A Funny Dream About the End of the World

Author's note: I dream every night. I don't know if that's common or not. I've heard many people report that they seldom or never dream. (I've heard it's a bad sign to never dream, but perhaps they merely mean they "never" dream.) Most of my dreams fade as soon as I wake up, and most of the ones that linger don't particularly deserve to. But I have a handful of dreams that stay with me after years and years. This dream is not one of them. This one I had last night. Maybe I should jot down some of the other ones, too.

In my dream, I was reading a book. Or rather, I was following along in a book as the book's author read it to a group of us in a classroom setting. (I can't say if I was my younger self or just happened to be in a classroom.) I remember, I had barely made it to the reading on time, having decided at the last minute to forgo a stop for ice cream. 

The book was a very slim volume, and the author was proud of that. The exact title escapes me, but it was something like And That's How We Ended The World with a subtitle along the lines of "A wholly inadequate response to..." someone or other, a name invented by my subconscious, I suppose.

The book was actually a graphic novel, with artwork in the style of a mid-20th century children's book, a combination of hand-drawing and rich watercolor. In contrast, the book itself was glossy, perfect bound, a decidedly present-day feel. Sadly, I am only able to recall the two climactic spreads, but that's perhaps enough to gather the full story from.

The first—in apparent contrast to the book title—showed a huge flaming meteor hurtling from space into the top-left corner. The rest of the spread showed a series of scenes from around the globe in rough geographical arrangement. 

At top, an Inuit village on the snowy tundra, the ice and igloos already beginning to melt. The next row featured variously images of rural plains, towns/suburbs, and gleaming cities. In the distance, past the fields, a prairie fire has started. Meanwhile, in the suburbs, the plastic lawn ornaments and sedans are drooping with melt. Finally, in the city, the very top corners of the high rises sport candle-flames. The next row is one long panel, with a rainforest at left giving way to a parched desert on the right. Across the entire scene is a rather perturbed looking snake. (???)

The last row is a series of detail images from all the panels above. The human figures dotting the picture we now see up close. Rather than gasping at the terror in the skies above them, everyone is fixated on their phones. From the bottom corner, opposite the flaming comet, enters a hand revealing the screen of one these phones. Displayed is an app reporting second-by-second the distance and ETA of the meteor. 

Despite the ominous content, the overall feel of the spread is sunny and bright. The palette is almost tropical. This is in contrast to the next spread, where the sky is black, dotted with white stars. We see it only through a grey, steel-framed window. 

This is the lab where scientists are laboring on their last ditch to save earth. The images lead us through the panels in a serpentine path, left to right, then back, then back again as we gaze down the page. At top left, is a large, close-up petri dish. The subject growing in the dish is bluntly labeled "MEAT," though it more closely resembles a sushi-roll. 

Along the visual path, we see more such dishes, and scientists taking things out of the dishes and assembling these things. The slabs become organs and the organs are stuffed into torsos. On side-channels, various limbs are stacked into existence. It should be noted that all of this is illustrated in a rather whimsical, almost Seussian style. 

Every panel is needlessly captioned with a brief narration of exactly what is being pictured. In the penultimate frame, a pair of arms and a pair of legs and a torso are arranged loosely on a table, with shiny silver cables running between them in the places where they ought to attach. This is described as the final assembly, and all the aforementioned parts are named. But the cables run off to one last unlabeled panel, in roughly the same position as the phone on the previous spread. Here sits a metal box with a great grey brain sticking out of the top and a bright red indicator light on the front. 

There was some aspect of the last picture that didn't exist on the page. There was a strange sense that the purpose of the brain in the box was being conveyed, not in words, but psychically somehow, as though the author had reached the reader telepathically with the ink. 

I don't have any words for it except to say it was a joke. Or a punchline, rather, the two climactic spreads being the setup. It was something of a commentary on futility or something. And, as far as I could tell, it landed. It was funny.