Agony and Irony

So, this morning Margaret and I were enjoying our Saturday treat breakfast at Avenue G (baked egg and cheese for her, a scone for me), and I suddenly remembered that I’d had a dream last night about meeting John Darnielle.
 
I told Margaret about it: John was sitting on a highway embankment practising some new material. The embankment was cobblestone, inclining down to a parking lot; I spotted him from the road across the street from the parking lot, and drifted over closer to greet him. He was wearing a jacket with patches of paper affixed to it, with lyrics written on them for songs he was working on (this struck me as impractical — he couldn’t very well read them looking down at them — and not especially snappy-looking, but hey, it’s not as though I’m a fashion hero). After a short while he paused, and I introduced myself: ‘Hi, I’m AKMA, that guy who wrote an article about you, just wanted to thank you for all the great music’, but I sensed that I was beginning to ramble and fawn. I wanted just to shut up, was trying to wind down my monologue, and John evinced a strained patience as two members of his band (no one I recognised, not Peter Hughes nor Yuval Semo nor Jon Wurster) stood and waited. I made a closing joke about not introducing my eighteen-year-old daughter to Wurster, but it wasn’t funny and I was feeling increasingly desperate and stupid. So I woke up.
 
I explained to Margaret that I woke up feeling intensely relieved. I had escaped from the mortifying situation, and it had only been a dream! She laughed and noted that if it had been her dream, she’d have been overshadowed all day by the memory of such intense awkwardness. This difference comes as no surprise to us, nor to any who know us well….