In Your Dreams: A national lottery

Tower of London chopping block

And the winner is

By Moristotle

Last night I had another installment of a recurring dream.
    A start-up political party has been trying to mount a campaign to take back government. In a move to raise money for political action, they have announced a lottery. Tickets are expensive, $25, but the payout for the winner is huge. He (or she) gets to be the one to wield an axe at the beheading of a certain high government office holder.
    I never enter lotteries, but in my dream I see myself mailing in my check and receiving a ticket.
    And the next day a car pulls up at my house, and two men in long black coats come to the door. (I’m inside my house, but somehow I can see them getting out of their long, black car and walking toward the house. But, then, I remember it’s a dream, so everything’s okay.)
    One of the men says he heard that I might be available for a special assignment at the beheading, in case my ticket isn’t selected. Would I agree to be at the chopping block, just in case something goes wrong?
    I don’t know what they’re talking about, but they say it’ll be okay, and they know from what they have heard of things I’ve said that I’ll be glad to be there for the occasion.
    I say okay, they can count on me.

The next day, the winner of the lottery is announced and, sure enough, it’s not me. But the same big, long, black car comes up to my house, and I am chauffeured to the site of the execution.
    The official is brought out in manacles and forced to lay his neck on the chopping block. He has duct tape holding his thumbs against his palms so he can’t tweet anything.
    The lottery winner is brought out, announced, and handed the axe. The lottery people show him where to stand and one of them nods to go ahead and chop.
    The lottery winner takes the axe, but he has turned clammy pale and almost drops it. He tries to steady himself and draw the axe up, but again he sags and this time drops the axe. “I can’t do it,” he says. “I can’t do it.” And he runs off the stage.
    One of the lottery people – the lead man who came to my door the previous day – calls me over and hands me the axe. “Okay, this is why you’re here,” he says. “We know we can count on you.”
    I take up the axe, which feels marvelously light and well-balanced. I can’t understand why the lottery winner had difficulty with it.
    I step to within the axe handle’s length of the pumpkin-headed official’s neck and position the blade to lop.

Something bumps against me. I hear a voice.
    My wife is shaking me and yelling something.
    Finally I’m awake enough to make sense of it.
    “You kicked me and poked me!” she says. “And you were mumbling about stomping a pumpkin. Stop that and go back to sleep!”

Copyright © 2018 by Moristotle