DREAM CAPITAL

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DREAM CAPITAL

Interesting dream last night: Me and Teal were talking about how weird it was that we had never been to the Capital of Idaho. The name of the Capital of Idaho was like “Montpelier” (real life city in Idaho and also the real life Capital of Vermont), but, like, not like “Montpelier”... The name oscillated between that and names like “Melmoth”, “Monmouth”, and “Map City”.

Dream Space and Dream Time? Though I have never noticed this myself, I heard somewhere that it is not possible to tell time in dreams — that it don’t matter who you are: a dream-clock’s numbers will oscillate through a smooth and unperturbing nonsense to you… It makes sense that the letters in dream-toponyms would do a similar thing. Like, since these letters would be the tellers of Dream Space, they must be calibrated to not tell the big secret of Dream Space. (“Your inventing me in your brain right now”.) I’m guessing that if the name had stabilized I would’ve noticed it was not the Capital of Idaho, and that that would’ve ruined my dream.

Approximate Location: Straight east of Declo, about halfway to the southbound I-84. This is a portion of the SRP I do not know well: 4C…. For some reason, I thought Declo was south of Burley — did not realize it was east until looking at the map this morning. Looking at the map this morning, best approximation for the road is “Declo to Cotterel on Hwy 81”. It is a stretch of road I’ve never driven. Internet says it is twelve miles long, but in my dreams it is a lot longer. Dream Capital felt about 40 miles east of Declo — felt about 40 miles west of the southbound I-84. I don’t remember the drive to there, but that’s what it felt like being there.

Outskirts: Teal was driving her truck. I was looking out the passenger-side window. Seemed like a standard SRP town of about 8,000. Flat with no notable features in the distance. No visible water. Outskirts were sagebrush, then some farms, then a subdivision, then a gravel pile, then storage units, then a baseball field, then a cemetery. The cemetery was well-kept behind a chain link fence with some interesting pillars dispersed throughout — swirling lava rock things about 20 feet tall, but not strange to me. I assumed they were marking the graves of the great citizens of the early days of the town — the ones who were responsible for its being of the Capital of Idaho.

City Center: We drove through. It was small enough that we could get the basic idea from the road. There were yer standard brick buildings from the early 20th Century — tall windows for tall rooms for men in vests to pose for black and white photos in. They were not vacant, but they were not efficiently adapted to their new 21st Century purposes either. There was one place that sold wicker baskets, another that sold muffins on weekends, another that sold elaborately framed paintings of Mormon Jesus. Then there was a large 1980’s-style building, about five stories high with a parking garage attached. It was clearly serving some kind of state government function. Then there was the Capitol Building. It was sparkling white and towering over the rest of the town from the top of its massive staircase, facing east to what I joked was probably the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. Then me and Teal had a brief conversation comparing this Capitol Building with the Capitol Building in Boise. We agreed that it looks kinda cheesy when people try to make Greek Columns out of materials that are not Table Rock Sandstone.

Best Buy: We went to the Best Buy on the other side of town. This was the only time we got out of the car. It was a bustling Best Buy. As Teal was purchasing something in the self-check-out area, I looked around at all the people. Employees were wearing yellow vests, carrying some sort of handheld device as they rushed around. Customers were squeaking shoes, rustling bags, dropping boxes, spilling sodas, dealing with small children. I remember thinking to myself these exact words: “All these people are from here”. That’s all I remember though. I think this was all about the time I was waking up.