How to Wake Up Stressed

Two nights ago I dreamt I had a baby. Not that I gave birth to a baby, but that I was in possession of a baby—presumably my own, though the dream didn't specify the origin of the baby, just that it was my responsibility. I'm not even sure if it was a boy or a girl, but since it was a baby, the pronoun it will suffice. So I'm wandering around with this baby, and we're in some sort of wooded area like a retreat campground—lots of tall evergreens, log cabins and dirt paths, and nobody else is around.

From the get-go I have no idea what to do with this baby. I don't know if it needs to eat, or what to even feed it, or if I should put it to bed, or what. And not only is the baby small enough to hold in one hand, but it keeps getting smaller, which is not something I thought babies did and only underscores the point that I am not fit to care for this baby.

So we're wandering, and we're wandering, and the next thing I know I'm walking into a log cabin, and inside it looks like some creepy tarot card/palm reader type place, with all manner of unnecessarily bedazzled cloths hanging at random points from the ceiling, eerie flickering candlelight, gratuitous creepy shadows, and a general shouldn't-be-here/shouldn't-bring-a-baby-here ambiance.

The next thing I know I'm sitting at a little round table across from an old woman (old hag, really) who looks tailor-made for the live-action role of the witch from Snow White. I'm in some sort of trance at this point and barely paying attention while she's whispering this and that incantation, making strange hand motions, and basically doing her witch thing. Suddenly I notice that I'm not holding the baby anymore. The witch has the baby, and she's packed it in rice, sort of like sushi. Not a bit of the baby is showing, just a vaguely baby-shaped ball of rice, and she's drawing eyes and a mouth over the baby's rice-packed head.

This, even I know, is no way to handle a baby, so I quickly snatch it away from the witch and get out of there. I run to my own cabin, put the baby in the bathroom sink, and start washing off the rice, hoping the baby hasn't been crushed or suffocated. Once the rice is washed away, I'm still not sure that the baby is all right until it begins to poop—a sure sign, in my dream, that the baby is in perfect health.

However, the baby is pooping an exorbitant amount (much more than would logically fit inside what is now an inch-tall baby [yeah I said it, logically]), so I turn up the faucet to wash away the mess, and to my horror the baby gets caught in the stream of water that's rushing down the drain. I fumble for the baby and manage to pin it against the side of the drain with one finger at the last possible moment. And now I'm completely freaking out, because I know that if I push too hard, the baby could be killed, but if I don't push hard enough, it will fall down the drain. I'm struggling to get ahold of one of the baby's arms and pull it out of the drain, but all the while the water keeps rushing down the drain and I can't get a good grip.

And then I woke up. Recurring dream, let's hope not.