The Worlds of J Matthew Root

Sad Ren Fair and Magical Tattoos – Dream Log: April 5, 2023

Driving some crappy old small car in terrible shape. Everything falling apart. Ripped seats. Crumbling old plastic dash board. Chipped black paint. Driving to some Ren fair / comic con thing. For some reason after taking forever to park the car in a tiny parking lot far from the fair I get out, rummage in the trunk for something and start to walk. Some forgotten small town somewhere. Everything is sad and run down. Like the town itself had simply given up. Most of the buildings look abandoned. The few other people walking to the fair around me are wearing various costumes- not terrible but far from good. Paper mache masks painted with colors that only seemed bright in contrast to the dim resignation all around us. I discover to my surprise and disappointment that my costume consists of a long dark coat, a tan fedora, dark circle sunglasses, a dirty old feather pillow and a short shovel. I have no idea why or what these items might refer to but its too late to go back to the car so I carry them awkwardly.

I follow the other people between the buildings to a back yard with a giant old tree and no more buildings beyond it. Seems this is a one street town.

The fair is on the side of a small hill running down from the tree and covered with bright green lush grass. Its starting to get humid and uncomfortable and the fair consists of about thirty people shuffling slowly past a few tables and chairs painted black with almost nothing on them. Just a few old worn paperback novels. I try to carry the pillow and shovel in a way that might seem like they mean something but quickly give up.

Driving back through roads in the woods- but now my Dad is driving and we keep going down incredible steep hills where the car almost tilts over- or at least should, but doesn’t. I’m facing the wrong way so I can’t see the road- just seeing the trees going by and feeling so off balance. He’s talking the whole time but I can’t follow what he’s saying.

Finally we skid to a stop and Dad gets out to go do something. As we stopped I could have sworn there was a beautiful girl lounging behind a fence that we almost crashed into and I turn around to look and find that she’s in the car with me. Sitting in the back seat unharmed and looking at her phone. Her pale skin is covered in amazing tattoos so detailed that they are basically impossible. Some of them move. Some of them have tiny carved wooden pieces incorporated into them that turn in impossible ways. She’s completely focused on reading something on her phone and barely looks at me but offers her leg so I can check out her tattoos. Running up her thigh is a tattooed line that turns into a long table of sorts with an assortment of amazing objects on it. Tiny ornate boxes and stars and puzzles. But they’re not tattooed. They are real, tiny, carved wood pieces somehow floating right where they should be to look like they’re on the tattooed table. I realize while I’m mystified by her tattoos that now some friends of hers are also in the car and it seems they want to go. I offer her my business card in case she could use any more artwork and in hopes of seeing her and her tattoos again. She takes it without looking at it and they all leave.

Airport Stopover Nightmare – Dream Log: May 7, 2023

They told to get off the plane during a stop at some New York airport and I ended up lost in a labyrinth of passageways. All dank and dark and not where I should have been. Back corridors painted dark gray floor to ceiling and looking like they almost never got cleaned. Sticky floors making crackling noises as I drag my luggage along with me. Slowly the halls got larger and more filled with random stuff. Boxes and bits of machinery sprinkled with random trash. Workers walk past completely ignoring my pleas for help. And then the walls disappeared as I entered a gigantic warehouse space. But it was far from open. Now the maze was made of stacked boxes and steel columns. I encounter two workers in bright red and black uniform shirts laughing and pushing a coworker into a box on the bottom of the stack. At first I think its just a joke until I notice that worker is not at all happy being shoved through the small hole in the stiff cardboard. Only his forearms and head sticking out as I turn away trying to find a way out and wondering how I ended up here. Hoping the workers don’t notice me. Trying to find my way back to the public part of the airport where I should be.

The warehouse turns into some kind of factory with vast processing going on. Choking on the hot dry air as I walk past piles of clothing on the floor organized into rows that look as though they’ve been vomited out of some machine. Colors matching for each wavy row but these are not new clothes. They’re old and worn. As I move on the rows of clothes become gray and I notice they’re not clothes anymore but bones organized by type. All becoming dusty and crumbly as they are slowly pushed along the floor by the rest being forced out of whatever distant machine was puking them up. Pelvises and skulls marching single file. Long bones looking like piles of sticks and gray sludge rivers of smaller bones all slowly pushing their way across the dark painted concrete floor. The room is huge and loud. Hot ash hanging in the still air. Machines rumbling and grinding. Workers yelling over them. The endless rhythm of hiss and thunk. Everything so dry and sterile. A processing plant for the dead. Bones and dust pushed by a long handled broom. Sounds of things being dumped into steel containers. How did I end up here?

And then- as if the death became too much- suddenly I’m outside. Surrounded by green. Bright fresh Spring leaves everywhere. Almost hiding the few buildings around. I’m not in a city. Some rural place in rolling hills all covered in green. The air is warm, humid and full of life. I so happy to be out of the hell factory but now I’m sure I’m going to miss my next flight. Still dragging my luggage along I travel down a road lined by ivy covered fences. Passing a couple walking a small dog who do not notice me at all but talk to each other in hushed voices. I keep moving. There must be a way back to the airport. Where am I? Down the road and now I’m on a path and the woods around me have become thick. Green light filtering in from above. I notice the weirdest shape in a small clearing in front of me. Gray and furry- like a long tail about two inches thick draped over a squared arch about shoulder high. Its got odd joints that don’t make sense and places where tufts of longer matted hair hang down. Almost like two very skinny legs connected by a length of tail. Bits where I can’t understand what is going on and then I see it is moving and feel it notice me. Wobbly and unsteady it moves towards me. One uncertain step at a time. I move onto a different path and it shambles past. Alone in the woods. The light from above dimming and it stops as if its looking at me but I can’t see a head or eyes. A few places might be ears sticking off it but I can’t tell. It just stands there- wobbling slightly as though its just as confused by me as I am by it. It made no noise and moved like a puppet suspended somehow from invisible strings up above. Eventually it started to move on and I almost tripped over my forgotten luggage. Did it look back? What part would do the looking? I’m never going to get back on the plane.