Outside of the Door
(dreams 5/27/22)
Janet Kuypers
5/27/22
I think we were on a road trip or something,
and we stopped at a mall
or food court or something
and I said I should use a public washroom
before we got on the road again
I stepped into
the most dilapidated room I’ve ever seen
walked over to dirty stall doors
that were shoulder-high
looked down to find
a lock on the outside of the door
then, toward the floor
feces and urine covered the ground
I saw an additional lock from the inside of the stall,
saw no one else was in this room,
so I stepped inside a stall
and tried to close the door,
but it was too far away from its wall brace
for the lock to come close to fastening
but if no one was there
I might as well get this over with
and I started to pull at my pants,
looked down to see my laces were untied
and now getting soaked with urine
(keep in mind, I don’t own shoes with laces)
but suddenly
a man walked into the bathroom
all nonchalant-like
toward another stall
so I said,
excuse me, this is the ladies room
and without him turning his head toward me
he said something under his breath,
like,
what difference does it make
and that’s when I saw his face
and he reminded me
of a guy on SNL
who was first at Second City
like it was some sort of connection to me
from Chicago
but now that I think about it
he looked more like that actor
who played Lenny on Laverne and Shirley
all of this made no sense to me
and I couldn’t think of going to the bathroom any more
so I just made sure my clothes were in place
and I just got the hell out
I walked outside in this mall area
where I was supposed to meet my husband
and all I could think was,
if it was first thing in the morning,
why was that bathroom so filthy?
I hoped I didn’t reek of feces
while I kept looking for him,
until I saw him
standing on a ladder
helping people with a storefront down the hall
he saw me,
waved,
quite animatedly I might add,
and I was wondering why he was helping these strangers
and then I heard
beep beep beep
front door
and woke hearing the alarm system
for my front door
letting me know
that my husband just left the house
for a pre-dawn walk
(before the sun rises here
and makes it too damn hot
to enjoy anything outside)
so I went to the bathroom
(it was clean, by the way)
and when I came back to bed
I heard my cat meow
so I got in bed
tapped the bed
and she jumped up,
I scratched her ears,
then she turned toward my feet
and lay down along my leg
I put my hand down next to her
and she moved one of her back paw legs
along my arm a few times
until she rested her back paw on my arm
my mouth was closed
but literally in a grin
as we bonded forty minutes
before I heard
beep beep beep
front door
and knew that soon
I could curl up
with my husband instead
—
I told him about my dream
and he asked me
why I keep dreaming about bathrooms
and why they’re usually so filthy
and why they all seem so invasive
I have no idea
—
I’ve been wondering about that for a while now
so maybe someone could let me know:
why do I always feel like I’m somehow being assaulted
in a room that’s supposed to be private
why am I always being assaulted
in the most private of places
in the middle of the night
in my dreams—
| 
