I can't watch movies about zombies, monsters, vampires, werewolves, witches, demons, ghosts, the Easter bunny, or things that crawl through sewage to snack on fresh guts.

Running from the living room where herky jerky, glassy eyed stiffs hunt down a bunch of people jammed in the corner of a warehouse, I yell, did they make it?

With a look of glee, Jerry hesitates. TV light splotches his face with white moving light, goes dark, turns light again. Yes, he said.

Oh good. A bunch of actors smeared with special effects and howling fake screams can all go home safely again tonight.

Scarier than made-for-television movies are this morning's dreams…I was trying to get a word together but could only manage to moan. My lips were paralyzed. Couldn't talk. In my dream I became aware of someone next to me. Looking up at the closet from the floor I realized I was crouched down with a man whispering in my ear.

Can you see him? the man asked. Some gray shape stood shrunken like a frightened little boy in the corner of the bedroom closet, his feet near my hiking shoes and his head drooped against his chest.

I have not seen him in so long, I tell the man. Trying to reassure the pasty, bloodless looking little boy, I want him to lift his head. I can only moan. I feel myself straining, sounds rumble around in my throat, but no words.

My mind skips and in my dream I rouse again. I see things sideways, as if I have my cheek on the mattress and look across the room at the old woman with heaps of flowing skirts where she rocks in a chair. Then, I see the little boy. He crouches in a pale little way at her feet where her skirts droop like a blanket. They swallow him like a tide meandering in to cover smooth stones. It is somehow imperceptible, yet fast.

Her old worn face flashes across his smooth, wan cheeks and his image appears beneath her wrinkled brow and gray bun piled with hair pins. Then he is gone or they are gone and there is just one person in the rocker, but I have faded again.

We are in a station wagon. I watch the colorful world flash by outside a back window, and nameless others are with me, including the bitch that's driving. Bouncing on a dirt lane parallel to a large storm pipe, I hear a deep, echoing voice yell, here! A woman is trapped inside the pipe, and we have just driven past her location.

Stop the car, we've found the spot, I yell. Not yet, snaps the driver. We aren't to the end yet.

Never mind the end! Stop! She is back there!

No!!!

Bitch, damn whore! STOP THE CAR!

I wake and Jerry tells me that I have only been restless and murmuring for maybe a few minutes. Who was the little boy? Usually the tangible stuff of dreams leaves a momentary sensation against the skin or butterflies in the gut that are coming from a part of the brain that keeps no memory. Usually, the dreamy things fade so fast, but this little boy is a familiar little one, or triggered a familiar sense of sadness or urgency or worry about what will happen to him. Who will help him? Why is he so pale, dejected, silent, with eyes cast at the ground as if his face were too heavy to lift?

This morning in the woods, as most mornings, I am very careful with Lily and Hershey and who has their tattered tennis ball. In deep snow we are confined to yesterday's deep ruts that we pound for a smidge more space. I worry that with one growl, and one nip for an answer, we'll be rushing to the vet again. I step outdoors with a fear that Hershey will be hurt. We thought about why we should buy a muzzle, and why we should not. We purchased a static shock training collar, but I am too wimpy to wrap it around Lily's neck.

At the bar I see J. who looks worn from so much time plowing the streets since the sky collapsed, dropping more than two feet of snow on top of the 10 inches of several days before. Snow and rain today make the mess soggy, and tonight's chill will freeze the world into a sloppy heap of snow as solid as cement. More snow is coming. I feel like the little boy, just standing with arms dangling and nothing to say.

A friend, C., had come by with a town backhoe and chomped away at piled snow. He spent extra time outside my driveway moving the heaps and pushing the mounds of snow away. With it he took a couple of Rose of Sharon bushes and other shrubs. I told J. about it as I cracked his Corona Light. I was laughing. Those plants were buried.

He thinks he was doing you a favor, J. said.

I know! I love him for it. Please don't tell him about the shrubs!

It's easier to replace plants than feelings.