I love dreams. Love dreaming. Love the fact that there's an entirely separate universe we unconsciously drip into each night and float around inside of, doing and living and experiencing everything from death to childbirth to hot dog eating contests while our conscious brains are unplugged. I remember almost all of my dreams. Have considered stringing them together into a novel, actually, each dream a separate chapter - leave all of the bizarre existential details in place and see if - when I get to the end - there's any sort of cohesive message. A sort of pseudo-therapeutic look into my own brain in narrative form.
Chapter one: young Heather chews a hole through the family room wall, discovers a raging inferno on the other side, helps her family to safety only to get left behind in the rush and ends up living in a refrigerator box on the side of her street.
Chapter two: adolescent Heather's mother sells her to Nick Nolte. Takes her to the beach to make the exchange, walks away with a bouquet of brightly colored candy roses and a series of admonishments to Heather about her reluctance. Doesn't she know this guy can provide for her in ways her own parents can't?
Chapter three: high school Heather has beautiful shiny, glossy hair - hair so beautiful, shiny and glossy that talent agencies chase her down the street begging her to be a handgun spokesmodel. The Sig Sauer people really think she's be the perfect face for their product, there aren't enough young women buying guns anymore (anymore? was there ever a period in history....?).
Chapter four: college-age Heather gets it on with her philosophy professor at church. In the middle of the senior citizen's Bible study. Room full of people. She's afraid if she gets caught she won't be allowed to go on that mission trip. On the other hand, the senior citizens are sort of egging her on and she really doesn't want to push the guy away and get heckled by a bunch of grandmas.
Chapter five: twenty-something Heather secretly dates Matt Damon. She realizes she doesn't really find him particularly attractive, but she knows there are probably Vanity Fair parties in her future if she sticks it out. The only problem: Matt's totally embarrassed to be seen with her and makes her hide under a table whenever anyone comes anywhere near the front door. When he's certain no one will see, he's very sweet, poetic, romantic - a huge wimp. But the parties....with the other celebrities...and the Carolina Herrera gowns....and the--quick, get under the table!!
Yep - that'd be some good readin right there.
I've actually had more than a few eerie incidents of dreams "coming true." In startling detail. Mundane detail, sure, but everything from the time of day to the location to the conversations between myself and the dream characters manages to come true a few days or weeks later. Nothing dramatic, but disconcerting either way. Much different than any hard-to-place deja vu sensation...this is more like watching a television re-run where you know what the character is going to say next or which direction the camera will swing. So I've got this fascination with dream analyses.
Noticed this article today written by a social worker and "certified Jungian analyst" giving a sort of Cliff's Notes version of Jung's theories on dreams. Jung takes a sort of "distillation" approach: take all of the elements of your dreams - the details, the scenery, the celebrities and candy roses and ooky makeout sessions and shiny hair - and strip away the specifics - come up with the more essential elements of the dream. Therein lie the archetypes. The self, the shadow, the mother, the child - the stuff that EVERYONE'S dreams are made of. They're all symbols. Dreams speak their own language, don't bother trying to understand them in the conscious sense; the example in the article is of someone showing up in a foreign country and becoming frustrated that the people there didn't speak English....it's a non-sequitur. Dreams don't speak "awake" language.
This was my favorite excerpt:
"Because there is often such difference between the attitude of the dream and our conscious standpoint it's often helpful to have an analyst or dream group to arrive at a more objective interpretation."
I love the idea of a "dream group."
Group therapy, but at its most abstract. Everyone talks dreams. We connect with parts of ourselves we don't usually communicate with personally, let alone socially, en masse. The article suggested we get in the habit of looking at our dreams as a series (I like to think television series). Record them - notice themes, recurrences...get familiar with the language your dreams speak. It's like "Rosetta Stone" for REM. I hate Rosetta Stone. Charge out the nose. I decided I wanted to learn an abstract, "not-taught-in-community-college-continuing-ed-classes" language this year - coughed up something biologically important when I saw the price tag on their "first year, phase one" set and decided those are Bastard People, those Rosetta Stone People. Anyway - get familiar with your dreams' dialect.
Mine apparently speak Hollywood. Anthony Lapaglia, Colin Farrell (ooh, that one had a disturbing anatomical twist), Nick Nolte, Matt Damon, Renee Russo, Christina Aguilera, Kiefer Sutherland, David Hasselhoff. They've all had some dream screen time. Most of the time they're both in love with me and ashamed of me. Want something from me and are afraid they'll get found out. I'm both beautiful, and being asked to do ugly things. A girl with good hair shilling for a shotgun. A little girl being sold to a dirty old man. A heroine left in a box on the roadside. Sex in a church. Dichotomy.
Weird.
As Gary Trosclair says:
"It would be easy to get caught up in theories and research on dreams. But what it really comes down to is being open to and engaging with what the dreams give us, rather than expecting them to conform to our 21st century mindset. As with sleep, giving dreams respect and attention in our lives offers a chance for rejuvenation. It's the attitude that heals."
With that, I'm hittin up Craigslist for Dream Analysis Groups. I suspect my subconscious is searching for something. Or has found something and is trying to pass that (gunslinging) wisdom along to my waking self...in dreamland I've got high fame ideals and fears of shortcomings. I've got a celebrity complex and assume they'd be slummin it to hang around with me....I've got virgins and flames and geriatrics duking it out for my soul. And that bouquet of sugar roses: well I love candy. That one's a gimme.
...and I chew holes in walls and see fire. It's not as concise as "I see dead people" but it still has some box office appeal. Especially if Colin Farrel and his unusual...anatomy showed up to rescue me from my cardboard hovel on the suburban roadside. That'd be killer.
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