DNF marathon dream

I had a dream last night that I was running in a marathon - or trying to, anyway. The dream took place in and around the start/registration area. I was trying to get a bib number and start the race but every time I made contact with a race official I would be led off somewhere to help with some kind of set up or course maintenance or something – somehow they kept thinking that I was a race volunteer rather than a runner. It was frustrating because I always had to run back to the starting area and I was wasting all my energy before I even started the marathon. I kept seeing all these runners going along but I couldn’t join them. I ended up running all over the place and saw a lot of the course which looked pretty good – sort of like a Disneyland/theme park kind of course with lots of little bridges and waterways and twists and turns. Later I saw some friends gathering after the race talking about it and their times and they wanted to know how I did and I tried to explain to them that I hadn’t even started.