Sandman's in Gainesville

[I'm sitting in the middle of the front seat of a police car, with an officer on my left]

What happened to my car? You say it's all right, you have it, good... Yes officer, I was going on a pleasant bicycle ride when I stopped at this very same fast-food restaurant we're outside of now, by the road in front of Wal-Mart.

[I reach up and tap the wooden outer wall of the restaurant with my hand]

I just wanted to read my book that I had carried with me and have a drink and a small meal. But the power went out and the woman behind the counter refused to take my order. I angrily walked out of the place, got back on my bicycle, and pedaled north. It was a good ride, and I knew that there were some good places further north (including that wonderful Mister Donut by Publix at the far north side of town on this road).

[At this statement the police officer seems interested and begins to write something down]

Well, after a short while, I made it to Wal-Mart and chained my bike. It was then that I noticed that my book was gone! It must have fallen off my bicycle while I was riding it. Now I had to backtrack and see if I could find it. I weighed in my mind the importance of the book: it was for school, but it could be replaced. Still, I thought I might be able to retrieve it if I saw it along the road. So I unchained my bicycle and got back on it, heading back south. As a drove down the road, I realized that I wouldn't be able to see something as small as a book from my side of the street. So I stepped out of my grey Dodge Spirit and walked across the street to a place where I had just a few minutes earlier ridden my bicycle. Then I suddenly thought Oh, no, what about my car! I looked up and thought I saw it slowly drifting driverless back into the road. I did a double take and it had completely disappeared. And then I collapsed and everything went black. The next thing I remember, I'm sitting here next to you relaying this story.

[At this point it hits me: I was already at Wal-Mart, and then rode my bicycle a short ways to...the same Wal-Mart. And...wait, how could I have had a car when I was riding a bicycle, and...]
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And now I come to the point when I describe events from the viewpoint of a person awakening from a dream. The incongruities and contradictions revealed themselves one-by-one, and at the end, when I was finally completely awake, I arrived at an interesting insight.

I have a "dream memory" whereby, only while dreaming, I access memories from previous dreams and incorporate them into my ongoing experience. I had walked/run northward down the same stretch of road that I rode my bike on after first leaving that restaurant. But in other dreams, that stretch was several blocks south of Wal-Mart. So I naturally ended that ride at--Wal-Mart again! The doughnut shop by Publix? Completely nonexistent, except in previous dreams (I even worked there once in one). Although, come to think of it, just recently a new Dunkin Donuts was opened near a Publix in the same general area (but on the other side of the street). The quantum jump from bicycle to car is a typical feature of a dream, but while dreaming, my ability to think critically is severely diminished and I didn't notice this at the time. Also, the act of reaching up and tapping the outer wall of a building while sitting in the middle of a police squad car should have given this away as a dream. And--wait--if I had collapsed like that, why was I there like that in a police car instead of the hospital?

Maybe this dream narrative stuff sounds a little offbeat and irrelevant. But it was something to me; I guess you just would have had to have been there (inside my brain).