ALASKA

For the second time in recent weeks, I had a dream about Alaska.

I’m not sure where I was. But at the moment, I was by myself. I started walking down the road, lamenting the fact that I hadn’t changed into my tennis shoes. Instead, I was wearing my black dress shoes for work. They were no doubt getting dirty, as I was walking through slush. There were no sidewalks. So I ended up walking down the road, as cars whizzed by me. I somehow knew that I had to go about five miles to get to the nearest town – which I thought was Fairbanks. Remarkably, I got there only after a minute or two of walking. I then went in search of a map. So I ducked into a pizza place. It didn’t say “Pizza Hut.” But once I got inside, it was clear that it was in fact a Pizza Hut.

The next thing I knew, my wife, kids and parents were all with me. We sat down in a booth. All I wanted was a map. For some reason, it took forever to get a waitress – which was very frustrating, as we only wanted a map, and weren’t planning on eating there. We finally did get some help. And we received a cheap, paper map – which was probably printed on one of the paper placemats they give you.

We then went outside to plan our route. If we went north, we could end up at a body of water, 208 miles down the road. We could also go east or west, and find ourselves out in the wild almost immediately. I suggested we go east, where I surmised we would see lots of wildlife. By going east, we would be driving over terrain which was divided into “shelves.” What that means, I have no idea.

We ended up driving east. And it was more like a green forest than snowy tundra. Then my dream suddenly ended.