Something wasn't right.

I've been having some strange dreams lately. It's probably been a lot of things: I rearranged my bedroom and now my bed's in a strange place. I'm regularly living on 6 hours of sleep a night. I go to sleep thinking of unfinished projects and wake up in a rush.

I've been having strange dreams. Dreams of flying I'm completely familiar with; not flying like a bird, soaring, gliding, and circling through thermals of inspiration, but more like the flight of a butterfly, alternating floating downward and twitching upward. This is a familiar dream.

Strange dreams. Dreams like vignettes. A few seconds here, lay the background, and scene. And on to the next. Most of them I don't remember beyond the wheel-of-fortune structure of flipping from one environment to the next.

Strange. Two nights ago one flash was my car, the front fender damaged on the driver's right, sort of shredded, sort of planed off, so the bumper was higher on that side for want of a bottom. I was unsettled on Saturday, vaguely unsettled on Saturday, until I remembered this night-picture and segmented it off from reality. All better.

Today's morning ritual involved getting up later than I ought to have, to catch my train, rushing to get it all together, walking up Haste to my car.

Berkeley parking is somewhat of a mystery. When I get home, bet it 6pm or midnight, Berkeley is perpetually packed, residential and meter parking alike. Luckily, a silver-lining of my working world is being able to park at a meter, as my start time is substantially earlier than when the meters tick on at 9. The mystery is that, though the meters are packed when I get in in the evening, come 7am mine is the only car remaining on a block of 25 spaces.

Are the other 24 who were here last night all earlier risers than I am, or are they partying until 2am, then driving home?

No matter. My car is at the top of the block, and walking towards it from 300 feet out, I can't decide if it's mine. It doesn't look quite right. I don't think about it again and come half-a-block I can see that it's Baby. I walk up, unlock the door, hand on the handle, and I stop.

I go back to the front of the car, the dream-vision coming back, to check out the front bumper.

Fine, normal. Okay. I turn back to the door.

Something wasn't right.

Back to the front I go, and realization dawns. No license plate. Gone. Just an empty bracket. No trauma of a violent parallel parker, just the void of absence.

I check the back, just so see if my assailant was going for a hat trick. At least they left me that one, with the registration tab I spent far to long acquiring.

When did this attack occur? Were there cars around bearing mute witness? Did it happen days ago and I only just noticed? Was my dream prescient, coincident, or simply a subliminal realization trying to share itself with my conscious awareness?

So now I assume that my license plate, too clever by half, is adorning someone's dorm room or apartment. What my assailant isn't counting on is the interconnectedness that seems to run through my life. Three friends of mine who don't know each other all attended the same wedding on Friday, for two people I've never met. I can meet someone and within 15 minutes find a common acquaintance. I just know that I can find someone who knows upon what wall, in which hall or frat house, the license plate "GRR ARG" stands imprisoned and shackled. Have you seen it? Vanity theft is the most dangerous kind indeed. For the victim robbed of a non-fungible item, the desire for recovery is strong, and the thief feels the need to display the acquisition, for what good is art in a drawer?

It will take a few weeks for this spell to run its course, but I know that I will get it back. It may take some help from friends, or some more dreaming, but it will come back.

Grr, arg! Indeed.

Addendum: I just got off the phone with Ali, who tells me I was very lucky that they didn't take the back plate, as I can get a replacement front plate without a problem, but if someone steals the back plate, they'll keep the plate out of circulation for seven years. Umm, thank you I guess?