A review by glenncolerussell
The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud

5.0


I enjoyed reading Freud’s book. When he speaks about dreams and their interpretation, I am reminded of a microfiction I had published years ago where the editor told me it was the weirdest story he has ever read and that a Freudian psychoanalyst would have a field day interpreting. Here it is below. If anyone would care to offer an interpretation according to Freud or any other school of psychoanalysis, I'm sure you could have some fun.

The Roof Dancer

Sidney and Sam, identical twins, crackerjack roofers, started work up on a roof one sultry July morning when Sam tripped on a piece of tar at the roof’s peak and slid down head first. He would have plunged straight to the ground if Sidney hadn’t reached over at the last moment and snatched him by his boots.

Hanging over the side upside-down, Sam had a view through a second floor bedroom window. The lady of the house was completely naked. Her ample rear end was bobbing and swinging to a polka playing on an enormous ancient phonograph.

Sidney yanked Sam back up to the roof but Sam became so excited in the process, he ejaculated his semen seed. By the time the seed popped out of the bottom of his dungarees, rolled off the roof and landed in the yard, it was the size of a cantaloupe.

From all corners of the yard kids skipped over and began frolicking with the seed. Its round contour grew to the size of a watermelon in their hands.

Sam stared down at the kids. He began a high-step gleeful dance, part mazurka, part gavotte, part rumba, part hornpipe right there on the roof, bottom to top, edge to edge, twirling like some enchanted wood nymph, his pot belly jiggling in pure ecstasy.

It wasn’t long before the man of the house, a bald, mustachioed Mr. Verea, made his way up the ladder. “What’s all this racket I’m hearing?” he asked, scanning the roof.

Sam pirouetted daintily at the peak, doffing his baseball cap. Mr. Verea grabbed Sidney by the suspenders and yelled, “Do you guys think I hired you to put a new roof on my house or perform ballet?”

“Yes, sir, right away, sir,” Sidney stammered, beads of sweat pouring off his forehead and bulbous nose.

Mr. Vera pushed Sidney rudely. “Now, I say, do it now!”

Sidney wobbled backwards, nearly toppling over the edge but regained his balance and shoved Mr. Verea back. A rapid-fire shoving match ensued along the entire length of the roof. At the same time Sam fluttered down on tiptoe, scooped up an armful of shingles and started putting them in place.

A fully-dressed Mrs. Verea made her appearance at the head of the ladder. “Get back down here,” she railed at her husband. “Let those men finish their work.”

“Nobody is going to push me on my own roof,” he replied.

“I say come down,” insisted Mrs. Verea.

“Come down yourself,” said Mr. Verea.

Stepping up from the ladder to the roof Mrs. Verea kicked her husband in the pants. He stopped shoving Sidney, turned around and started shoving her, whereupon she too started shoving him furiously.

Sidney fanned himself with his baseball cap and looked over at his brother – just now, between acrobatic leaps of a saltarello, Sam placed the last of the shingles on the tar.

As if he were at the court of Louis XIV, Sidney curtsied gracefully, then pointed to the ladder before climbing down himself. Sam followed, hips swinging but fell between the rungs. There was nothing for Sidney to do but guide the ladder, with his brother stuck in it, to the van.

The kids approached; they held the distended seed, the shape and length of a garden hose now: translucent with flecks of gold, sparkling, radiating light in their hands. When Sam jiggled and kicked down the driveway, the kids shook the magnificent seed, each shake casting out fine gold dust that turned to streams of water when it touched the earth.