Keeping On

So, it's very obvious that I miss home.

Of all my many faults... I have one shining quality.  My emotions shine as if they were neon signs.  Why is this a quality?  It makes it difficult for me to have two faces.  Depending on the and the situation this allows me to be very straightforward and honest, perhaps forces me to be so.  It is not ideal, but I am alright with it.

I have played two Australian basketball games.  The first game we got absolutely stomped.  Lost by fifty points or so.  The second game was set up to follow suit.  We were down from seven to five men and we were playing "The Spartans."  I don't know if any of you saw the movie "Gladiator" but boy are those Spartan guys (led by none other than Kevin Costner) mean!

Anyway, the teacher I worked with (Beauregard), who invited me to play on the team as "imported talent" ended up picking up another player for the night, just to give us a breather.  For those of you who do not know the finer points of basketball, (Hardcastle) having six men instead of five is a huge help.  This allows you to rotate every four minutes or so and give everyone a break.

The sixth man Beauregard found sprained his ankle, six minutes into the game.

Fortunately, we ended up playing a fairly mediocre team.  Just like the first night, they were mostly young men in their thirties or early forties.  They had a few stars with some meat blocks for rebounding and the majority of them had permanent sleeves of dark green and crimson ink that said things like, "I'll cut you to get that rebound" or "Intercept my pass and I'll scream @#%&*."

We won by about sixteen points and even the other team seemed to have a good time.  Even the other team smiled really big as they stared at us driving away in our cars.  Friendly guys.
There is a new student teacher at the school.  I don't think we will ever speak.

Nothing else has really happened that I feel like writing about, so I will recall a dream...

~~~~~~**~*~*~**D**~**~*~*~R***~***~E~*~*~*~*~*~**A***~*~*~*M~*~**~~~~~~

I was riding a tall gray stallion through the streets of Spain around 1600.  I was riding to a cliff.  I don't think I intended to go there, but I remember knowing that I would end up at this cliff by the sea.  As I was riding to the cliff I saw a monastery and my horse veered off the path towards it.  I had to gallop through a field there didn't seem to be a path.  But when the horse veered into the field birds started to drop out of the tall grass that was growing there.  Out of the tops of the grass, where the grass grains are held.  They were like very little magpies, but green.  The flew into the air and swarmed my horse, pecking at it.  They didn't attack me, just my horse.  They did this until the horse died.  I tumbled to the ground and found myself at the gate to the monastery.  I tried to lift it, but I couldn't.  So, I called out to the gate into of the garden but there wasn't anyone there.  The birds were circling the field behind me.  I kept calling out, I think I yelled lots of things.  Among them I remember yelling, "The Band!" and "Shut the curtains!"  I kept yelling until I saw someone walk from under a tree.  I couldn't tell who it was, and they didn't say anything, but they waved their arms around in the air, drawing big circles.  They kept walking towards me and I saw that it was the French Student Teacher.  She seemed to walk towards me forever but never get closer.  I got angry and punched the gate down.  Then I woke up because I had hit the wall next to my bed.

~~*R*~~*~*~*~*~*E*~~~~***A*~**L*~*~~*~*~~*I*~**~*~*~~~~*T*~**~~~***Y**~*~*~~

I dream pretty often, but I usually don't write them down because I don't want to remember them.


Cheers to you sleeping well,
Melmoth