Dream 59: Football, Running and Playing for your Supper
I was playing football as part of a team. It was an unusual field in that it seemed to be high up on top of some castle ramparts and it wasn't a full football pitch. The crowd, coach, manager and so forth were down below. They could only see odd bits of the game as the field tilted or dropped down every now and then. The ball kept going over the edge and would get thrown back up, usually with a barrage of instructions from the manager. It was quite stressful, I think it was an important game but the field made it difficult for us to maintain any sort of rhythm.
Next I was running through the countryside. P was a little way behind me and we had undertaken a running tour of some country we were visiting (highly unlikely!). I was wending my way along a path and enjoying the sun, breeze, fields, trees and so on. The path went along side a small river and followed it for a while. The running was easy. I knew P did not want to go at my pace, but he wasn't far behind and I was keeping an eye on him. I met a man in a battered blue van, he had a group of kids with him. He was trying to tell me something in broken English, but I didn't understand what.
The banks of the river opened out and more paths appeared. There were a few people on the paths and as I ran on, more and more. I was commenting on how many people there were when I suddenly came across a great long queue. There were some tents and huts in the distance and the queue was to get into them. The people were very patient and had quite a lot of camping and climbing gear with them. They let me through since I was on the running trip. I stopped to chat to one person (who looked a bit like J). She told me they were on a special hiking and climbing trip which was popular and prestigious. I told her that I had done quite a bit of climbing and she invited me to join the queue. I tried to explain that didn't have any of my equipment with me, and that it would be impossible to join them without even the basics like my harness and climbing shoes. By this time we were at the head of the queue. I knew P wouldn't be interested in climbing but I was torn between carrying on our trip and joining the new one. By this time P had arrived too. We chatted to one of the women in charge. She was talking about us doing a gig for them, in exchange I could do a hike or a climb. P and I said maybe we could do one comedy show on the first night and then do some singing the next night. They would also give us a bed and food etc. I hesitated as we normally charge a fee as well, but then we thought it might be ok this time. We had P's guitar but I wasn't sure where our other equipment, costumes etc were going to come from, but no one seemed worried about that as things just seemed to turn up when required. It was very crowded with people still trying to get into the event, but it was very calm and good natured and I thought we'd probably enjoy the gigs and staying in the camp/huts.