Breaking the Waves

Tsunami dream.

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I'm wading into the water with a toddler who can't swim. The waves lift and curl out of nowhere, and she goes under. It's so difficult -- almost impossible -- to push her up for air. The tide rushes us to shore. She's not breathing. She's barely in my grasp as I scrabble up past a roof and into a tree. The waves are rising. They're getting bigger and bigger and bigger, until they break over entire blocks -- the whole peninsula even -- and we're safe for a moment inside a house, scrambling to find any survivors before the next set takes shape...

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K. is a trained swimmer. He once taught me breast and backstroke. I doubt either would help me in the above scenario.

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I fell in love with Emily Watson as Bess in Breaking the Waves before the holy water broke her. Now she's making movies for Lifetime Television.

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In dreams like these wouldn't drowning be better?

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When a cooking misstep caused my friend to get jalapeno in his eye, he thought it was a joke when I tried to pour milk in it. As the heat increased, he relented.

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My astrological element is water. I'm cancer, the sign for disease.

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After hours and hours in the pool during weekend water polo tournaments, K. fills his goggles with milk to "wash" his chlorine-stunned eyes.

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Did anyone catch that girl on The Amazing Race who freaked out at the water slide? I think it took more courage for a grown woman to go on national t.v. wearing water wings than to confront a six-story drop-off...

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Yes, the cow juice eased the burning.