Commentary 04

16. See? Joe is back into the dream world he's supposed to be in - smiling. And (somehow) undressed... Of course he muses on all this male excitement he's been having - but then gets right to work again.

The bleary-eyed nurse shift is a bit off. They usually change far before the patients wake up and start getting around.

We do see here that there is an unnatural efficiency to this place, as well as being constantly monitored. Convenience for the patient, but obviously knowing everything he's doing.

Now in the library, we see the sensual aspects returning - sheer comfort. Also, a tweak of Amazon's nose by name. Interesting here is that even as readers, we are getting to see that Joe is trying to figure out what is going on with dreams. So they may have him back in dreamland, but do they really?

17. Joe has Roger convinced. And Sue tells us where she found tactile stimulation was good in a dream. Just in time for shift change. Here's a hint that they might do more than just wonking people's dreams all day.

18. Of course, Joe is back with his kahuna mentor again. Asking about dreams. This is again from one of King's books, although he mentions there are a lot of books on dreams. But the first to tell me that people dream when awake - all the time.

19. Uh-oh - Joe's just fallen back to Adventureland.

And we are introduced to the Buddha-like figure sitting in the canyon. Alabaster and Onyx side by side. Doesn't happen in nature that I know of. Joe figures it might have been a meteorite, but this is just a guess. Mainly because it's surrounded by sandstone, but that wouldn't necessarily make it so.

There is a whole interesting point here that I never got back to. I really wanted to, even in the Prequel, but it didn't happen. You have to study what the different sides of the statue tend to do, what effects they have. This will wind up being motivation for all sorts of things later.

Unfortunately, this section also introduces us to the flash floods which rip through this canyon with frequency. Probably protects the figure somehow. But a true cliff-hanger this time...

20. And I don't really know why he wound up in cartoon land, except that he was overdue. And a great contrast to nearly being drowned. They're playing "guess the cloud", an endless lazy afternoon game. After a nice conversation, they head on down the hill to the barnyard and Joe is cherishing all the great times from his childhood.