THAT DAY

I'm reading Walter de la Mare's Desert Islands. All through childhood he had recurring dreams of another life, as an adult with a different language and culture. Weird!

Slings & Arrows: Canadian TV series. The director of a regional Shakespeare theater gets haunted by the theater's last director--or hallucinates him, who knows? Poor Oliver doesn't. And his next play is about another haunted executive--named Macbeth. His cast dreads it--call it the Cursed Play. He can't decide how to tackle it.

Then a local school stages Macbeth. He goes, and gets an epiphany from the twelve-year-old girl narrating; she gets to the heart of it for him. When a guilty man feels haunted... does it matter if his ghost is real?

THAT NIGHT

I see a commotion in a driveway. A mom and her tweenage daughter have caught and are questioning a squirrel. Some squirrels, of course, know English, but not all--does this one? Big, brown, with a scruffy tail and a knowing eye. Oh, he knows what they're asking: "How did you DO that?" He's been raiding a bird feeder supposed to be rat- and squirrel-proof. They can't figure out how. "We promise to let you go if you just tell us or show us."

The girl grips the squirrel firmly; but though he's truly trapped, he seems cool and calm--even having fun!

I see why he's not scared. These humans aren't angry; indeed, half admiring--impressed he was clever enough to beat the system. Clearly they don't want to hurt him. Does he hope to escape? Are there more tricks up his, well, not SLEEVE. Cheek?

So far he's not telling. And I can see why. Admiration's nice, but is it worth giving up a secret that's making him acorn-rich?

• Mom & daughter: The schoolgirl who narrated Macbeth in Slings & Arrows is the squirrel-interviewer in my dream; her mom, hidden in the audience in S&A, is more foreground here. Lady Macbeth? But not so bloody-minded.
• Brown character knows unexpected language: Walter de la Mare's recurring childhood dreams of being a brown-skinned adult in (perhaps) Afghanistan or Ethiopia, speaking a tongue unknown in his waking life.
• Clever squirrel: Oliver, the rather (dare I say it) squirrely Shakespeare director, raiding a kids' production for inspiration... and getting it. Cheeky of him!
  Sorry.
• ACTION: Dunno exactly. But the dream does seem to endorse... squirrelly behavior. And making a pile off it. Of acorns, at least.

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