I had a particularly good travel anxiety dream the morning before I flew off to Georgia.
I was to take the bus to 69th street, the el to 30th street, then the airport train. I dreamed that I arrived at a 69th Street Station that is not much like the real one. I knew what I was doing and I had plenty of time to spare, so I ate lunch and confidently wandered around for a while. Then I headed to the lower levels to get my train ticket and get on the el (I was to do both). It was like a huge disorganized department store down there, with many levels, and I got lost trying to find the ticket machines and the booths for the el. The floors were grass-covered. Every once in a while a crop duster would fly overhead spreading powder, and everyone would lie face-down on the grass and hold their breath until all the powder fell. I did that twice. The powder fell slowly, so we had plenty of time to lie down. Just before it landed we’d hear the words “elephant dust” whispered from above.
Finally, after searching through the bedding department where there were great stacks of beds on display, too high to see the top of, all reachable by ladder, I found where the booths were supposed to be. They’d all been torn out; that section was being rebuilt. The time was getting late. I asked directions and found that they’d been moved far away; I was near the edge of the building and they were somewhere near the center.
Fortunately I woke up before suffering any more adventures.
Original version, November 1994.
Updated and added here January 2012.