I just had this vivid dream. It’s important to note that I recently got a job as tech support at a library.
For some reason, I was working as a reference librarian at Alfred Noble Library in Livonia in the summer time. An elderly woman came in and asked me to look up a book for her. She gave me the last name of the author: ‘Brado.’ I looked it up and the description read:
“Memoirs of a disturbed teenage girl, which she never intended to be read – UNIQUE, UNCIRCULATING. 191.27”
She asked me to take her to the book, so we started towards the door. As soon as we stepped outside, a ridiculous blizzard began.
In my dream, the library had expanded to take over a nearby field – but the shelves were all outdoors. They were each roughly 2 stories high, and arches had been built between each shelf, out of books. There were people who were hired to scamper around over the arches and pull out the books if necessary. It was very Beyond Thunderdomey in feel – primitive without seeming like it was out of the past.
Anyway, we made it to the shelves and we were on the wrong end of the dewey decimal system, so we started walking through the shelves, which turned out to be a maze constructed so that the passages were shaped like numbers.
As we rounded the bend of a ‘2,’ the old woman started running, and I told her to slow down. She didn’t listen so I started chasing after her. When I finally caught up to her, I was out of breath and she was standing in front of where the book should have been with her back to me. She turned around all suddenly and I saw that she had become the teenage girl. She lunged at me and I yelled ‘BRADO! AHHHHH’ and woke up.
According to my girlfriend, who was sleeping next to me, I really did YELL ‘Brado, ahhh,’ which came out sounding like “Intense Chewbacca yelling through water:” “BWAAA OOOOH! AHHHHHHH!” I woke up pasty white, and it took me several seconds to determine that she was not, in fact, Brado. I am clearly insane.
In the Dewey decimal system, 191 is modern philosophy of the United States and Canada, in case you’re curious. I looked it up.