My Business Trip to the Moon

I dreamt that I went with two co-workers on a business trip to the moon. We went there in space helmets and short sleeves; the moon was very balmy in my dream. I was happy to see that the clumpy dust was a consistent blue-white color, but I was disheartened to see the entire earth in my field of vision, to see that I was so far from it.

I wanted to go to the Sea of Tranquility, but my co-workers said it was time to go. When we got back to our landing spot, our capsule was no longer there. One co-worker sat down in the dust and started arranging driftwood around him. "What are you doing?" I asked. "I'm putting the ship back together," he said. "Come on, let's go." I had to explain to him that the pieces of wood were not our capsule and he, confused, argued, "But it got us here!"

I set out to find out what happened to our capsule. I found a moon base and was able to use the giant-screen telephone to call back to our company on earth. I learned that a vice president of the company needed a capsule to pick up his girlfriend, and that ours was the closest available. They promised to send one shortly. I walked around the moon base and met some other employees. One guy complained that he hadn't been told before that the moon was this warm or this casual, and all he brought with him was suits and overcoats. He felt embarassed for being overdressed. I reached into my bag and gave him some of my t-shirts. "Keep them," I said, "I'm going home soon."

I went back to landing site to find that my coworkers were gone, too. They left a note apologizing for leaving me, but they also left instructions and a form for how to order another capsule to come for me.

The capsule came in pretty short order--not a long enough wait for me to worry much or get mad at my co-workers for leaving me. I was pretty anxious in the capsule by myself, though. I tried to roughly calculate the chances that my ship would overshoot the earth and hurtle out into space for eternity. At one point I was so panicked that I regretted leaving, thinking that it is better to be stranded on the balmy moon than to be lost in space forever. But then I re-entered, splashed down, and was glad to be home.