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Sacramento. 

The State Capital of the State in which I was born.  The State in which I've resided for thirty-four of my thirty-six years.

Despite having spent so much of my life in the State of California, I hadn't even driven through the Capital until I was in my early 30s.  Until then, I always veered off Interstate 5 towards the coast before hitting the State Capital; heading for San Francisco, and sometimes across the Golden Gate Bridge to the coastal Counties to the North.

And even after driving through Sacramento a few times, I hadn't set foot upon the Capital of my home State until the end of this past Winter.

I'd found a dealership in Roseville that offered me a reasonable payout for my 2000 Hyundai Elantra - a car I'd had for nearly ten years, but no longer wanted or needed.  On the way to the dealership, I missed a turn-off and ended up in a run-down section of Sacramento.  At one point, I got out of the car and went into a liquor store to get directions.

The directions were incorrect and took me to a place I hadn't intended on going.  Namely, the City of Placerville, where I got better directions and was soon back on course.  I'd enjoyed being lost briefly, but would have to wait a while before making it a way of life. 

Two weeks later, I was back in Sacramento.  Less than a week into traveling, my friend Barnaby picked me up in Davis, CA.  The 18 miles from there to his place in the Alkali Flat-section of Downtown Sacramento took mere minutes in his car.  On foot it would have taken perhaps six hours.

The next morning, I awoke on Barnaby's couch and searched around for a pen and something to write on.  Upon a napkin, I wrote down a very vivid dream I'd just had about a High School track meet.  The previous day, in Davis, I'd walked past such a meet and decided against stopping to check it out.  A lone man with a full salt-and-pepper beard and a thirty-pound hiking pack might stick out at a High School athletic event.

In the past month and 1/2-plus, I've had dozens upon dozens of dreams while sleeping on this same couch.  The couch of a friend I've known for two-thirds of my life.  In the State Capital. 

Here and there I've spent a night elsewhere: the sloped lawn of City Hall, alongside members of Occupy Sacramento; a cheap Motel near the river.

At several points, I've felt stuck here.  At each of those points, however, something important eventually happens.

A long, enlightening conversation with the proprietor of a Motel.

Time spent with a homeless man who I've never met in waking life, yet who somehow seems familiar.

Whenever I ask the question of whether I'm awake or dreaming something is revealed, and I become aware that there are reasons that I haven't left this place.  The revelation always provides the answer; and the answer transcends the dual nature of perception inherent in the question.

I've been analyzing certain memories; looking for the underlying message.  The seed.  The key.  The more I analyze, the more it seems that memories of dreams become indistinguishable from those of waking life.

The moment of waking and the moment that the dream begins - these are the frozen, immortal moments that do not end.  Time starts when you step out of the mirror, on one side or the other.  Time and space on the one side reflects the other, but the rules are different.

How far the ripples extend and which shores they arrive at remains to be seen.  At this point, I don't feel like the reason I've stayed so long in Sacramento has much to do with what has happened on this side of the mirror.

What I'll be sharing with you in a series of posts over the next day or two is what has happened on this side of the mirror.

Then I will leave the State Capital.  For real, this time.  A friend is on her way to help extract me.