The subconscious is a funny thing.  Dreams are its domain and unfortunately remembering our nocturnal adventures into ourselves is never a guaranteed outcome.

When we do however, the matter of deciphering those recollections still remains.  And I really need your help making sense of this one.

Last week, I had a dream that was preceded not by any drugs, drinks, or drunks.  It was the quiet of quietest nights that came before and that is what made the nightmare that follows so much more jarring.

In this dream, I awoke in the same bed I slept in, in the same apartment in the same complex in which I actually live.  It started off with the minutiae that comprises my typical day at home.  There was the shower; the bowl of cereal; the ten minutes on reddit (okay, so maybe my subconscious took some creative liberties for the sake of runtime).

I waved hello to all my neighbors, who experienced no frightening-after-the-fact-of-the-dream disfigurements, and headed over to the garage downstairs.  My car was parked in the same place it always was and the same turd had his Tiburon parked behind me, just like real life.

There were no jumps in time in this particular dream.  I experienced/saw myself walking over to the same apartment denizen; knocking till he was awake; and yelling at him to move his illegally parked car out of the way.  It was all just as irritating as it always has been.

Once this guy had moved his car, I was free to get to mine and, now, also alone in the garage.

As a bit of background, I’m a man very attuned to his surroundings.  I always look around just in case someone is going to jump out of the shadows to punch me or a hobo will come in for a surprise hug (that’s “rape” in hobo talk).

In this dream, continuing the pattern of consistency, I was no different.  I also hate spiders, so I look up a lot.

That’s when I saw it.  The woven webs, abandoned.  Up in a corner of the garage.  But where was spider?  And then who was phone?

So I turned to look behind me and discovered the sort of creature my mind had conjured up for me, dangling at the end of a web: a crab-spider.

It was pretty much a giant spider that looked exactly like a normal crab.  Or a normal crab that spewed out webs from its buttockular area.  Either way works.  That’s what I saw.

Naturally, I freaked out and ran.

Of course, as befitting of a nightmare, I only ran into more of them, now lowering themselves into every which path I turned, each of them click-clacking their claws in front of me, inches from my nose.

As I sprinted out of the garage entrance headed to the outside world, I could hear the high-pitched ticks of the arach-staceans landing on the concrete.  Looking over my shoulder as I ran, my eyes caught a swarm of them skittering towards me.  I don’t remember screaming, but I’m willing to bet that in my mind I was.

When I made it back outside, touched by the warm kiss of sunlight, I breathed a sigh of relief.  Then immediately to my right, in the middle of the street, I found one of the giant crab-spider masters.  This one was as big as a Volkswagen Beetle although this one, for whatever reason, was lying on its back, helplessly shutting and opening its claws in frustration.

I was utterly terrified and helpless as it might have been, it was still a giant crab-spider.  Then I woke up.

What the fuck was that about?