I need to stop eating weird things before I go to bed, otherwise I wake up remembering dreams like this:
I’m on a quest to discover the Lost Bowling Alley of Atlantis. I’ve been assigned this quest by a Lord of the Quests who works part-time as the operator of a creaking wooden roller coaster called Die Fledermaus (not to be confused with “The Bat” at Canada’s Wonderland). After a quick roller coaster ride, I hop on a bicycle and pedal through the muddy streets of York (before it became Toronto) circa 1813. In case you were wondering, my bicycle has a 19th gear for time travel. Somewhere out in the suburbs (which wouldn’t be far from downtown back in 1813), I discover the site of the bowling alley, but it’s buried deep in the ground below a multi-level shopping complex that dwarfs even the West Edmonton Mall. As I descend into the bowels of the mall, getting closer and closer to the Lost Bowling Alley of Atlantis, the levels above my head begin to collapse. I have to dodge wrecking balls. It’s like a video game, but with better sound effects. When I reach the bowling alley, I find the wooden floor smeared with mud and the balls stuck in the gutters. Everything has the smell of rotting seaweed. Realizing that I’ll be crushed beneath a collapsing shopping mall, I give up the bowling alley. Some quests aren’t worth the risk. I race through corridors and up escalators, past smashed storefronts and despairing sales clerks. Nothing remains of the floors above ground; everything has sunk into the parking lot. Still below ground, I see flickers of light through broken chunks of ceiling. I wriggle through a hole and gaze at the new world around me. The bulldozers and wrecking balls have finished their work and stand idling in the distance. All around me, for as far as I can see, there are rolling hills covered in Astro Turf and plastic trees with animatronic birds chirping in the branches.
I have no idea what my dream means, but I can be certain of one thing: the Lost Bowling Alley of Atlantis never really existed. It’s just an ancient myth, perhaps the vestige of a story from a humbler civilization.