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brynnaverse · 7 years

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Last Night’s Dream

Foreward:

No one likes hearing about other people’s dreams, I know that. I remember hearing Noel Fielding once say something like, “listening to other people’s dreams is dreadfully dull.” But I can’t find the source for that quote, so I may be wrong. Therefore, I don’t expect you to read this. It’s written badly anyway.

Preface:

I have apocalyptic dreams all of the time. They’re usually extremely vivid. Pieces of these dreams sometimes sneak into my consciousness and it will take me half the day to realize they’re fake dream-memories and not memories of actual events. Typically, in these apocalyptic dreams I either (a) accept my fate relatively quickly in a wave of calmness or (b) find the group of people I trust, who I can hold up with and survive the impending doom[*]. You would think that my brain would register these biological hallucinations as nightmares, but 90% of the time, it doesn’t. Ninety-percent of the time dream-self is either completely at peace with the situation or is excited to bring my important people together to solve the puzzles/ problems at hand until my eyes decide to wake up. When my brain has decided to survive Armageddon, I wake up inspired. I can solve anything, even if I don’t become the leader of the team, I know that I’m important to survival (not the survival of mankind, to say, but the survival of my team...they’re the important ones anyway).

So here we go. From this point forward I will be writing in first person: I, Me, Mine, blah blah blah, are all going to be in reference to the dream-self. All footnotes are in reference to my real life, or day-self.

The Dream:

I was living in California[**]. I ran a small business managing performing artists[***] while spending the other half of my time learning about marketing and performing contortion. I was making a decent living, I wasn’t worried about bills and taking courses to help further my career came across as affordable. My life was entirely ran from my laptop, my external hard-drive, & my phone. The world was in a relatively troubled state. There were horrific events happening around the globe, but none of them directly effected me or my happy little life on the fringe. Ignorance is bliss. My dad was in the Air Force[****], if I needed to worry about anything, he would tell me. My dad is also the sort of person who believes in independence, problem solving, adventure, and working things out on your own: therefore, he’s likely to withhold information if HIS interpretation of said information will irrationally scare you and hold you back from your own freedom.

I was reading about a cruise. It was a small networking cruise that was intended to be packed with people in the variety-show industry. There would be performances, seminars, socials, and other general conference things. The focus was to get professional performers to present themselves better, on the back-end, to improve their footing in their desired market. I wanted to go. I felt like I needed to go! I had never been on a cruise, and this was the ideal opportunity to brush up on my skills as a manager.

With the world in its current state, I called my dad and asked him if it was the appropriate time to go on a cruise. He had mentioned a few countries that weren’t ideal to visit & that things on the American front were a little rocky, but that it should be okay. So I enrolled.

When I called to schedule my booking the lady on the phone told me that the ‘Performers & Networking Retreat’ was on a larger ship than the flyers proclaimed and it was due to the fact that we would be sharing the boat with an ‘Adult Christian Retreat’. She assured me that both conferences were on opposite sides of the ship and it was unlikely that the two groups would mingle. I didn’t care. I wasn’t even sure why she thought it was so important to go on about. I took a mental note of it and registered for the conference.

The weather was beautiful the day the ship left. I was a little intimidated going on this networking retreat by myself. Usually at conferences I have one of the performers that I manage with me and simply speak on their behalf, and I’ve never presented my performer-self in such an established environment. I packed lightly, we would only be on the water for 48-hours and the dress code said casual. Thus, my packing consisted of 2 clean black tank tops, a pair of clean jeans, structured sandals, my laptop, my external hard drive, a notebook, a pen, a water-proof disposable camera, & a crappy little Nokia phone that I would be able to keep signal and be used while at sea. I left my real phone on land. I kept my clothes and major electronics in my backpack in my room and carried the other things with me in a hip-satchel as I wandered throughout the ship taking in the full retreat experience.

For a long time, everything was running smoothly. The social events were ran a lot like raging college parties with a speakeasy vibe. You needed passwords and handshakes to get into certain areas and the only way to get those was to meet the right people and ask the right questions. You were forced to make friends, otherwise you were basically excluded from the conference. Each of the event spaces was set up like a performer's wonderland. There were a few traditional stages with lush velvet curtains. Some were small lit platforms where people could gather around and watch the showcase. Others were improvised stages set up on the backs of broken down trucks in warehouse caverns in the heart of the ship. There was beautiful graffiti, sparkling lights, small private bars in hidden rooms, and mazes of color, each area was its own rabbit-hole where you had to gather information from various people and collect your own unique-clique of industry-individuals. It was getting dark, the weather was turning gloomy and the waters a little choppy.

I ended up in a section furnished with classic cars that had been gutted and modified to create seating areas, bathroom stalls, bars; even flipped over and covered in a layer of acrylic to become a stage of gears, engines, and tubing. The group I had bonded with was made up of magicians mostly, a few people who owned venues, and a sprinkling of actors with a small awkward array of skills. There were one or two agents that I wanted to talk to and a manager who was an ancient juggler who really made it big back in the day, but wasn’t interested in being on stage anymore. There was a magician on stage. He kept complaining that the waters were too rough and that it was ruining all of his tricks. I assumed that he was just too drunk to perform them well. Every once in awhile a new person would wander in, look appalled, and storm off. The magicians rotated. I was happy to have finally found some sort of routine. As much as I loved the rabbit holes, it was nice to be somewhere comfortable for a little while.

I wandered off through a maze, a beautiful magician was leading me by the hand swearing that he needed to show me something. We ended up on the deck of the ship. The water was black, the sky thick with clouds, and a thin cold mist filled the air. I liked the way it felt when I breathed it in, but the way the boat was rocking hurt my ankles. I caught glimpses of stars through breaks in the clouds. The planes flew low into the city. You could tell the airlines by the colors of the wings. We were close enough to port that you could still see a line of lights and buildings, but it was too far away to make out definite shapes. I noticed a few other boats in the water. Big freight ships slowly bobbing along next to giant military vessels. They made our cruise ship seem insignificant. I guess it was romantic. We didn’t talk much, just listened to the thunder rolling in and kissed hard like we were really in love even though we barely knew each other [*****].

---I don’t have much memory of the next part of this dream, knowing the way that I dream it was probably sexy stuff but it’s not integral to the story---

Struggling to remember puzzles and passwords, I was determined to find my way back to the stage of deconstructed cars. The events were dying down as the night went on and less and less people were out and about. Everyone I saw seemed to have sour looks on their faces like they didn’t want to be there. It wasn’t the vibrant retreat that I’d left... but it was. I stumbled through a curtain onto the acrylic stage floor, the tides turning for the worst. Standing there was a woman in a black pant suit swaying back and forth holding a book. The audience, though a mere 20 or 30 people, was mostly made up of people in white tank-tops and grungy jeans, a few of them wearing blazers nodding along to the string of hate flowing from the woman’s mouth. I noticed the clique I had created sitting high on top of the roof of a car in the back of the room looking-on with confusion.

The woman was going on about how, “magic is all lies and deceit given to man by the Devil” preaching how, “God would be ashamed if he knew what we were congregating over.” and that “we would be cleansed by fire and brimstone if we did not beg for forgiveness.” This went on continuously as more and more nodders trickled into the space. After a while of sitting at the back of the stage I stood up and asked her, “If you’re so offended by all of this, why are you here?” She looked back at me with hatred in her eyes as if to say, “it’s the only thing I’ve ever known.” but her voice shrieked with profanities as she had her minions drag me off stage.

My emotion at this point, confused. I didn’t have much time to question the situation. A loud crash that echoed through the ship. The colorful lights that once lit the rabbit holes became a violent, fluorescent white blinking between red. I squirmed out of the clammy hands of the security guards and ran through the maze that my temporary love had shown me. The space was small, filled with quick turns and dead ends so I didn’t worry about anyone following me, not many other people would fit. Especially not the nodders.

I returned to the deck of the ship. There was a scattering of people emerging from their rooms, obviously performers awakened from a deep sleep, still coated in their glitter and hairspray. There were also a few people in white tank-tops and grungy jeans adorned in their thrift-store blazers. Everyone looked out into the ocean. A hundred yards away, if you looked really hard, you could see the black curved top and periscope of a U-boat. It was facing the wrong way, the tides had turned it around, it had rammed into the side of one of the giant barges that seemed so peaceful before. The percussive waves from the collision began to reach the cruise ship and we rocked at mercy to the sea. I thought to myself, “Maybe the freight ship is okay, maybe everyone is okay. It wasn’t a head on collision and the barge is so much bigger than the U-boat that it wasn’t enough force to have any real effect. Maybe! the water absorbed most of the shock and everything is fine!” I wound my disposable camera and took a picture placing the strap around my wrist.

It was raining pretty heavily at this point and lightening was littering the sky. I asked a few people if they had seen more of the situation and if they could explain it to me. They said there was a loud rumble and everything shook before the U-boat ever reached the surface, other people mentioned that there was a smaller military boat behind the barge & that they collided as a result of the U-boat’s interference. I had noticed that there were more ships in the water now than there were earlier. Everyone was talking at this point. Every story was different. The planes were getting lower.

I ran to a stairwell and called my dad.

Out of breath and covered in rain I opened with, “Hey! so, I know it’s late but I have a few questions.”

Concerned he responded, “Is everything Okay?”

I was becoming worried, “I don’t know....but you may know more about the situation than I do. I don’t know if it’s made it to the news yet, but a U-boat has just crashed into a barge off the coast...”

“It hasn’t made the news yet, but I knew about it, I just got called into duty”

“What?! You’re never called into duty?”

“We don’t really have time to talk about this.”

My father quickly explained to me that war was on the horizon and that tensions were so high that almost any catalyst would be seen as a direct threat and initiate an international war. Though the military knew that it was a large earthquake that caused the U-boat to veer off course they would announce it to the public as aggression from international powers leaving them with no choice but to use nuclear action. He said that he had been “On Hold” from the Air Force for deployment. That he knew he would probably be leaving soon, but that no one knew when.

“How could you not tell me this?!” I screamed into the Nokia brick. People on the cruise ship and transitioned from gossipy-confusion to actual panic.

“I didn’t think it would happen so soon! I’ve been on hold before and nothing has happened, it wasn’t worth worrying about. You going on a cruise wasn’t going to change any of that.”

Ocean water was sloshing onto the lower decks, people were running around scrambling and screaming. I’d never been on a cruise, but I’d been on a lot of ships. For the most part, they were pretty self correcting. At this point our best option was to ride the waves until we made it through the storm.

Dad asked, “Are you okay? I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, please say something.”

I hadn’t noticed my silence, eventually I responded, “Yeah, I’m okay, I understand.”

Someone grabbed my hand and pulled me up-stairs to the captain’s deck [******].

Dad yelled, “Bryn! are you okay?!”

“I think so, I don’t really know what’s going on anymore.”

I looked out over the edge and saw smaller ships get swallowed by larger waves. It had seemed that the port had deployed every boat it had, like everyone was fleeing the city.

Dad barked, “Stay on the line as long as you can, I need to know you’re okay!”

“I’m trying!” I quickly responded out of breath, as the few people on this deck began adorning life jackets. I snapped pictures of the city burning in the distance. I looked up, most of the rain had stopped but lightning was booming all around us. It struck one of the wings of a plane which came barreling into the ocean slicing into the sea like a steaming butter knife made of screams.

I tried to stay calm, but I was scared, I was legitimately was scared. This was real! The world was going to end with a huge storm opening for nuclear holocaust and there I was on the top floor of a ship with a bunch of strangers wearing life preservers like they were playing dress-up. Our ship jerked as Captain Alex [*******] tried to stay on top of the waves. People shouted information at me to relay to my Dad, he was our only contact to the outside world at this point, he was our best bet at being saved.

We had been turned around so many times that the end of the barge was swinging toward the bow of our ship. The sea was saturated with vessels and chunks of metal.

A metallic boom echoed through the ship, water violently drowned the lower decks.

---At this point, I was terrified, I wanted to hope that I would survive this, but I thought about how useless survival would have been. My notes, laptop hard-drive, my professional life was in my room. My room was filled with water. Even if I survived I would have nothing, the life I had spent so long building was over. It was hard to accept that. All I had was a crappy Nokia phone, my ID, and a waterproof disposable camera. Livid at myself I thought, “What the fuck is wrong with you? This isn’t how the world functions anymore! All of these things you feel like you need to carry with you are archaic and useless in modern society?! Why can’t you just function like a real person?!”---

Dad was still on the line, “What was that?! Where are you?!”

You could taste the salt of the sea in the air. The ocean was creeping closer to our peaked oasis, Captain Alex knew that our time was up. More planes crashed into the ocean in the distance angering the sea. The group panted and panicked as we inflated the life raft. Everything was slippery and nothing was working.

I cried back onto the phone, “I have to go! I know you and Mom don’t talk but if you don’t hear back from me you need to call her and tell her that I love her-”

A huge wave toppled over the inflating dingy, swallowing my plastic brick and pulling my arm down into the cold void of the angry ocean. I was stuck to something. I gripped the side of the dingy with my right arm and felt the water rush up my nose. After a good deal of struggling, I was pulled up onto the raft by the other people who were on the captain’s deck. That was it, the ocean was destroying everything in sight. I snapped pictures of everything. Debris in the water, planes smashing into the water, explosions off of ships in the distance. I took a picture of the cold, scared group with my camera and began crying. The angry preacher lady was there, the fight completely wiped out of her, the fear I read in her face before radiated throughout her entire body. I didn’t recognize the others. My anxious brain ran through the situation, “Could it have happened differently? What did I do wrong? Was this the end?” A Southwest plane nose-dived into the water less than 50 yards away sending an aftershock that the little raft would never survive... I was scared... legitimately and genuinely scared.

I woke up.

[*]: We all know that the latter is ridiculous, everyone thinks that they’re special enough to collect the perfect team of miraculous misfits who can survive Armageddon. Let’s be real, the likelihood of that is EXTREMELY improbable; no one is a superhero. If the ground fell off the Earth everyone would die unless they were in a plane & then they would die when they ran out of gas; the longest lasting survivors would be the handful of individuals in space, but they too would (most likely) run out of resources and too, meet their demise.

[**] My mother is extremely superstitious, I was raised being taught that California is going to fall off. My mother, though primarily atheist and extremely skeptical, genuinely believes that if SHE goes to California it will fall off due to her presence. She is scared that I have inherited this curse and that if I move there, it will fall off... because of me.

[***] This is what I currently do for a living, though I plan on moving to California, I don’t believe that I will be able to support myself on my current business structure and will require another part-time job to supplement my income.

[****] My dad is actually in the Air Force.

[*****] I love these moments. I’m really into short term, hyper-condensed relationships where both people can really experience that ideal of ‘love’. Everyone involved is 100% a part of the moment and truly wants to be with the other forever. When everyone knows that there are definite factors that will terminate the actual possibility of this never-ending love, but disregard that knowledge because of the moment. “It’s only forever. Not long at all.” My friend once called them “Weekend Marriages”. I’ve adopted this term, even though they rarely happen on weekends for me.

[******] I’d like to say it was the hot magician from earlier in the dream, but I don’t remember. #dreamlogic

[*******] I don’t know why I knew the name of the captain

#dream #end of the world #apocolypse #nightmare #ocean

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harmonyresonant · 5 years

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Limitations of wisdom and its affect on motivation.

The last time I fell in love I knew it was destined to fail, perhaps in one of the worst ways it could. I said to her it felt like two galaxies colliding, but galaxies can either group together or tear themselves apart and fly away.

Those moments come to me more than most I think, at least consciously, the thoughts that are so easy to let escape as trivialities, impulses to be excised with just as much fervour as their entrance, but yet if only accepted, could stop a mistake, or change your life.

What's the criteria for distinguishing these kinds of thoughts? Risk? Cost? Benefit? Joy? Importance? Substance? Love? I've spent years trying to find the real source of motivation, of my motivation, because at the end of fear is truth, and fear will only propel so far as your body and mind allow it.

Justifying motivation is not esoteric for the starved of food or hungry for love. Motivation and its reasons are intertwined with purpose, and with it - our sense of direction, and with that, our sense of growth or death.

Polony and tomato sauce with white bread, Bread on its own, Chips from the fish n chip shop, Nutri grain with no milk for dinner, no food brought to school, a home of bullying, dream killing, suppression. I'm just the tip of the iceberg. I empathise with the meth addict on the street, the Mum that boils her baby daughter, the husband that murders his family, each a victim of environment and circumstance left to play out its default option.

I know all about default. I know nearly everything that needs to be known about how it plays out. When I rejected it, I was commanded by every single person and circumstance around me to let go of the fight. I watched as my friends became the victims of it, drop outs, pregnant, jailed, drugged, abused, stiffled, angry, lost. Stop it. That's wrong. Are you sure? I can't believe you would do that. Take this, you owe me. Be more considerate. Let's have a talk. You just need to be a 16 year old. Your results are in. That's just how it is. It's time to move on. You seem chaotic. You just seem upset is all. I'm just trying to help. I think you need to see a psychologist. I think we should just be friends. If there were words to describe the amount of fury and anger I hold towards individuals of my past I would save you from them because I have shown each of these comments their due diligence and marvelled at my own self control. To entertain those people in my mind gives them an authority I refuse to allow, so I move on.

When global weather patterns are shifting and solutions are being found by quantum computer augmented AI systems as pornography fills every void that opens - spite, seemed like the most reasonable response to such as unreasonable world. At 11 through to 22 It worked to dissociate my want of meaning in my circumstances, a want of meaning in where I felt I should belong and where I am, people often pointing out I should be a drug addict and dead or in jail, adjunct simultaneously to those same individuals pressuring success with their own benchmarks. All three things only not the case because of a mixture of calculated precision and blind luck. They wouldn't know, because they are unable to know, they refuse to know, outright, in front of you, so I would achieve because fuck you. Anger and rage is bottomless, perfect for a mixed up misunderstood adolescent male. The nerve of family to attempt comparisons of their standards with my own makes me laugh with a deep seated sickness. They arent any better off knowing differently. I couldn't control myself if I indulged myself in their correction. I've done it to some, corrected them, but my capacity for flooding someone with sadness and tearing their soul from them isn't so much fun as violently calculated. It's what comes after, my mothers death a calculated suicide of neglect, the insidious idea to die and make everyone your victim to alleviate guilt for failing to be held punished for your sins ready like a conspiring death eater to leach its next victim through me. How she coughed up black tar of putrid rotted lung flesh and congealed blood as CPR accidentally flooded her airways, typical of wanton excess of disgust. These details are best left undisclosed until times like this. How they saw me as a victim when i spared them. Of course though, they were too cowardly to ask. Hugs as it were. For their embrace, but they soon realised I wasn't available for receiving empathy because when I look at people I see directly into their soul, and when they are ready, they tell me what they are afraid of, in their own way, and it was too much for my family to cope with, because they're afraid they were responsible for killing her and conspiring to create the circumstances albeit naively in arrogance which eroded my Mums mental health and therefore my sister and I's life. I looked directly at my Uncle Warren in the emergency department without a tear in my eye watching the circus unfolding in front of me and I saw it written over his face, laughing at her losing her job, her sadness, her divorce with the members of the Smith side, now she lay dead, then he looked away. The too hard basket became my home because that's what these people do to hard things, they are the lowest kinds of human, the ones that lie to themselves about their affect on children, and can't help but make it worse by leaving them there alone scared with no excuse other than fear. Besides, school was starting up in 4 weeks, there was ironing to do. Clothes to fold. Forms to sign. He'll be fine. He'll get over it. The young soldier boy. How if they demonstrated any strength to cry in front of me in regret i would explode, they don't deserve to cry. I hold onto this until they either die or reconcile it. I'm good at waiting.

So for a while I forgot what love even was. Then she stepped in. Blind luck reared its head, and she showed me a warmth, depth and love so beautiful, graceful and innocent I felt like if I touched her my fear and hatred would spread like a disease. There are certain decisions we make in life as people that we don't understand, and we wear the consequences. I am not blessed with that capacity, I was not afforded the resources needed to make the conscious skills we develop young, into the subconscious - everything became consciously calculated, what I wear, what order the day is in, what words I use, my tone, my posture, my timing, what people i need to manipulate, what are their current moods, their buttons, when the rain falls or the concrete cracks it has always been my fault or my responsibility - better me than my insane family. Of course you don't win by playing nicely. You don't learn by being comfortable. And of course, through the gauntlet, you don't feel good about it. Good or great, make your decision, and in poverty when you're broken, you are forced to choose great, usually for as long as it takes until your circumstances begin to sustain themselves, and there is only space for a few so you have to do what's necessary for as long as necessary. There were plenty of times I would punch my windows, the walls work cartons and scream, how pathetic, I got a hold of myself quickly. Got psychological problems? Bury them. Getting worse? Bury them. Life is not a documentary or a game, fail to achieve certain things in certain timelines while the cards are stacked against you and the consequences are extreme. Even more so without financial or social securities/networks. So after years of neglect she began to make me feel like I could rest. Like I deserved it. She helped me forgive myself for the stress I had caused myself and other people. She forgave me for being sorry that I couldn't be the guy she needed me to be, that I couldn't be Nathan because I was unsure who or what that even was.

Spite evaporated and then I was purposeless, my motivation gone, it disrupted my focus, my academic results, the routine of my fractured world. And she became my angel, she became the person that would forgive me for failing and tell me it would be alright and I would believe her because she understood me, I live in those moments just by remembering her, but as soon as she opened her arms she was gone. She was doing things my mother didn't and she coped a lot of difficulty from me for doing it and the legacy of failure in parenting, guardianship and neglect continued to haunt me, as it started to haunt then eventually remove those I loved. It wasn't the first time either, a pattern like many other. It was at that point that I made the decision to never allow it happen again. I would finish what she helped start, and with any luck, find a positive reason to endure the absolute crushing isolation of being the source of problems for those you deeply care about or die finding out, unable to be reached, usually impossible to help but this time different, now without the offensive weapons which I used to shield myself. I'm sure it would've been easier to approach me if I was outright hostile but people were watching, vultures waiting with their 'here to help check list' with step 1 as, 'Take a break'. Idiots.

The process is finished.

Now I am appreciating and beginning to give back in small ways to life.

I don't really remember what it feels like to love someone voluntarily. I guess that's how it's supposed to work, by accident, time, something like that, but I'm approaching a stage in my life where I'm too exhausted to care, maybe my Mum took it with her to her grave. Maybe I have had too many people come and go for good reasons to believe in holding onto someone. I finished the race first and early or last and everything's been packed up but for me it was always about finding a home in my heart, so I wouldnt look for it in someone else's, something that's as much given to you as much as fostered by yourself. It always felt like though I had reached the mountain peak, as soon as I got there I realised there's no way to go further up, so its time to look across and down at everything that's been done, take a break and look across to the next peak. I have no option but to hold onto the good things that've happened to me in my time, even if they're in totality a bit messy, as for the girl that saved me from myself, I'm no longer scared or fearful when I think of her now, like I might be dishonoring her, in a lot of ways she's still my angel. I hope we get to be friends one day once we've settled down so we can compare notes, we moved too fast to keep our both our feet on the ground long enough to be together but until then wherever she is I hope she is smiling and being taken care of because she is of such a rarity of courage and authenticity that it seems only she can reach people like me and that deserves happiness and real love.

Spread your wings.

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laboisvert-blog · 7 years

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Trump cancels rally amid clashes between supporters and protesters

CHICAGO -- The Donald Trump campaign on Friday night canceled a rally slated to take place in an arena at the University of Illinois at Chicago after protesters overwhelmed the event. The campaign cited safety concerns, given the tense confrontations between Trump protesters and supporters. After the cancellation was announced, fights started to break out at the UIC Pavilion, CBS News' Sopan Deb reports.

Fights broke out at the UIC Pavilion between Donald Trump supporters and protesters after Trump's slated rally was canceled due to safety concerns, March 11, 2016. Ahead of Trump's arrival, hundreds of demonstrators lined up outside the arena to protest the Republican presidential front-runner. Large groups of Trump opponents also occupied multiple sections inside the arena. The mix of Trump supporters and opponents created a tense atmosphere, and finally a spokesperson for the campaign announced the event was canceled. "Mr. Trump just arrived in Chicago, and after meeting law enforcement, has determined that for the safety of all the tens of thousands of people that have gathered in and around the arena tonight's rally will be postponed until another date," the man said from a podium. "Thank you very much for your attendance, and please go in peace." However, a Chicago police spokesperson told CBS News there were no meetings between police and the Trump campaign about security. CPD spokesman Anthony Guglielmi told the Associated Press that police never told the Trump campaign there was a security threat at the venue. He said the department had sufficient manpower on the scene to handle any situation. Guglielmi said the university's police department also did not recommend that Trump call off the event. The decision was made "independently" by the campaign, according to Guglielmi.

Protesters gather outside of UIC Pavilion before Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump was slated to appear, March 11, 2016.

Protesters are escorted out of UIC Pavilion before Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump's rally at the University of Illinois at Chicago March 11, 2016. REUTERS CBS Chicago station WBBM reported a Chicago police officer was seen bleeding from the head, but it wasn't immediately clear what had happened. He was reportedly taken to Stoger Hospital in good condition. Other police officers could be seen clashing with demonstrators. The tumultuous event follows other incidents of violence at Trump campaign events. Earlier Friday, Trump visited the St. Louis area -- ground zero for the Black Live Matter movement -- and confronted streets filled with fierce protests that resulted in 32 arrests by local police. On Thursday, a North Carolina man was charged with assault after he was caught on camera punching a protester at a Trump event -- a protester already in police custody. Earlier Friday, Michelle Fields, a reporter for the conservative media outlet Breitbart News, filed a police report after alleging she was manhandled by Trump's own campaign manager, Corey Lewandoski. Lewandoski and the Trump campaign deny the allegation. Trump has been criticized for the hostile remarks he's made about protesters. For instance, at a February 23 rally, referencing a protester, he said, "I'd like to punch him in the face." The front-runner was questioned about those remarks at the Republican debate in Miami on Thursday night. "We have some protesters who are bad dudes, they have done bad things," he said. "And if they've got to be taken out, to be honest, I mean, we have to run something. And it's not me. It's usually the municipal government, the police because I don't have guards all over these stadiums." Then at a press conference Friday morning, the GOP front-runner once again put the blame on the protesters. "We've had a [protesters] couple that were really violent," he said. "And you know what? The audience swung back, and I thought it was very, very appropriate." Friday's chaos prompted Kansas City, Missouri Mayor Sly James to offer some advice ahead of the Trump event scheduled to take place in his city on Saturday: Later Friday, rival GOP candidate Ted Cruz said Trump has created "an environment that encourages this sort of nasty discourse." Cruz spoke to reporters at a suburban Chicago Republican dinner, calling it a "sad day." "Political discourse should occur in this country without the threat of violence, without anger and rage and hatred directed at each other," Cruz said. Cruz said blame for the unrest Friday rests with the protesters but "in any campaign responsibility starts at the top." He added, "When the candidate urges supporters to engage in physical violence, to punch people in the face, the predictable consequence of that is that is escalates. Today is unlikely to be the last such incidence." Trump was scheduled to take part in the event but did not attend. Another rival, Marco Rubio, didn't think Trump was directly to blame for Friday's unrest, but he "has in the past used some pretty rough language and encouraging the crowd, saying things like, 'In the good old days we used to beat these people up,' or 'I'll pay your legal bills if you rough em up.' So I think he bears some responsibility for the general tone of the things that are happening," he said in an interview Friday with Megyn Kelly on Fox News Channel's "The Kelly File."

He added, "[W]e are entering a kind of very disturbing moment in our political discourse that is reaching a boiling point that I believe has very significant repercussions, not just for this election, but for the future of this country." Editor's Note: In the midst of reporting on this event, CBS News' Sopan Deb was detained by law enforcement. We are awaiting more information on the circumstances and will continue to update our report. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/donald-trump-cancels-rally-overwhelmed-by-protesters/

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