I woke up in the middle of the night. The sound of barking had startled me. In my mind, I was thinking “ What in tarnation is Sparky barking about this time at this hour ? “. I drew the curtains of my window to see what all the fuss was about. As I pulled back the curtains, I saw the most unusual thing. It wasn’t my backyard that I was looking at anymore.
I quickly put on my robe and ran downstairs. As I walking outside, I noticed that Sparky wasn’t there and I thought to myself “ Where did the barking come from ? “. I walked further and further into the mist. The mist got clearer and my feet came to a halt. I recognized this place. It was the theme park from my childhood.
I stood there in the middle of the familiar theme park. The silence of this amusement park frightened me and I began to search for answers as to why I was here alone. An arcade caught my eye and I moved into the open doors, despite the flashing lights and whirring machines, the place was silent. All of the video games in the arcade were violent games that had horrified me as a child. Such games as “House of Dead” chilled me to the bone at just the sight. The park was surrounded by lush green forest, and there were three main trails leading to the arcade, a waterpark and finally a lake.
With the building fear of the combined emotions I had felt over my childhood, I fled to the lake. I needed to escape this dreaded place, so I jumped into the chillingly cold lake. The lake was my escape route and I had to take it, regardless of feeling. As I began swimming across the water, I felt creatures slithering across my feet and biting at my legs. The sensation of it all was heart wrenching, as I had hated and despised the feeling of something unknown touching me underwater. This whole area was filled with my deepest and most personal fears, and my only option was to find out why I was here. I leaped out of the freezing lake and followed the path back to the arcade where it all began.
The same fear and anxiety was back as I entered the arcade. Screams and flashing bullets entered my ears as I approached each of the machines. I needed to find the root of this dream and to figure out the purpose of this place. Looking at the floor, I found a coin and realized it was a token to one of the machines. Playing one of these horrid games was excruciating, but there was reason for the as to why the coin was on the floor and I needed to face my fears. I inserted the coin into the “House of Dead” arcade machine, and began to play. Picking up the mechanized gun that came with the game, I began shooting the zombies, and kept firing until all of them were dead. When I completed the game, I realized this place was not as bad as my mind had perceived it to be. Collecting my thoughts, I began to trace my steps to the reason why I was in this dream again, and it all became clear that this dream was to help me overcome my fears and my mind’s misunderstandings. When the game was finished I began to awake.
My eyes slowly blinked open and I rolled back over to the open room where I had slept. The fears I had come to know in my childhood started to unfold. My mentality had changed and I had never dreamed of that place again. One of my mind’s misunderstandings had been solved in a dream and I was able to sleep peacefully.
