Nightmare Statute of Limitations

Due to a raging infection in my right cheek, I've been on a slew of extremely potent antibiotics the past couple weeks. While those antibiotics have been effective in reducing the infection and swelling in my face, they've also had a very powerful side effect: sleep disturbance. Each night I have terrible, vivid nightmares and wake up a couple times in the night. It got to the point where I terminated the antibiotics early. I know, boo-hoo. But that's not the point of this post.

Hanging in my closet is a well worn - very well worn - denim shirt that I bought(?) in probably 1991. I believe I wore that shirt (with a tie) to debate tournaments in high school. I wore it the summer before starting university. I wore it to keggers. I wore it on Spring Break. It is perfectly broken in. Robert Redford would love to own it. It is that worn. Unfortunately, though it still fits just right, I haven't been able to wear it since approximately 1994. Because sometime in 1994, I had a a very, very bad dream wherein I either (a) committed a murder or (b) was an accessory to a murder. And in that dream, I was wearing that Gap denim shirt. (Yeah, it's just a Gap. Not Ruff Hewn or Timberland or any of the other fancy early 90's brands.) Now that dream was so vivid that while I can't exactly rememeber the details of it, I can remember the impact it had on me. And the best way I can measure that impact is the fact that I have not been able to wear that shirt because I do not want to risk that dream coming true. So long as I didn't put on that shirt, there is no possible way that horrible dream could ever come true. A couple of times I've put it on thinking, "Don't be a nutter. It was just a dream." But I inevitably puss out and take it off in favor of something else.

It's been 14 going on 15 years since I had that dream. And I think the statute of limitations for a nightmare coming true has probably passed, hasn't it? Or is it still a possibility? I'm thinking it's time to either put the shirt back in rotation or burn it?

Today's Song: Romeo and Juliet, Indigo Girls (because I surely wore that damn shirt to a Park West concert - maybe Indigo Girls or Sting or something)