Do you ever dream about food? Can you smell or taste food in your dreams? Here are two dreams of food, both had on the same night. "Lasagna" and "Mardi Gras Lobster".
It's 3:30 in the morning and I'm driving down a long, pitch black, country road. My mother is with me, I'm driving her to be somewhere. Where, I do not know. She says she is getting hungry and wants breakfast. She wants lasagna. I begin to tell her that there is no place to eat when suddenly a large city intersection appears, stop light and all. On one of the corners low and behold sits a large dinner with a big sign on it's roof proclaiming LASAGNA in glowing neon pink. The parking around the building was packed full of cars that looked like they were from the 50's and 60's, sleek cars with tail fins. The inside of LASAGNA's was even fuller (at 3:30 in the am). My brother, Eugene, is inside waiting for us at the breakfast bar. We sit with him and a waiter brings us each a giant plate of spaghetti with meatballs. He tells us that they are complimentary. (strange, complimentary spaghetti in a LASAGNA house) My brother looks at his plate and shoves it away.,"I don't want this." "But sir its complimentary", says the waiter, and he places the plate back in front of my brother. "But I don't want it!", and Eugene shoves the plate away again. " Would you like it with a nice steak,sir.", the waiter says again as he puts a giant ribeye on top of the spaghetti and pushes the plate back in front of Gene. While My brother stares at his spaghetti and steak plate the waiter produces two more steaks and places them on top of our spaghetti. Compliments of the restaurant, he smiles big and walks away. We all stare at our plates.
I live in the South and have been to many a Mardi Gras parade, and I have visited NOLA (New Orleans, Louisiana for the uninitiated) many times, but I have never been to the Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans. I always had celebrated in Mobile, where I had lived and where the celebration started.
We are standing next to the Mississippi River near Jackson Square, in NOLA, waiting for the parades to start. (parades, to the best of my knowledge, do not run along The River) People are happy, partying, sharing with each other. Near to us is a man boiling crab, shrimp, and very oddly, lobster. He insists that we help ourselves and he starts to fill plates full of seafood and giving them out to all the people there. Beautiful big crabs and huge lobster, already split and dripping in butter.
... and now dammit I am really hungry for some seafood, especially for that buttery non existent "Gulf" lobster. Happy Mardi Gras. Celebrate the feast before the fast, Bon appetit. Sweet tasty dreams.
I can't remember ever dreaming of food, but I do remember some dreams searching for something to drink -- always elusive and most of the dream contains that elusive search.
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