Michelle's House of Horrors

Never risking anything meant never having or doing or being anything either. Life is risk, it turned out.
–Lev Grossman/The Magician’s Land

Yesterday: Isolation tank float
Today: Balloon float

Now I just need to have a rootbeer float or go on a river float to complete a trifecta of floats.

OH! I just remembered that tomorrow I am making a float in glass blowing class.

I didn’t really set out to do that. Serendipity.

So, how was it?
Compared to a helicopter flight into a volcano on Kauai? A little tame.
Still. A whole lot of fun, and I didn’t have to go all the way to Hawaii. The people at Vista were pretty awesome. All volunteers, aside from the pilots. Friendly, helpful, all having a great time.

It was surprised by how still the air was. Of course, that’s obvious in retrospect–the balloon moves with the wind, so there wouldn’t be much sensation of windiness. Plus, balloons don’t go up if it’s windy at all. Too dangerous.

I didn’t realize just how much improvisation is involved in piloting a balloon. They really can’t set out in a specific direction. They can go up and down by heating the air more or releasing air, and they can rotate the entire balloon by opening vents to one side or the other–but they have no directional control at all. They are completely at the mercy of the wind. They land in whatever field happens to be nearby and friendly to balloonists, and were calling ahead to the farmhouses to let folks know there was a landing coming. They pay the landowners in balloon rides.

And guess what? Even though I went alone, I talked to people. A little. Hey, I am still me. I didn’t do a standup routine. I didn’t dazzle anyone with my charm. Do I even have any charm? I wonder. I did manage to sit at a table with other people and chat with them like a civilized human being instead of just getting in my car and leaving as soon as we got back on the ground. And it wasn’t just because I wanted a mimosa, either.

Risky behavior for me.

It was a typical Oregon day: gray. It wasn’t supposed to rain, but a few drops came down during the flight. It never rained hard enough to deter Oregonians from their recreational duties. We are a rain-resistant lot.

To summarize: the only downside to the day was that it started at the unholy hour of 0430. I would have an easier time staying up that late than I did getting up. Nice people. A gorgeous ride. Pretty scenery.

And it’s not over yet–tonight I get to up to Tequila Hill. That may not be a positive for them, because this time I am cooking.

Update: dinner was good. I made chelo kebab. Persian food. It even turned out well.

We all put on some lotion after dinner because we had dry knees. Per Maliya. Then Rick and Maliya jumped rope. We smoked some hookah. We drank some cider. We drank some wine. The usual.

On the way out Chelle reminded me to have fun glass blowing, and it hit me. That is another activity involving fire. I am scared of fire. She pointed out that I am facing my fears, and that is a good thing.

I guess maybe I am, although I did make Rick grill the meat. Cooking over flames is still not something I am comfortable with.

So I keep thinking, and I do NOT know why, “got joie de vivre?”
And the answer is “hell, yeah!”

Life is good.

In the dream, someone was trying to kill me, but at first I thought they were trying to kill other people. In big, dramatic ways. Explosions. Mass gunfire. Cars driving into crowds.

In trying to figure out who was creating the mayhem, because to me it seemed like calculated mayhem, I started to believe that a particular person was the target. Then that person died in one of the explosions, and the incidents kept happening. Fires. Building implosions. Helicopters with rocket launchers.

Someone recently said I have a flair for the dramatic. In my dreams I definitely do.

At a certain point, I figured out that they were trying to get me. In running through a burning building looking for a place to hide, I ended up in Stewart’s apartment. Never mind that he lives in a house. Never mind that there was no reason he would still be inside a burning building instead of running away like everyone else. Never mind that it would be more logical to get out of the burning building myself. Never mind that when I opened the door I had no idea he was inside. It was a dream.

Dream logic is a whole separate thing. Sort of like my own logic.

Stewart said I could hide at his place, even though I thought it might put him at risk. He also helped me figure out that the person I thought was helping me was the one who was after me.

It never occurred to me to wonder why it was so important for someone to hurt me that they were willing to kill dozens or hundreds of other people while they were trying.

It often occurs to me why anyone would want to hurt anyone on purpose.

I fell asleep on Stewart’s bed. I woke up during the night and he was awake, arms around me, watching the door, stroking my hair.

I felt safe. Calm.

In the morning, we talked about what to do, and in talking it over again, we realized that we’d been wrong the night before. There was a nurse I used to work with who was on a rampage. Then there was a knock on the wall, which was like a garage door. Someone forced it open a crack and threw in some sort of incendiary device. We crawled under the mattress, and were safe when it exploded.

Well, I think we were. The explosion woke me up.
I suppose it’s possible that I am actually dead. I am probably not going to continue the blog after I’m dead though.

It was comforting to know that someone was protecting me in my sleep…

It’s funny how small a gesture it takes comfort someone, and how often people choose to hurt them instead.