I dreamed that I arrived in a strange European town to conduct Tristan at the Metropolitan opera. But it is not like any Metropolitan Opera I know. it’s a series of squat low buildings and I am let off far from them and walk there.
Getting closer, I’m picked up by the violinist Daniel Draganov driving a white sedan, which pulls up to a little extra lane next to the grassy area by the opera and I get into his car. I walk into the building when he lets me off with a Dover edition under my arm and a white baton.
Oddly I don’t actually remember conducting the opera itself in the dream. Only the aftermath. I didn’t really perform it, I must’ve done something else instead, something I want to forget.
After the opera, I find myself in a hotel room with a briefcase and some papers and some money. I leave the room after locking the door, and walking around in the city I realize that aliens have invaded. The people are all somehow transformed, and I realize that it was my performance that did it. Somehow I was the unwitting agent of these aliens. I have been sent there to do this.
Uneasy, I return to the hotel and get a different room. In the room there is a briefcase and papers and a wallet just as I had before. Now I have two of each. The room is on a lower floor I believe it to be the second floor.
I have to get away from this country and warn the world. Carefully I put all my correct papers into the other briefcase. I put my money into the other wallet. I sneak out of the room and try to lock it. However, the key doesn’t really fit in the lock. I lift up the door and try to jam it in, but the hardware simply isn’t designed to make the door lockable. Where the old hardware was, it is papered over and painted in white.
I carefully look down the corridor because I want to make sure I can escape. The coast seems clear but after I walk a few yards there’s a right turn into a breakfast room and the hotel lobby and the check-in counter. I realize I wasn’t on the second floor after all. I stand there wondering how I’m going to get through the lobby and warn the world that the aliens have taken over the country.