This is something I wrote a long time ago when I was a student and also working for the university ……

A Mid Spring Nightmare!
Act One

Last night I was up late after celebrating the last day of school, and beginning of the spring break. I just turned in two midterms, one assignment, and two book review papers. Last day of school for 10 days, last day of work for 10 days, cause I work for the school as a computer consultant, I also took off from work for 10 days. I needed this badly.

So anyway, after getting home late, I was doing some work on the net, advertising for the club, sending chat invitations, etc. Suddenly someone IMed me, I usually almost never answer AOL IM from strangers, specially when busy, yet I answered this guy, of course after checking him out. It was very early in the morning, maybe 2 AM. This is how it went:

S: hello sir
X: hello, how are you?
S: good
pause...... (I'm doing work in between)
X: what can I do you for?
S: are you Iranian?
X: sometimes!
S: you are funny.
X: some think so
S: do you know what moharam is?
(I'm thinking oh shiite, another Islamic lecture is coming up and I really don't have time for it!)
X: yes
S: well, there is a celebration for Ashura, Tasua, and Moharam at Mira Mesa high school tomorrow night, will you come?
X: thanks for invitation
S: are you interested
X: I don't think I can make it, pretty occupied, but thanks for the invitation
S: but we have free food afterward too
(I'm thinking about mosques' free food, or Hajis giving free food for Moharam, back when I was in Iran!)
X: thanks but busy
S: you should come, there will be symbolic traditional chain sticks too
(I'm thinking, oh we gonna bang our heads and backs with chains and qameh knives too, how can I refuse)
he goes on.......
S: you know the little ones with wooden handles .......
S: It will not really hurt your back, but it just shows you the pain that he suffered for you.....
S: you know some of the pain that he suffered........
S: do you know imam Hussein?
(I wanted to say, oh yes he is a personal friend!)
S: you know the holy Muslim saint, the story of Yazid........
X: yes yes I do
S: well if you come, Imam Hussein will save your soul
(I am thinking, great, picturing Hussein in karbalah with 72 patrons on camel backs, coming to rescue my soul!)
S: it is good for you, Hussein will save your soul, if you come tomorrow night....
X: thanks but busy
S: it is only once a year
(I am thinking, damn only once? food, chaining and banging my brains and back, rowzeh khani, prayer, and on top of that Hussein will personally save my ass too, how can I argue, I want it to be more than once a year!)
S: you know you will go to Satan in hell, unless you let Hussein to enlighten you....
X: got to go thanks (I get really busy now!)
S: OK brother, try to come, I will inform you again...
X: later
(oh boy he will inform me again, this guy really wants to save my soul, what a guy.)

After I got done, I went to bed. Now it's 3.30 AM, yet I am used to getting up 5 AM every day, automatically I get up at 5 AM. No matter how late I sleep or even if I slept at 9 PM, still wake up at 5 AM, work out, or football practice, study, or prepare to open the computer lab at 6.45 AM! So I had a few hours to sleep, but could I?

After a while, dozing off, It started: "The Mid Spring Nightmare"

"A Mid Spring Nightmare" by Ahreeman Shakespeare!

I was somewhere in the Twilight Zone, between heaven and hell! Suddenly the stranger with his green computer (it was a seyed computer), green flags (color of seyeds, Mohammed's Klan) and green aba (robe) came to me, he had a few other side kicks, he wanted to save my soul, he said come to me my son, Hussein will save you, come....

Suddenly I was in the IPC, we had a headquarter, everyone was there, the club was between heaven and hell, I guess we were in Twilight Zone!

There was The Big Guy up there, wearing all white, trying to grab my hand and drag me in to the heaven, I looked at his face, it was George Burns, damn it is true, George Burns is God! He wanted to hand me a cigar with one hand and grab my other hand to drag me up!

God: well x you really done it now, I don't know if I can save you this time....
X: it's that bad ha?
God: Yes sir, Yas sir, Yasser Arafat that is.
X: Damn…… Arafat has a reference here too!

I looked down and a guy with two horns and a pitch fork was looking at me, sticking his pitch fork up and down towards my behind. He really wanted my ass bad! I looked closer, damn it was Elvis!

King: well thank you, thank you very much (with Memphis southern accent)
X: it is you!
King: well you don't see double boy, hell ya it's me
X: never thought of you as....
King: the devil boy?
X: well ya
King: well boy, what did you think, did you possibly think a human could pop all those pills, smoke all that snow, sniff all that crystal, and still have room to stick some downers in his butt to get really high?
X: I guess not
King: well there you go boy
X: so what's the deal?
King: the deal is I want your ass boy
X: wow (thinking so does everyone else, take a number!)

Suddenly our people showed up,
There was Reza with a blue turban on his head, and one in his hand!

Reza: Dr.?
X: don't call me that, that's how I got in trouble at the first place!
Reza: Dr. X, listen, put this on and join
X: join what?
Reza: join to save your soul
X: with a blue turban?
Reza: ya, the reformists decided that as long as the black turban is for clergy, the green for seyeds, and the white for every one else, we should come with our own color
X: wow!
Reza: yup black is too reactionary and hard-line, too fundamental, so we came up with blue
X: cool dude, you are one hip Muslim boy
Reza: and the color, way too lively
X: yup it's Italian asul blue, it rules
Reza: that's what I said
X: OK but my brain dehydrates, and cannot breathe when wearing a turban!
Reza: are you being sarcastic again, blabbering your mouth and talking from your ass?
X: no don't get me wrong
Reza: I am trying to save your kaffir ass, put the damn thing on
X: no really
Reza: so what are you saying? that everyone who wears a turban doesn't get enough oxygen to his brain?
X: you said it, not me!

Intermission ……

A Mid Spring Nightmare!
Act Two

Then an angel showed up with two wings, and in a red dress! She was floating in the air, a meter above the ground...
Pantea: You finally done it, you are hanging upside down in Twilight, ha?
X: yup
Pantea: no where to go?
X yup
Pantea: I tried to save your ass by trying to tell you to be wise
X: yup you did
Pantea: no guilty conscience on my part
X: nope

There was a business woman wearing a suite with a mini skirt standing at the heaven's gate, trying to bargain her way in:

Nancy: listen chuck, I am a good Christian, let me in
Invader: take a number, we will study your case
Nancy: there is a mistake, is it because I dated Muslim men all my life?
Invader: that info is confidential, take a number
Nancy: I was just minding my own business, they barged in to my life.....
Invader: you are holding up the line

and she went to the waiting room......
3 wise men came, with a difference that they were 3 wise women, the front one looked American, yet had a Persian scarf on her head! She had an encyclopedia Iranica in one hand and a peace sign in the other, there was a peace necklace around her neck too, she had a 60s paisley dress on.....

Azadeh: Dr. how are you?
X: how the hell do you think I am? I am hanging between heaven and hell, one leg in twilight zone, Rod Serling is talking at the background, twilight zone music is mildly playing, and I cannot wake up out of this nightmare!
Azadeh: I feel for you man
X: don't give me that peace and love crap, figure how can I get out of this?
Azadeh: there you go again, you have to chew on the system's del o jigar from inside like I told you, not by revolution, but by reform .....
X: what the hell are you talking about, it is too late for that, figure something out for now?
Azadeh: Groovy man, peace and Solh be with you.....

and they went to join the cast of Jesus Christ Super Star III (the new version) for the practice play, it supposed to be out oh well hmmmm.......

I heard someone called me, someone hazy, more like a vision, a 2 dimensional, but not a full 3 dimensional figure!

Mirage: X?
X: Mirage?
Mirage: so you are finally in my dimension
X: you mean the twilight, yupo
Mirage: I spent a life time here, I guess I was too agnostic to choose a path
X: well you had doubts
Mirage: I guess I am not really a materialist, and evolutionist, yet not either an idealist and a creationist.
X: well, so now we know what happens to the intellectuals at the other side!
Mirage: did you hear B. B. King's new album?
X: damn you … will you figure a way for me to get out of here, instead of B B?
Mirage: Ahhhh, only if we were not to concern with our material situations
X: what the heck, my neck is on the line here......

and the figure hazed away in a gloomy gray, it was a mirage...............

It's a fly, it's a bird, it's a plane.
No, it's Super Man of Steel
and the new comic series will be at the store near you (TV sound said!)

and a figure wearing a blue tights with a Persian flag on his chest flown by in low latitudes.

Oh boy, I got to get up, I got to get out of here, I waited for spring break so anxiously, and now this.

Am I ever gonna wake up, or will it be too late and the 10 days vacation will be gone, and I have to right away go back to the reality without a vacation?!

X: There is no place like home, there is no place like home, I wanna go back (Dr. X in wonderland style)!

Elvis started jabbing the pitch fork in my neck,
King: what you trying to do boy? There aint no way out, besides all your buddies are down here!
X: like who?
King: like Marlene Monroe, James Dean, James Morrison, Jimmy Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, damn even Khomeini!
X: so it's really hot?
King: damn boy it's rocking and party is just getting started!

and I tried again closing my eyes, really concentrating (I was even dreaming in color) flames of red and yellow were getting close!

X: there is no place like home, no place like home..........
clicked my biker boots 3 times together at the heels!

BAaaaam...... and I woke up in my bed at home!

X: OHhhhhhh No NOoooooooooo, who are you in my bed, where is my main squeeze?
[I woke up with one hand choking myself on the neck (resemblance of King's pitch fork) and other hand holding my balls not to burn by the fire (resembling, Hmmmm well hands!)]

X: where is my babe, who are you, what are you doing in my bed?
(did not remember dating this one, I don't drink or use drugs to pick up someone like this from the night club! But I must have been drunk!)

X: go away

(It was a bearded man dressed up as Oprah!)

Khamanei: Come on give me a kiss.....
X: No, I must still be sleep, It's a nightmare!
Khamanei: No child, you are awake, but life is a Nightmare, ha ha ha (evil scientist laugh)
X: Oh no I am trapped in reality and no way out!
Khamanei: Come and give your Valiy-e Faqih a smoocher....
X: is there an end to this Nightmare?
Khamanei: Besme Allah-e Rahman-e Rahim...........

(Scream at the background)

"A Mid Spring Nightmare" by Ahreeman Shakespeare

Dr. X