Mark Forrester

Metamorphoses

While working as a cook, I have frequent anxiety dreams centered in the kitchen. Tickets are piling up, we are short staffed, supplies are running low. 86 the chicken breast. And the salmon. A large holiday party, not listed on my calendar, is waiting for their entrees.

When I become a professor, my dreams follow me to the university. It is the first day of the semester, and I am woefully unprepared. Or the second day: I have missed the first class! I am scheduled to teach a course in a subject I know nothing about. I have no syllabus. No text books. I cannot find our classroom, even the right building.

In these dreams, the parts I play are fluid, the scripts change without warning, and I struggle to keep up.

casting call—
my granddaughter names me
the arch-villain

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About the Author

Mark Forrester has taught English at the University of Maryland for more than 25 years. He is a high school dropout, a former chef, and a husband, father, and grandfather.