I had the weirdest dream last night. I have dreams most nights of the week. Some are short, some are long, some about people I know, most are silly. I forget many of them as soon as I wake up. This one was different though. This dream was weird! Almost a nightmare. So bizarre, that I woke up and wrote down the entire thing.

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I was wearing a white, halter-top wedding dress standing in some sort of room. Both guys and girls were bustling about. I was just standing there, maybe looking in a mirror, and all of the sudden I started freaking out.

I realized, for what felt like the first time, I didn't want to get married!

I began going over the reasons in my head: I had just met him. My parents weren't there, my friends weren't there. I didn't plan to come to Atlanta (?) and meet someone and get married. I thought to myself, I can just get married now because all the people are here and then get divorced later. Then I shook that thought out of my head. No, it's better to end this before the wedding than after the wedding even if it is my wedding day. When I get married I want to be married for good and not get divorced.

I turned and asked a passer-by for my engagement ring and that person handed it to me. I slipped the ring onto my middle finger. "Wrong finger." I laughed, pulling the ring off. The person looked at me strangely as I pushed the ring down on my ring finger. The diamond shined up at me but I noted that it was the type of engagement ring I hated -- diamond solitaire. Yuck. This isn't what I wanted.

I sighed and looked around. All these people were in the room helping me get ready (fixing my hair and putting on my makeup) and I was letting them help me while I kept thinking to myself that I didn't think I should get married. I told one girl that I was calling off the wedding because I couldn't go through with it. It was too much. It was too fast. I walked up to another girl, gripping her arm and whispering frantically, telling her the same thing. I gave them my reasons and kept adding more. In fact, when I was talking to the last girl it dawned on me that I didn't even know if he was married to someone else. I tried to remember if he had a wife and kids. For some reason, I felt like he did.

“Where is Brad?” I began asking people in the room. They said he had just walked past the room we were in. “Did he see me?” I asked urgently. Someone said yes and I said, "Dang that's bad luck!" Then I thought to myself, oh well I'm calling off the wedding anyway.
I stopped to take pictures with friends because I figured even if I didn't go through with the wedding, I wanted to remember how pretty I looked.

I kept thinking to myself, I've got to call this off right now. I asked one of the guys where Brad was and he pointed out to the field. Immediately, I ran out of the room, outside and down the porch steps. For a second, I could see myself, fully decked out in my wedding dress with my hair and makeup intact. I was holding the length of my dress at my sides so I could run. I was running out into the field where tons of guys were throwing a football around.

I saw the back of a white man with super curly hair. He was dressed in a white button down shirt, black dress pants and an open black vest. There he is, I thought to myself. I started screaming Brad's name. The man turned around and I stopped abruptly, startled to realize this man was not Brad. I don't even know what he looks like from behind I moaned to myself.

Then I turned and to my relief, there was Brad. He easily caught the football gliding toward him. He spotted me and grinned. He was cute, brown-skinned, about 6'8 (he had to bend down to hug me) and was dressed in jeans and a long sleeve camel colored shirt. He is wearing jeans. I was irritated at the thought, but ignored it because of what I was about to say. Brad seemed pleased to see me in my wedding dress and after he hugged and kissed me on the cheek, he stood there grinning at me. I barreled on.

"We can't get married." The words fell out of my mouth. His smile faded. He was gripping the football looking at me like I was crazy.

"What? Why not?" He asked me.

"I'm sorry. This just isn't a good idea.” I said.

He put his head down, I tipped his head up to look at me and went on telling with my explanations, "My mom isn't here. My dad isn't here. My best friends aren't here. I didn't expect to come to Atlanta and get married. I don't even know if you're married. I don't even know what you look like from behind."

"Huh?" I lost him at the last reason.

I tried to explain, "Before, when I was looking for you, I thought someone else was you and it wasn't and I realized that I can't recognize you from behind....never mind. I know we’re not, but just feel like we're eloping. I can't go through with this. I'm so sorry."

Then he started giving me all these reasons for us to get married. He was trying to change my mind. I was growing more annoyed by the second. "I was just out here and I was just going to catch this football then run in there and marry you." He looked at me with sadness in his eyes.

"I'm sorry." I said weakly.

And then I thought to myself, This is why brides run away with no explanation. Here I am trying to be nice and give some sort of explanation and he is trying to talk me out of it! I could’ve just run away and just left a note for someone to take to him at the altar. But I wouldn't do that because I would die if someone did that to me. I always want an explanation. But if I would’ve known it would have turned out like this then I would have just got into a cab or in a limo with my friends and been the runaway bride. Oh wait, my friends aren't here. Are black girls ever runaway brides anyway?

He was still staring at me when I turned and walked away.

I felt like a weight had been lifted and I thought to myself, I'm glad I got out of that. I did not want to get married right now. Who's going to tell the guests? I guess he will
Then I woke up.

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I have no idea what any of that means (if anything at all). I am soooo weirded out.

The weirdest parts of my dream are that my “finacee” had a name yet I don’t know anyone named Brad (with the exception of one of my bosses at CNN and Brad Pitt haha). And there were tons of people, I knew everyone but I didn’t recognize any of the faces as people that I know now.

My mom had a pretty good interpretation that I am mostly satisfied with but I am still mulling this one over.

Whatever that dream means, one thing is clear. I need to stop watching chick-flicks, reading chick-lit and reading women’s magazines for a while ‘cause, clearly, my head is a mess.