Don Juan in Helsinki: 7

At some time in the 1990s, I cannot say exactly when, all my friends lost their interest in making hot squishy gland-slapping monkey sex and began to make babies instead. Suddenly even the men gave up bonking and went around with plastic carts full of squirty rubber things and strapped plastic papooses on their shoulders so they could carry their babies around on their bellies. This was disgusting to me. Children are of no interest to Likkanen. In fact, to me there is something very wrong with a man who abandons all his interests in life and prefers the company of small children--it is not sexually normal. Of course, one cannot say this aloud, not in New York. My own father certainly did not behave in this manner, it is not Finnish. In fact, he barely spoke to me at all until I was grown up and in high school.

Of course, it is true that making babies is a natural and healthful thing for women to do for the good of humanity. Where else would more sexy and attractive women come from, if not from babies? But they are a boring subject for a normal person to think about! And what is even more boring than babies is baby pictures. These I cannot stand, especially the sonograms. When my friends hand them to me, I do not even pretend to admire them--I simply close my eyes and think of something nice, like bonking. And I feel exactly the same way about listening to other people's dreams. What in the world could be more boring than that? Because now, you see, I am about to be very boring indeed and tell you all about my dream that i had on this airline flight. I apologize to you in advance, but I must tell it now because it is very important to the story. But if you are like me and find other people's dreams of no possible interest, then I suggest you stop reading now and wait until my next blournal post to read any more--until then, perhaps you can think of bonking, too. In fact, if you are a young and sexually attractive woman, perhaps you would like to think of bonking with me. Or even if you are just a young woman. You can think of me as blonde, if you like.

So here is my dream, and it was a very bad one, the worst of my whole life, because at the time I did not think it was a dream at all. I thought it was all truly happening. I dreamed the plane really crashed, and this was so realistic that I was not entirely sure for some days that it was actually a dream. But when we reached Helsinki, there was nothing in the news about the Cricket's death, which would have been all over CNN, believe me, because she is so world-famous, and so this is how I knew. Plus I am blogging about it now, and I do not think that is possible from beyond the grave. Though in my opinion, most blog comments are so pointless and stupid they might as well be made by dead people, for all of their erotic interest to anyone. Perhaps someone should start a site with a Ouija Board.

OK, OK, Donho, you are saying now--quit your stalling and just get on with it! Just tell us your stupid dream, LOL! Well, I am stalling because it was so frightening for me that I don't want to ever think of it again. And I have a special reason for this; because it is what the shrinks call a 'recurring dream'. Yes, it's true, I've had this terrible nightmare again every night since then, so now I am too scared to go to sleep at all without drinking alcohol heavily first. Naturally, I can never truly get drunk. For a Finn, heavy drinking is exactly like the stages of grief. Or marriage. First comes denial, then bargaining, then perhaps a fist-fight or two or even smashing a bottle over someone's head, until at last the true Finn reaches the calm acceptance that is the most important spiritual element of achieving an unconscious stupor. We do not drink like the Swedes or the English do merely to fornicate and forget. No, no, for us, as in everything else, we make it into an art form. And it is true that perhaps I had drunk a bit too much vodka when I fell asleep on that airplane.

Because in my dream, when the engines died and the long fall and all the screams started, I could not wake up, no matter how hard I tried. I was fighting and straining just to open my eyes, and I could feel the Strawberry's hand grabbing so hard it was as if all the bones were about to break, but no luck. I could not wake up. And then my last thought, just before the plane hit the ground was, really, why bother? LOL! Not much point, eh? You know how they always say that in dreams where you are flying the only time you are crashing is when you are really dead? Well it is true! But by then we were obviously not above the water any more, because we were crashing into land--the Faroes, perhaps, or even Norway. Anyway, at the end of that long screaming ride down and down and down with the airplane shaking and shivering itself apart, when we hit there was only a terrible shock in my spine--and then...blackness. Nothing but blackness. I was dead in my own dream! Or perhaps I was just asleep.

When I woke up (woke up still inside the dream, I mean, not woke up back to the real world of bonking and blogging), everything was still very dark. My back hurt me, and i was sore all over. I was still lying strapped into my airline seat, but it felt fractured and broken apart beneath me, so I was lying back on top of it rather than sitting in it. Where was Strawberry? I could feel nothing beside me except papers or pillow stuffing, something soft, anyway. There was absolutely no sound around me, but I felt cold. Were my eyes open? I could not tell. As I checked this with my hand I could see a faint bluish glow up far ahead, perhaps where the cockpit should be. My eyes grew a bit more used to this, and I began to make out other dark shapes and lighter surfaces inside the cabin. There were a few other seats like mine strewed around in about three centimetres or so of pale debris--but no more passengers. I was all alone. The blue light grew stronger, so now it was as if I was underwater. What is this, Likkanen, I thought to myself. Huh? Are you drowned, dude? Have you become a merman perhaps? Because, you see, I noticed I was still breathing; in the cold, this made my lungs hurt. So next I thought, OK, am I actually dead? Well, it was a natural conclusion. One often wonders this waking up after a night of clubbing.

So next I'm thinking, follow the light, dude. That is what you are supposed to do in those Nova documentaries about Near Death Experiences, perhaps it is correct behaviour under the circumstances. So I painfully climb out of my seat and begin to stumble and crawl along through the cabin toward the light, which is now much bigger and brighter and glowing. Hey, I think, at least my legs are still working--and it is true, they are the legs of a true Finn, so sturdy and dependable. they have 'sisu', which if you don't know it is the great Finnish national quality. It means 'endurance or 'persistence'. It also means 'stubbornness' and 'stupidity'. I remember particularly being very proud of my legs and feet at that moment, because understandably this was a time of great trauma for them. It isn't every day one asks them to survive a plane crash.My excellent legs carried me along through the cabin and into the first-class section, which was empty except for a few seats and a twisted trolley. At the end of it, where the cockpit should be, was the light, softly swimming and shimmering like the surface of a pool under a thin skin of ice or blue creme brulee. Or Jello. Already I was beginning to feel hungry.

And then I had the strangest feeling. I thought that if i went through that blue Jello to the other side I wouldn't like what I found at all. Not one bit! But then I thought, OK, now you are just being stupid, Likkanen--if you are already dead, what could possibly be worse than this? So then I walked through it into the light. And that was how I discovered that there is always something worse ahead.

Next time: Jurgen's Cave.