Sixty-One: Nothing a Pair of New Shoes Can't Fix

It begins in a public bathroom, as dreams tend to do. And it's a busy bathroom, as dream bathrooms usually are. The difference this time is that I actually get my own stall for privacy ... although there is no wall on one side of the stall and if you sit just-so you can be seen in a mirror over the sink. Why do I need privacy? Well, there are the obvious reasons, but it's also because I'm being stalked by Stanley Tucci.

We're supposed to get married, but I know he's working for the bad guys [not Nazis this time, but something more like bad spies, like the agents of SMERSH in the Bond books/films]. Wanting no part of that, I sneak out the back (Stanley is out front; I can see his shadow on the door) and run across a field in the direction of the airport. [which airport? no idea.]

Halfway through the grass I see a very young ["Rawhide"-young] Clint Eastwood sitting in the driver's seat of an old red pickup truck. I get a psychic flash and yell at Clint to run for it. He decides to trust me and we both sprint for the creek [there's a creek ... because there's a meadow, there's naturally a creek] as the truck explodes.

"Thanks," he says. "You're the psychic."

Yes, it's true. I'm "the" psychic, which is why Stanley, who now comes on the scene, wants to marry me. I guess it's his mission or something.

"This is only temporary," he tells Clint. "Your days are numbered." And then he adds: "She's with me. Come on, my mother is waiting."

"I don't think so," says Clint. "She's coming with me." He grabs me hand and we run toward the hills, away from the airport, from Stanley, from his mother ... all the way until we reach the outskirts of a small city where we stop. "Do you know this place?" he asks me.

I want to say it's West Covina ... or Brea ... or one of those inland cities of Southern California, but I'm not sure. The good news is there's a shopping mall that I recognize from previous dreams.

We'll be safe here, I tell him. I know for a fact they have a large atrium court with a great micro-brew bar, and the largest, single-story JC Penney ever put on a dream map. Oh yes, I tell him [and he's got to trust me, because I'm THE psychic]. We'll definitely be safe here.