About three times a year, I have a nightmare about a plane crashing. This is because my house is located directly under the flight path of an airport three miles west of me. Since they say most crashes occur during takoff and landing, my odds of being involved in a crash are greater than if I were a passenger on a plane itself.

In the ten years I’ve lived here, I’ve gotten used to the noise, but I never stop wondering if some day an injured plane won’t make it to the airport and instead will crash into my neighborhood. The only good thing about these nightmares is that when the planes crash, they never hit my house. They hit other people’s houses all around me, though. My subconscious keeping me safe, I guess.

Last night’s nightmare went like this:

I was a passenger on a 747 getting ready for takeoff. Not at the airport, but instead on a highway near me. We begin to accelerate down the highway, passing cars on either side of us. I’m not sure how it is our plane fits on the highway, but it’s a dream, so anything is possible.

We approach a hill in the road that will be used to get us up in the air. Nevermind engine thrust and the laws of physics; in my dream it’s the tiny 4 foot incline that’ll give us lift and get us airborne. As we get to the hill, the pilot announces "Uh-oh, there’s an aircraft with trouble ahead." As it passes over us, I glance out the back window (I’m inexplicably in a car at this point) and see the troubled plane trying to make it back to the airport.

Our pilot slams on the brakes and we come to a stop on the berm of the road. We all turn around and see that the other plane’s back left wheel is on fire. The plane comes to a complete stop, in midair, and then flips over. The plane is shaped like a shoebox, and tapers at the rear. Its squarish figure makes it impossible to keep its momentum and it drops like a rock in a ball of flames.

Seeing this, I buckle my seatbelt (?), put on my watch (??) and begin snacking on a box of white cheddar cheese crackers (???). We continue watching this event unfold and are relieved to see the Three Stooges jump out of a fire engine that arrived earlier because they were alerted about the impending disaster (????).

Why the Three Stooges? Well, there’s a great scene in the movie It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World where Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Joe DeRita appear as firemen responding to the end-of-movie mayhem. I haven’t seen the movie in months, but dreams have a weird way of pulling out memories from the deep recesses of the mind and sticking them in random places.

As the Stooges put out the fire, we return to our starting point because we’re going to make another attempt at takeoff. But I don’t wanna try and take off after what I’ve just seen! I scream "Shouldn’t we wait another day before trying this again?" but the pilot doesn’t hear me because he’s way up front. I realize that we have to go through this despite my objections, so I put on my life vest and get into the crash position. Nobody else on the plane is doing this and I feel silly for being alone in my panic. I start to sob quietly and then I wake up.

I always wake up at the moment I think I’m doomed. Dear Brain — thank you for working in that crazy way you do. I appreciate whatever connections you make to shake me up out of my nightmarish sleep to save me the agony. I just wish you could make me forget these dreams, now and the next time. Because I’m going to have another one in about four months, right on schedule.

Stumble it!