Carpet Stores, Nightmares, Wallets and Cranes

My Facebook friends know that my voting place on Tuesday was a local Middle Eastern carpet store. I got a lot of funny comments when I posted the photo below. If you look below that grand carpet hanging from the ceiling on the left, you'll see some fellow citizens at the voting booths. It cracked me up that I was voting in a Middle Eastern carpet store, but I refrained from expressing the irony.

When I walked back to my car after voting, nervous and hyped up, I saw this on a wall in an alley:

I had just gotten off the phone with my dear friend whose sister is dying of cancer, and  I had mentioned in one way or another how weird it is to live one's life when such things are happening, to make coffee, to chat about one's day, to vote in a Middle Eastern carpet shop in Los Angeles, CA. Then, I looked up at the sun in the brilliant blue sky behind these fantastic cranes on the corner of Wilshire and La Brea. I actually love construction sites and cranes, in particular. There's something magical about them, like ballet, maybe, or an angular spider's web.

I had another nightmare the night before I voted about losing my wallet, although this time I was in college, trying to register for my classes. I woke up suddenly, sweating with my heart pounding, and felt near elation as the realization dawned that it was only a dream.  I'm always struck by how trivial the content of dreams can be and how weighted their interpretation. When I snapped this photo, I was sitting in my car, waiting for one of the boys to finish their football practice. I think I look Middle Eastern, which I am, a bit, having a grandfather from Syria, which leads me back to the carpet store where I voted and the end of this post.