What a frightening and vivid dream I had last night! So much terror and panic, yet tinged with a little bit of hope, the dream followed the typical scheme of my recurring nightmares, which I haven’t had in about two months, I’d guess. Yes, it’s a movie – or is it? – and I’m acting in it, and there’s no guarantee I won’t live to see the end credits, as a character or as a real human being.
Oh, dear.
This time it was the movie War of the Worlds, Spielberg version. Though nothing was the same as that movie. For one, it took place mostly at night, in a rural location. The tripods were dark, and to watch their massive black shapes against the night sky as they thunderously crashed through the forest was absolutely terrifying. And once they were atop you, as you crouched in the bush – do they see me or don’t they??? – silent save for the electronic whirr of those clawed tendrils, one thought and one thought only crosses your mind: do I run or do I stay hidden? Which way leads to certain death?
Instead of Tom Cruise, I was working with Tommy Lee Jones. Already, I felt much better. I realized we had a chance to make it out alive. There was a bunch of us, small-town locals, led by default by a flannel-shirted Tommy Lee, running from log cabins to shelled-out buildings on Main Street, such as the General Store and the church. There’d be a respite, we’d scratch our brains to form a plan, then scramble and hide as the tripods would appear out of the mist on the horizon, a few miles off, relentlessly thudding towards us to kill as many earthmen as possible.
The scariest part? We were meeting in that General Store. We thought we were safe; it was quiet, and the ground wasn’t vibrating from the heavy death machines. In the dark, ’cause no one dared light a candle (there was no power). Tommy Lee had us in a circle, he had a plan, or something, but like a typical protagonist he wasn’t revealing it to us in its fullness, keeping us and the audience from guessing. He came to me, about to explain my part, when – that hydraulic whine, at the window! Two bright lights, eyes somehow, flooded the store, exposing us all. It crashed through the windows, and all of us froze (do they see me or don’t they???)
The light device was connected to a tendril, and it snaked heavily into the room, zeroing in on the faces of each and every one there. It came up to me, inches away, right up to my eyes, and I saw something click in the light, and I knew my retinal pattern had been examined. It passed me by, passed Tommy Lee by, one by one all of us – and then it stopped at the old hippie character. And then I knew – he was caught. He was wanted. They knew about his rebel activities, somehow, and now the aliens had him dead to rights.
Would we all be killed, or spared? What would happen to the old hippie? It was all very tense. I am surprised I slept through the whole thing in real life. My heart must’ve been racing as if I was running the last quarter-mile of a 5K.
Old Hippie looked us all in the eye, one after the other, and I knew he was weighing a decision: Do I run and risk getting us all killed, or do I surrender quietly, to a sure death.
He surrendered, scared though dignified, walked slowly outside the store and allowed the tripod to seize him. We're spared as the tripod crashes away out into the darkness of the woods.
A day or two later, Tommy Lee’s had it. He has a plan, and I’m a part of it, though he doesn’t really tell me what’s happening. [By the way, before the Old Hippie scene and before this last one there’ve been many chases through the night, dodging fifty-foot tripods and razor-sharp tendrils, hiding under bushes as the monsters lumber by …]
It’s dusk now, darkness maybe a half-hour away. A chick we have as a spotter sees them first – three or four tower-high tripods materializing out of the haze. They’re shockingly near, and Tommy Lee, though he never panics, is moving us on sharply. The rest of the team gathers into their cars – they still run for some reason – and make off to “the old airport.” Tommy Lee tells me to do so, too, but I stay behind, watching, knowing I have a further role to play. Perhaps to save Tommy? What can he be up to? I see him rigging something up on the roof. He’s got ropes, winches, and whatnot, and inside the burnt-out log cabin below are a bunch of those 55-gallon drums. Gasoline? Kerosene? Something explosive? It’d better be. The tripods are closer – surely they see Tommy Lee on the roof. Is he goading them on, taunting them? What’s his plan? They’re closing in, and I’m out in the open, car idling, do I drive off or do I stay, and if I stay what do I do –
It’s 6:20 am, and my alarm goes off. Mozart’s clarinet concerto – one of the gentlest pieces of music to awaken to – jars me out of the dream, and I’m laying on the bed, heart still pounding, wondering whether Tommy Lee Jones made it out alive, and if not, how many of those damn monsters he took with him.
Oh, dear.
This time it was the movie War of the Worlds, Spielberg version. Though nothing was the same as that movie. For one, it took place mostly at night, in a rural location. The tripods were dark, and to watch their massive black shapes against the night sky as they thunderously crashed through the forest was absolutely terrifying. And once they were atop you, as you crouched in the bush – do they see me or don’t they??? – silent save for the electronic whirr of those clawed tendrils, one thought and one thought only crosses your mind: do I run or do I stay hidden? Which way leads to certain death?
Instead of Tom Cruise, I was working with Tommy Lee Jones. Already, I felt much better. I realized we had a chance to make it out alive. There was a bunch of us, small-town locals, led by default by a flannel-shirted Tommy Lee, running from log cabins to shelled-out buildings on Main Street, such as the General Store and the church. There’d be a respite, we’d scratch our brains to form a plan, then scramble and hide as the tripods would appear out of the mist on the horizon, a few miles off, relentlessly thudding towards us to kill as many earthmen as possible.
The scariest part? We were meeting in that General Store. We thought we were safe; it was quiet, and the ground wasn’t vibrating from the heavy death machines. In the dark, ’cause no one dared light a candle (there was no power). Tommy Lee had us in a circle, he had a plan, or something, but like a typical protagonist he wasn’t revealing it to us in its fullness, keeping us and the audience from guessing. He came to me, about to explain my part, when – that hydraulic whine, at the window! Two bright lights, eyes somehow, flooded the store, exposing us all. It crashed through the windows, and all of us froze (do they see me or don’t they???)
The light device was connected to a tendril, and it snaked heavily into the room, zeroing in on the faces of each and every one there. It came up to me, inches away, right up to my eyes, and I saw something click in the light, and I knew my retinal pattern had been examined. It passed me by, passed Tommy Lee by, one by one all of us – and then it stopped at the old hippie character. And then I knew – he was caught. He was wanted. They knew about his rebel activities, somehow, and now the aliens had him dead to rights.
Would we all be killed, or spared? What would happen to the old hippie? It was all very tense. I am surprised I slept through the whole thing in real life. My heart must’ve been racing as if I was running the last quarter-mile of a 5K.
Old Hippie looked us all in the eye, one after the other, and I knew he was weighing a decision: Do I run and risk getting us all killed, or do I surrender quietly, to a sure death.
He surrendered, scared though dignified, walked slowly outside the store and allowed the tripod to seize him. We're spared as the tripod crashes away out into the darkness of the woods.
A day or two later, Tommy Lee’s had it. He has a plan, and I’m a part of it, though he doesn’t really tell me what’s happening. [By the way, before the Old Hippie scene and before this last one there’ve been many chases through the night, dodging fifty-foot tripods and razor-sharp tendrils, hiding under bushes as the monsters lumber by …]
It’s dusk now, darkness maybe a half-hour away. A chick we have as a spotter sees them first – three or four tower-high tripods materializing out of the haze. They’re shockingly near, and Tommy Lee, though he never panics, is moving us on sharply. The rest of the team gathers into their cars – they still run for some reason – and make off to “the old airport.” Tommy Lee tells me to do so, too, but I stay behind, watching, knowing I have a further role to play. Perhaps to save Tommy? What can he be up to? I see him rigging something up on the roof. He’s got ropes, winches, and whatnot, and inside the burnt-out log cabin below are a bunch of those 55-gallon drums. Gasoline? Kerosene? Something explosive? It’d better be. The tripods are closer – surely they see Tommy Lee on the roof. Is he goading them on, taunting them? What’s his plan? They’re closing in, and I’m out in the open, car idling, do I drive off or do I stay, and if I stay what do I do –
It’s 6:20 am, and my alarm goes off. Mozart’s clarinet concerto – one of the gentlest pieces of music to awaken to – jars me out of the dream, and I’m laying on the bed, heart still pounding, wondering whether Tommy Lee Jones made it out alive, and if not, how many of those damn monsters he took with him.
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