to dive back in and swim for Manila it was already sunset. For some reason—perhaps this is the way my poor Geography skills manifest themselves in my subconscious—the sunset was behind us, and Manila was directly across the water. Light was falling very fast so I pulled my phone out quickly to take a picture, but because my phone had apparently been in my pocket the entire time, it couldn't take a photo, although I was able to open the Camera app just fine.
A minute later I invited them to jump in the water so we could head back. By this time it was completely dark (yes, time was moving faster than usual). They told me we didn't need to swim back, and pointed me instead to what looked like a narrow man-made concrete land bridge. There were four of us, and I was the second person to get on the bridge, which wasn't even one foot wide when it started so we had to do a kind of balancing act to get across.
The bridge widened as it went on, although not in the sense that the concrete became wider—it just turned into a series of fabricated pipes welded two pipes wide so that we didn't have to worry so much about balance so much. It looked like an elaborate set of monkey bars. It widened for a reason: so we could stop and make way for people coming from Manila who were using the bridge to reach the other side. (I can't describe the bridge accurately now. Perhaps later I'll add a drawing, or update this description.)
The bridge terminated at a funny-looking metal porthole, and we got in. Apparently it was a plane, and we walked up front. The plane's actual passengers were separated from us stowaways by a metal mesh fence. The people seated in the rearmost row looked familiar to me. They were Katz's sisters—and she and her parents were seated in the row in front of them. I said hi and asked them what they were doing there.
I woke up with a smile, one minute before my alarm went off. I still smile now as I recall it, and I'm writing it down because if I don't I'll forget it soon enough.
I think I liked this dream because I've always been a sucker for small, remote, isolated places like the fenced-off beach I found myself in. That plus the awesome feeling of late afternoon sunlight. And going places with strangers for a little while. And then making my way safely back to normal life.
Maybe I need to get away.
(Photo from Flickr/Jonathan Castillo.)
