The Shape of Days

This morning, just before waking, I dreamed that I was at the grand opening of a huge Chinese luxury hotel, a place with an atrium the size of an airplane hangar. In fact, now that I think of it, I think it might have been an airplane hangar.

I was there with a Chinese girl with pale blue eyes. I left her in the ballroom to go get drinks, and when I came back there was a note tacked to the floor telling me to come upstairs. I ran to the elevators, spontaneously naked for some reason, my hands cupped ineffectually around my goodies. The elevators were right by the front desk, where an inscrutable Chinese clerk glanced at me inscrutably. “Nice hotel,” I said in bad Chinese. He flicked his eyes in my direction and gave a microscopic nod. “Could use faster elevators,” I said, as I stabbed the button again.

At that point, my Ranger platoon walked by. They began to point and laugh, but then they saw my tags and I gave them a “Hooah” and everything was okay. “Ah, yes,” they seemed to conclude. “If a man is standing naked in a hotel lobby waiting for the elevator, it’s a comic incident worthy of ridicule. But if it’s a Ranger, he’s obviously doing it for some good reason, and he deserves our support.”

And that’s when my alarm went off and I woke up.

But what I really want to know is this: When did I start dreaming in wacky Hong Kong slapstick comedies?

• Observations for a Saturday morning in January
• Baste
• What should I write about?