My dreams in the past eight years have been easily forgettable. They are usually based on some sort of anxiety at work. But lately, I’ve been having some vividly strange dreams.

One of the latest dreams started with me at a Burger King parking lot in what looked like a bad neighborhood. I’m about to load my bicycle into the trunk of my car when all of a sudden a woman in a 1998 Oldsmobile Cutless Supreme pulls up next to my car and says, Hey if I were you I’d hurry up and get your bike in your trunk and get the hell outta here. I turn to her with a puzzled look on my face and say, Why? She then proceeds to gesture with her head behind me. I turn around and see a homeless man looking at me and I know at that second that he’s up to no good. The woman quickly drives off as I try to work as fast as I can to get my bike into my trunk without looking like I’m trying to rush out of there. I pick up the bike and for once it slides easily into my trunk. I close the trunk and the next thing I hear is someone running toward me. I quickly run to the driver’s side door and slam it shut. I look at my rearview mirror and see the homeless man running as fast as he can toward my car. I start to panic a bit and know one of two things is going to happen. Either he is going to try to prevent me from driving off or do damage to my car. So I hurriedly put my car in reverse, and before the homeless man realizes what I’m doing, I slam my car into him knocking him onto the asphalt. I then take off leaving the scene as fast as I can. In a panic, I watch in the rear view mirror him slowly getting up from the ground.

Right around this part of the dream I wake up still in a panicked state. I start thinking, Oh my god! What if someone saw me doing that, I can be arrested for attempted manslaughter. But then I realize I’m in bed, in my pajamas. I breathe a sigh of relief, Thank god …. It was only a dream…