Sparkling like a morning star...

I was walking down the street. The sun was almost gone from the sky and the chill in the air was dropping to an even colder temperature than it already was. I zipped my fleece hoodie up and walked a little more quickly than I had been. I was admiring the lights and decorations on all the houses in this neighborhood. Large, stunning Victorians with dazzling lights strung all over the roofs. Bright reds, dazzling greens, shimmering yellow, twinkling white and a few blue ones here and there. People had clear lights draped through the branches of their trees. Yards lined with plastic candy canes that flashed red and white. Fake snow covering roofs and sprinkled all over bushes, lawns and trees. Inflatable snowmen, reindeer, Santa, sleighs, elves, toys, trains and many other decorations lining the yards. I stared in wonder at each house as I passed. Not a single house had skipped on decorating. Not a single house had done a half ass job. Each and every one were so elaborately decorated. It was like walking through a stage for some cheesy Christmas movie where every house does insane decorations that some how all tie in together and look stunning and beautiful. The lights were all so clear, so bright. Twinkling in various patterns and seeming to call out to those who passed by. I stopped in front of one house and stared in amazement at the giant snow globe taking up most of their front lawn. It had Santa's workshop inside, little elves bustling about inside. Smoke rising from the chimney, snow swirling around in no patterned direction. Reindeer outside the shop, tethered loosely to a beam, sipping water and waiting patiently for their time to come. Outside, around the snow globe, was a scene made to look like an outdoor ice skating rink. The whole yard around it had been made to look like the glistening ice of a frozen over pond. Mini wooden versions of snow men, elves, reindeer, toy soldiers, dolls and children had on skates and were frozen in various stages of ice skating. Some paused in a flawless glide forever. Others sitting on their butt, as if they had fallen, a grin painted on their wooden face forever. I started getting a creepy feeling while looking at the pretend ice skaters and decided to start walking again. Unease began to creep over me but I shook it off, trying to convince myself that I was just psyching myself out. Still, I turned to look behind me quickly. I sighed, scolding myself for allowing my mind to work myself into a paranoia. I stopped at another house and admired the decorations of their yard. I heard footsteps suddenly behind me. I turned casually but saw nothing. I shrugged but again came the uneasy feeling. I started walking again and glanced over my shoulders and to my sides. I didn't see anything. It struck me as odd right then that I hadn't seen another person anywhere. The houses were all lit up but I didn't see one single person doing a thing. No one coming home from work, no one running out to do anything, no kids outside playing. I heard the footsteps coming again. Louder this time and I picked up the pace, no longer caring about admiring the rest of the dazzling decorations. I glanced behind me once more and this time I did see someone. It was a gingerbread cookie. A very large one at about 6 feet tall and it didn't look precisely happy to see me. The knife and blowtorch it somehow carried in it's fingerless hands wasn't very inviting either. I almost stopped to stare, to make sure I was really seeing what I was seeing. As soon as I slowed, another appeared. This one taller than the first, with a menacing glare on it's cookie face. The thing that disturbed me most was they were just like gingerbread cookies exactly except for one thing. Their facial features were human. Human eyes, nose, eyebrows and mouth. It was freaky. The second one held a rolling pin and a spatula that looked like it had serrated, sharp edges to it. I sped back up and began to run. The footsteps behind me increased and I looked again to find them coming quicker. I giggled because it looked funny to see them trying to run. One screamed out at me. No words, just a loud, rage filled noise. I stopped giggling and ran faster. It felt like I ran a mile but the street never ended. It seemed as if it were an endless block of huge, beautiful, elaborately decorated houses. My sides began to ache and I had to slow down a little bit. The gingerbread men continued in their pursuit of me and I wondered vaguely how it was even possibly that giant cookies with creepy human faces and strange weapons were chasing me. I tripped over a crack in the sidewalk and went stumbling to the ground. I tried to push myself up but I couldn't move. One of the gingerbread screeched as he got within reach of me and he threw a ball of icing he had put on fire at me as I laid there struggling to get up. I screamed as the fiery ball of icing sailed over my head, barely missing me. Suddenly, a giant snowman was in front of me. He used a lighter to melt part of his snow onto me, causing a puddle to form around me. Once I was soaked, I could move again and scrambled to my feet. The gingerbread men were barely a foot away and were preparing to leap and attack us both. The snowmen grabbed me and we jumped a foot and landed on a carpet. He clapped twice and the carpet rose off the ground and sped away. The gingerbread men tried pelting the flying carpet with more icing fireballs but missed in all their attempts. We flew up and over the houses on the carpet and I laid back on it, gasping for breath and hoping my heart didn't explode or decide to just jump right out of my chest. I asked the snowman were he was taking me but got no answer. Instead, he flipped the carpet upside down and I found myself falling through the air. Luckily, I landed on a bounce house that had no roof. I didn't hit any of the children bouncing in it but they all screamed out just the same. I guess I would have too if a strange girl fell into my bounce house from out of the sky. I scrambled out of there and found myself in a backyard brightly lit with Christmas lights. Quickly, a woman in a green and red vest came up to me with a tray. She looked me over and then asked me why my clothes were soaking wet. She said she had something that would be dry and fit me and asked if I'd like to towel off and change. I said sure and she led me through the yard towards a large house. I looked around and noticed they must be having some sort of Christmas party. I wondered why they were having it outside and at night. It was quite cold and definitely not the best weather to have kids out in a bounce house and running around a yard. I shrugged and followed her into the house. She pointed to a table where a pair of black pants and a red hooded sweater were laying. She said they'd fit and directed me to a bathroom as she handed me a towel. I picked up the pants and hooded sweatshirt and found that socks, a bra and undies all laid underneath as well. All in my size. Strange but whatever. I went into the bathroom, dried off and changed. I went back out and she took my wet clothes and popped them into a machine. In 60 seconds, they were dry. I said I'd go change back into them but she insisted I keep the clothing and come enjoy the party with them. I shrugged and we headed outside. She gave me a cup of hot cocoa and left me to tend to something else. I wondered around a few minutes and the woman was back, offering me a cookie off of a tray with many. I reached for a sugar cookie but she slapped lightly at my hand. She smiled widely at me and picked out a cookie for me. She handed me a gingerbread cookie, grinning widely, telling me she made the best in the world. I took the cookie and she smiled again before hurrying off. I looked at the small cookie and as I did, the face turned from one made of icing to one of human features. It laughed and snarled at me as I watched it come to life. I screamed and dropped the cookie onto the ground as I ran out of the yard. The woman called after me, screaming for me to come back and enjoy their party. I ignored her and kept running. I cleared the fence and once on the other side, found myself on a stage, in the middle of a ballet. I looked behind me. The fence was gone and there was only a curtain there. The dancers stopped their graceful movements and glared at me as I stood there dumbly. I apologized and ran off the stage. The audience laughed and cheered thinking it was part of their routine. The dancing resumed and I crept around backstage, trying to go unnoticed by all those hustling and bustling around me. I found an exit door but before I could reach it, Oprah Winfrey blocked my path and grabbed a hold of me. She called me a poor dear and told me I must come on her show to tell my story. I told her I had no clue what she was talking about. She shook her head and out comes Dr. Phil, spewing bullshit about denial. I backed away from them both but before I got more than 5 feet away, they both faded away into a shimmering mist as they turned into something else. The gingerbread men that had chased me suddenly manifested in the shimmering mist that had been Dr. Phil and Oprah. I screamed and turn to run. They followed and the chase was on again. I found another door marked exit and flung it open. I ran out the door and found myself running down a street lined with restaurants, shops, bars and people shopping. I glanced behind me to see the gingerbread men coming after me and I ran faster. I found myself running into the middle of a town square. Where a water fountain would normally stand in such a place, there was a huge fountain that was full of steaming hot cocoa. I looked into it trying to gauge how deep the fountain was. I ran to a shop 15 feet away from the fountain and grabbed the ladder from the front door. I put it into the fountain and found that it must be installed into the ground because the ladder had to be at least 7 feet and it had sunk all the way down into the steaming fountain. I turned to see the gingerbread men drawing near. I ran to another shop and grabbed an umbrella made of metal. I got to the fountain just as a fiery icing ball zoomed by me. It hit the fountain and I used the metal umbrella to knock the fiery ball of icing into the cocoa. Instead of putting out the flames, the cocoa began to steam up more. More fiery icing came flying at me and I dodged them all, making each fall into the fountain. The cocoa was beginning to boil and just then, one of the gingerbread men was right in front of me. He pulled out his knife and swung it at me, trying to cut me. I used the metal umbrella to fight with him in a strange almost sword fight. We battled around a few minutes and I ended up knocking a leg off with one swing of the umbrella. He screeched angrily at me as he tried to gain his balance on one leg but I charged him, hitting him hard. He dropped the knife and the blowtorch fell seemingly out of nowhere. He stumbled backwards and I charged again, knocking him into the boiling fountain of cocoa. He thrashed and yelled out as he hit the hot liquid but it was too late, he was melting down and dissolving in the thick chocolate mess. I picked up the blowtorch and began looking around for the second gingerbread man. I crept around, not straying far from the fountain but didn't see him anywhere. Out of no where, he was behind me, slashing his serrated spatula across my lower back. I yelped and cried out in pain as I felt warm blood trickle out from the cut in my back. I turned quickly just as he swung the spatula at me again. He got me on the arm and a gash appeared there followed by blood flowing slowly out of it. He laughed at me as he prepared to swing at me again. I got the blowtorch ready and fired it up as much as I could. He swung and I lit his arm on fire. He howled in pain and dropped his spatula. I picked it up and threw it at him, hitting him in the face and making it stick into one of his human eyes. He howled again and pulled the spatula out. His eye came with it and as he dropped the spatula to the ground, the eye hit and turned into a puddle of green frosting. I fired up the blowtorch again and started trying to set the rest of him on fire. He tried to run but he wasn't faster than me. He was burning as he ran and soon pieces of him were crumbling to the ground. Then he suddenly burst into crumbs after one final howl of pain. I jumped onto the pieces to make sure they crumbled up very well. A woman came out of a bookstore and handed me a broom and dust pan. She told me I couldn't leave until I cleaned the mountain of gingerbread cookies up. I swept them all into a big pile and then used the blowtorch to set them on fire. The woman grinned at me and said thank you. She took back the broom and dust pan and scurried back into her bookstore. I started walking away. One moment, I was walking back down the street with all the shops, bars, restaurants and people hustling about and the next moment, I was walking into my job. Dressed in my work clothes and heading to the wall where the time clock was to punch in. My manager stopped me and informed me we had a new area supervisor and everyone had to come meet her before clocking in for their shifts. I followed him back to the office area and found myself staring at the new area supervisor, who also happened to be the woman from the Christmas party earlier. She grinned widely at me and told me she had been expecting me. I looked at her strangely and turned to ask my manager what was going on but he had taken off from the office area already. I turned back to her uneasily. She watched be for only a few seconds before opening up a file cabinet drawer. She smiled sweetly at me as she held her hand out to me and offered me another cookie.

That's when I woke up. No, I have not eaten a single gingerbread cookie this holiday season. I didn't eat anything weird or anything at all before bed before this dream. I wasn't thinking about any of this and wasn't watching anything on TV that reminded me of this. Also no weird spicy food that night either. I just have weird dreams pretty much all the time, lol. I don't need to do anything in particular to cause them. My dreams are always strange. At least lately they haven't been too dark and creepy. =)

I know I was going to write about my Christmas day today but I wanted to post the dream instead. I'll get to talking about the food, the gifts and all that jazz soon. Either tomorrow or Sunday. Maybe even Monday. It's back to work tonight and the rest of the weekend. Hope everyone has had a wonderful holiday!

Happy Friday y'all!