Feliz Viaje

I had a weird dream last night.

I was with my mom and a couple hundred other (black) people in a dusty border town in Mexico. We were all lined up waiting to get onto some tour buses. It was taking too long to load the buses and I started to get tired of waiting, so I wandered off.

I found a low-budget zoo in the middle of the town. A giraffe peered down at me over the gate. There must’ve been no security at this place, because I opened the gate. Instead of the giraffe coming out, a small black kangaroo leaped into my arms. I tried to put the baby kangaroo back in its cage, but it kept jumping out and I couldn’t lock the gate. I was scared that if I left with the gate unable to close, the kangaroo would leap out into the street and get hit by a car.

The kangaroo jumped up into my arms again and I took it back to where the buses were loading. I got there just in time to see the last bus leave. I knew that the buses wouldn’t be back for two or three hours, so I wandered around the town with this kangaroo until I found a concrete playground where some men were playing soccer. The kangaroo and I took a seat on the sidelines and watched the game. The men did not seem surprised that a black woman and a black kangaroo were watching them.

What was up with this dream?

Obviously the whole “black people waiting for buses” thing had something to do with the images I saw from Hurricane Katrina, but a black kangaroo? I guess that had something to do with my dog Beren, who does hop around a lot.

Why Mexico?

Weird.