Somehow I come to acquire a chameleon. Maybe he's a fair prize or something. He's in a plastic reptile container with a black lid. It's a small container. I am very excited about owning and caring for this creature. As I sit in the doorway of the backdoor to my old house, I watch the magical creature in his little home and give him things to crawl on. I leave him on the wooden bench that wraps around my old dining room table. It's dark and safe there.
I come back later to see my reptile friend in the evening. The kitchen is dimly lit. As I look around the back of the kitchen table, I am struck by the intense heat and radiation of a food dish next to my chameleon's container. Yes, in this dream I can sense heat and radiation. The food dish was some sort of pan pizza or lasagna in a glass dish with a rubber lid. The cheese was boiling. I could see heat waves and I knew somehow that this corona of cheesy heat was damaging to all lifeforms. I'm frantic and incredulous. I scream at my father, sitting at the computer desk in the living room, with more rage than I have ever felt in my physical life. It's something about how hot the food dish is and how he put it next to my reptile friend. My father is somewhere between chuckling at my face contorted with fury and being genuinely remorseful. As my father watches, I run back and pick up my chameleon container and I see that there's two chameleons in it. I snap off the black plastic lid with dramatic haste. At once I spot the ghastly image of my old chameleon, still clinging to his branch. His eye sockets are grotesquely inflated like radioactive, scaly balloons. The tiny yellow eyes are like dried corn kernels. His scales are entirely black, apart from the melting parts which are fleshy or yellow in tone. I am so disturbed and devastated that I am almost speechless. I realize the newer chameleon is healthier and can be saved. He's flashing different colors and is melting a little, but I still have hope. I pour my old, melting friend into the trashcan like black sludge, holding the new one in.
I gripe about how my dad is evil and stupid for trying to cover his tracks by putting a new chameleon in and immediately subjecting it to cheesy radiation. I walk over to the sink and poor tap water into the container. In some sort of reptilian miracle the water washes the melty bits and scorched scales off the chameleon as he flips around in it and eventually clambers to the surface. He is at once reinvigorated and completely healthy. This makes me happy. I can still have a chameleon friend.
I play with the chameleon outside his container over by the computer desk. My dad doesn't seem to be there. The chameleon is vivacious at this point, he's full of life. He's climbing all over my fingers like a crazy neon green monkey. He has orange highlights around his arms--a sign of good chameleon health! I am so happy. I even let him munch on my fingers with his absurdly wide mouth.
Over the following days, I tend to the chameleon in several tedious ways. I adjust the water level in the container several times to avoid drowning him, while also giving him enough to swim and bathe in. I even put a nice log/tree structure with vegetation on it inside the container, and it partially submerges. I almost crush and drown him with it at one point when he dives behind it, but I realize he's a more agile swimmer than I originally thought and he gets out in time (Side note: Chameleons don't swim. They barely even drink water). When he comes up, he starts drinking from what I realize is a little bowl of water built into the log structure that is above the waterline. I am overjoyed that he is drinking his share of water and that the log structure has a spot where he can do this. At this moment, his habitat pleases me and we are both happy. I'm pretty sure I put some blue and pink rocks at the bottom at some point.
Naturally, I take the chameleon to my job at the pet store. He's still in his container, though. I commit myself to my tasks and do lots of hard work. I come back to my chameleon who has been near the front of the store and register areas. My coworkers seem to have taken care of my chameleon in various ways. There is no water in his container, but there are crickets, big crickets, walking around in it. I am happy about this, because I was planning on starting his feeding regimen that day. However, I'm peeved that there's no water in there and that some of his habitat pieces are gone. I blame a newer employee, who I suspect was messing with my chameleon tank without my permission. Of course she doesn't know what she's doing; she's the new girl! Some time later, the crickets are gone and I determine my little buddy is well-fed.
The details are fuzzy beyond this point. I'll share what I can figure out through intense introspection techniques.
On some fateful day in the future, I come to find that someone has filled my little chameleon container with water, but the water is high. The water is, in fact, too high. There are no rocks. Someone has removed the rocks and has placed a large number of stupid orange fish in the container. My chameleon friend is in the center, under the water, clinging to the log/tree thing. He is clearly overwhelmed. The fish are community fish, but their large number and stupidity is causing them to suffocate my chameleon friend as they swim around aimlessly. As I am watching this frustrating situation unfold in front of me, I get the sense that this was done by one of my superiors. One of my managers, it turns out, has placed the fish in there. Yes, someone believed the container needed fish. I know this to be false. My chameleon was fine by himself. His habitat was not theirs to manipulate or deconstruct. As the time on the clock for this dream runs out, I am able to pour out some water and give my chameleon buddy some space above the water to keep his head. Not comfortable, no, but it is the best compromise I can make between his personal reptilian needs and the evil conspiracy of my team leaders.
Nearly every part of this dream seems to have come from my experiences as a pet store employee. My dad murdering a reptile with nuclear pizza? That means something else entirely.
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| Friend, perched on my chubby fingers. |
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