Category: Dreams

The School Dream

I dreamed I was an adult, taking a college class. A long and full class, with probably sixty students, all ages, sexes, and races were in the class. I was probably in the top twenty of the oldest students.

The teacher was Billy Sheets. Tall, slender, and middle-aged, Sheets had dark green hair and purple eye shadow. He usually wore a white Oxford shirt. He’s not a teacher I had in my life, but he introduced himself as Billy Sheets.

Class was informal. We had a half-ring of desks. That wasn’t enough to accommodate everyone, so we also had rings of pillows to sit on. In retrospect, it reminded me of a few writing workshops I attended.

The subject here, though, was sociology. While presentations were made, and I attended them, I seemed to spend a lot of time going in and out of class, and looking for a place to sit. Four memorable points emerged from this pattern.

I was walking up the steps to go in. Wooden, and painted brown, the steps were old and worn. Another guy started up the steps as the same time as me, but then stepped aside to let me go first. He wore a denim jacket, and I knew from seeing him earlier that he rode a motorcycle.

After I went up, I turned and thanked him. When I did, I saw his key fly from his hand, land on the steps and slide across into a crack. I heard it clink when it landed.

I told him that his key had gone into a crack and that I heard it land. Smiling, he said, “That’s alright, I’m not worried.”

His answer baffled me. What was he going to do? How was he going to get his key back?

Still thinking about it, I entered the classroom. I found a presentation by outsiders in progress. I was surprised because I was apparently late, and I didn’t know about this presentation. As I sought somewhere to sit, I discovered that coffee was spilled on anything. Several inches of standing coffee was on one section of the soaked red carpet. More coffee was spilled across the desk tops and soaked the chairs. The pillows were wet with coffee.

I asked, “What happened? Was there a coffee explosion?” Nobody answered me. Just as I settled in coffee free space, the presentation ended and everyone began going out on break.

I tried talking to others and the presentations, and got an idea of what I missed. (I don’t remember any of the details.) Then I went on break.

When I returned, we’d been moved to another room. It was a darker room, and more crowded. It was also the final class. Others were turning in projects and papers. I was horrified because I knew I didn’t have either to turn in. Frantic, I tried remembering if I’d already completed it and turned it in, but I couldn’t recall. I thought that if one was due, I was doomed to fall because I had nothing. I took some hope in that all my presentations had been highly scored, and I did well on the tests.

As the room became emptier, I approached Mr. Sheets and waited to speak with him. When he turned his attention to me, he greeted me with a smile. I explained that I didn’t have anything to turn in and apologized for not being sure if I was supposed to turn something in. I felt embarrassed.

But he said, “No, you weren’t assigned anything, Michael. You were a wonderful student and did a great job.” He shook my hand.

The class was over. Everyone began dispersing. I went out to a parking garage. A flowery cover was on one car. I thought it could be mine, but I was uncertain. Pulling the cover off the car’s back end, I opened a rear door and slid inside. I knew immediately that it wasn’t my car, as hundreds of medals and earrings were hung from squares on the ceiling. I couldn’t discern a pattern to it, and it baffled me why someone would do that. The car was otherwise immaculate and in excellent condition, with a plush interior.

I was confused about why I thought it could have been my car. My car was a different brand, color, and body style. With chagrin, I slipped back out. As I did, I saw the cover move at the front of the car. I realized a man was sleeping there, and as I realized that, a man lifted the over and sat up, revealing himself as Vietnamese. Neither of us spoke. I closed the back door and pulled the cover back down over the car. He laid back down and pulled the cover over himself.

Returning to the inside of the education center, I ran into my little sister, Gina, by the exit. A man my height, slender with very white skin and short white hair, and wearing flowery shirt, was standing with her. Putting a hand on my shoulder, he spoke to me in a very soft voice about things he’d like done. Now, weirdly, I told him that those were things that the command post would normally do.

We engaged in a longer conversation. I began to think he was the new commander and that I should be speaking to him with greater respect, because I was being very casual and flippant with him.

We finished speaking. He squeezed my shoulder and departed. I asked my sister, “Who is that guy?”

Gina said, “I have no idea. I’ve never seen him before.”

The dream ended.

There were many more details to this dream. I abridged things in the interest of time and space.

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The Actors As God Dream

I was with my friend, Ron, sitting at a cafe table outside. Another friend of mine, Marge (who doesn’t know Ron, and lives across the country in Ohio), came up. She said, “Can you think of anyone who played God in movies?”

As Ron and I took in the question with a look at one another, Marge said, “I’ve tried, and I can’t think of anyone.”

I said, “Well, off the top of my head, I can think of Morgan Freeman, George Burns, Alanis Morrisette – remember? She was God in Dogma.”

Ron said, “Morgan Freeman played God?”

“Yes,” I said, “in that Jim Carrey thing. I think it was called Bruce Almighty or something. I’ve never seen the whole thing. I think I saw some of it in a hotel.”

“Oh, yeah,” Ron said.

I said, “Didn’t Whoopi play God in something, too?”

None of us were sure. Marge said, “Thank you.” As she did, Ron and I pulled out laptops to Google actors who played God in movies.

That was the dream, short, sharp, and clear. What’s not clear is what it meant and why I dreamed it. My guess is that it was some food generated neuron frenzy.

I never asked Marge why she asked the question.

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A Manuscripts & Politics Dream

It began with my little sister presenting me with a manuscript. Handing over a large stack of paper, she explained that she’d written a novel and wanted me to read it and give my opinion. I agreed, but asked her to reciprocate: read my novel and give my opinion.

Gina’s manuscripts turned out to be a humorous mystery. I thought it had a lot of merit. That’s the feedback I gave her. Did she have feedback for me? No, she hadn’t read my ms. She started but then forgot.

Her answer frustrated me. I’d lived up to my end, etc. I was called away before we could finish the conversation. Gina and I agreed to meet later.

Going on somewhere else via dreamport, I was now in a hilly city. It had been rainy. I was standing on the corner by a street. A man in a dark suit and raincoat (who looked a lot like James Noble (the actor)) approached me. We knew one another and shook hands and talked. Within a few minutes, he was telling me that they’d just come out with word about who the new POTUS was going to be. He gave me a name. It as going to be announced soon.

The name surprised me. I knew the man’s name and so on, but didn’t know him. I expressed some concerns about him.

We started walking down the hill. He was  concerned about the choice, too, and was wondering where the man was. He didn’t know if the man had heard yet. As we walked down the hill, the other man mentioned the name again, and then said, “Do you know who he is?”

I began talking about that when the other said, “No, he’s my father.”

That completely surprised me. We went through a conversation about their last names, which was something like LaFontaine. I said, “Pierre?” The other said with a smile, “No, that’s the NRA guy.”

As I was mulling that information, others arrived, and the conversation went on again about the new president. Then the new president drove up in a little old white imported economy car. While it ran without any problems, the car looked like it was forty years old, something small, with petite chrome bumpers, like a Datsun 510 (see the picture?) from the early seventies. (I’ve never owned or drove a 510, btw.)

The others all went off. I trudged back up the hill and, via dreamport, returned to my sister and the manuscripts. She’d read my manuscript and had some suggestions. As we began talking about that, a second younger sister, Sharon, arrived to give me her manuscript. I was surprised. We began talking, and as we did, I said, “I need to add more humor to my novel,” and was excited by immediate ideas that came to me about how to do that.

Then I awoke.

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The Era Dream

It was another military dream. Multitudes of military members were there. Almost all were Air Force members, as I had been. I knew many of them, but not all.

Some Army personnel and people from the other armed forces were in the group. They were very few. We were all attired in service-dress uniforms. My wife was with me, and my friends had their wives and children present. I realized it was a mass celebration.

It was in a huge, haphazard building with multiple levels. Some levels were connected by ladders. Others used stairs or elevators. Some of it was outside, or had rooms that were open to the outside.

Some people shunned me or were antagonistic, but others acknowledged and defended me. The first group disappointed me, and was the larger group, but the second group pleased me.

I didn’t stay with either group, though. With my wife holding my hand, I went up and down the ladders and stairs, passing between levels on my own. I said hello to friends, and some returned the greeting. As I did this movement and talked to others, I began understanding, this was a gigantic retirement gathering. With that, I saw a setting sun and realized, an era was ending.

Then I awoke and thought of the dream with sadness. A part of me reflected, the past is gone.

We’re going forward.

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The Kinetic Dream

I dreamed I heard crashing waves and knew it was the sea, and then entered a place. I wasn’t alone but was with friends (yet there was no one I recognized from my life).

We walked grassy paths which sometimes had stone pavers. The paths were narrow. It was a haphazard arrangement. It seemed like the lanes wove around multiple small cottages.

A sense of age permeated the settlement. Made of rough stone, the picturesque cottages had small, red or green doors, low roofs and soft, amber-toned walls. Yellow light, like candle or fireplace light, was shining through their four-pane windows. Many windows had flower boxes with red or white pansies growing in them. Sometimes I saw people, mostly children, in the cottages.

As I walked about the place, I had a sense that they’d been separate cottages which had then had a roof built over them to enclose them. I made that comment, which incensed an older man (tall and white, balding, with a dark, disheveled mustache and goatee), who was apparently the owner. I didn’t know why he was upset; it wasn’t anything derogatory, but he seemed to take it that way. I tried to explain what I meant and why, but he brushed me off.

Meanwhile, a younger white woman with short, light-brown hair, told me to remember to say things from time to time. I gathered from her I was there to give a speech. I was to talk about energy. She was a teacher; she wanted to ensure that I explained kinetic energy correctly.

She and I separated. She was with one group and I was in another. My group were adults. They were all friends. Children made up the teacher’s group. She was talking to the children about kinetic energy and explaining examples, showing how kinetic energy held things up. I started thinking, that’s not what kinetic energy is. She said that kinetic energy was what made walls and chairs stand up. Hearing her, I’d look at her, and she would make fists and cross her arms and say, “Kinetic energy.”

Even though I nodded at her in agreement, I was confused because that’s not what I thought kinetic energy was. I tried remembering other forms of energy so that I could talk to her. We came across a large window. In it were two chairs and a table. I looked from it to her. “Kinetic energy,” she said, smiling and nodding, her fists clenched and her arms crossed.

I awoke.

After writing this and thinking about it, I see how it fits into the series I’m writing, Incomplete States, but more thought is needed.

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Botcheck

I botchecked myself (another noun becoming a verb). Verification was returned that I’m a bot.

The results trouble me, of course. If I’m a bot, why have they made me so human? (And who is they who made me?) I don’t need to struggle with weight and mood swings to convince others that I’m human, do I? I know many humans without weight issues and mood swings who seem quite human to me.

Maybe they’re not human.

Also, if they made me a human-like bot, why did they push me to want to be a writer? Was this by original design specifications, or has something gone awry with my wiring? It sure feels like my wiring might be off, with the plethora of crazy dreams I experience and all the muse bullshit that I endure.

After running this information through my systems a few more times, I settled on several questions as more important than the others.

  1. Who made me, and what was their purpose?
  2. How long will I be here?
  3. Am I on assignment, or did I arrive here by accident?
  4. Finally, most importantly, am I still under warranty?

You’d think that, as a bot, I’d be able to find this information without great difficulty. You’d think that, and you’d be wrong. For some reason, my maker is keeping me in the dark about these things.

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Saturday’s Theme Music

I had a wild night of dreams. After awakening, feeding the cats, and thinking about the dreams, I began humming this song from 1972. Because the dream had large segments about seeing and trying to understand what I was seeing, I realized my mind had started streaming, “Doctor My Eyes” by Jackson Browne. The song came out when I was sixteen and straying along the hinterlands border between being a child and an adult. (Even at sixty-two, I still frequently reel and weave along that border.) I laughed at the connections my mind had managed to find between life, the dream, and memories.

I found this live version today and just went with the flow.

 

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Another Military Dream

There I was, back in the military, in uniform, a short-sleeved light blue shirt with my rank on dark blue epaulets, wearing my salad, sharply-creased dark blue pants, glossy black shoes. I noticed I’d been promoted in my dream.

I was at what seemed like a modern and spacious headquarters building, talking with others. I didn’t know them much. I was explaining to them that I’d received a new assignment. Due to leave in three months, I hadn’t heard from the new location yet. Anyone familiar with the Air Force PCS process understands all these. You get the notification, sign and return it, and then the process begins. A sponsor is assigned to you, you’re sent a welcome package, you receive your orders and begin your checklist, and work with personnel to schedule all the requirements for changing locations and jobs.

There wasn’t information on my new assignment, except it seemed prestigious to me, it had been by a by-name request, and it was across the country. I was pleased to receive it. The others had to return to their work for the day, but I had nothing to do, and killed time by strolling around, wondering what I was going to do with myself, chatting with others, in a good mood, telling people, “I have a new assignment, and I’m waiting for my orders.”

 

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The Shoeless Dream

I call it the Shoeless Dream, but it was an involved and multi-layered excursion featuring music, family, red ants, and strangers, besides the shoes.

I know exactly the shoes involved, too. They’re still in my closet, and I wear them once in a while. They’re a pair of coffee brown suede Oxfords.

Thinking about how long I’ve had them, I realize that it’s now twenty years. That amazes me. I can put them where I had them because I remember wearing them at work when I lived in Mountain View, California, and worked in Palo Alto, California. That employment ended in 2000, and I moved from Mountain View to Half Moon Bay in 1998.

I lose the shoes during the dream. The dream is taking place at a sort of muddy, outdoor fair and picnic that reeks of a dystopian movie set. The shoes are important to me because I don’t have much. Despite that, I take them off as I walk around. Then, I set them down to to something, forget about them, and walk off. A little later, after going through the fair – about ten ramshackle booths made of plywood, painted with white primer (sometimes) and sometimes decorated with a few Christmas lights, I realize that I’ve forgotten the shoes. I make my way back to them without problem. Finding and picking them up, I go on.

During this dream sequence, there’s a lot happening in my dream. I’m walking around a property that I own, doing a survey. I’m passing by many others who greet me. I’m busy and don’t have time to talk. I recognize aunts in the crowd. As I walk around, I have one shoe on, and carry the other one.

Once again, I put the shoe down and walk off without it. This time, a long period passes. I visit with my sisters, and talk with them about music, ending up singing Collective Soul’s song, “The World I Know” with my youngest sister, and then with my oldest sister.

Further walking around, I head for where I’d earlier noticed vomit. Passing it by before, I’ve decided that I need to go back and clean it up. I remember it was by the patio and go there, but when I get there, the vomit is gone. Instead, there’s a huge line of fire ants. Others are leaving the picnic/fair, so I warn them around the ants. Then I discover ant hills, and other lines of ants. The ground beneath is hard, dry and cracked. I remember that it had been muddy, so I’m puzzled.

Thinking about the mud of before reminds me that I’d lost my other shoe. Retreating my steps, I return to a muddy place, where the picnic/fair still goes on, but now under strings of bare yellow lights. I walk around. People talk to me. I know some of them but some are strangers. I don’t remember anything that’s discussed, except that I tell people that I’m missing my shoe, show them the one on my foot, and ask if they’ve seen the other one. Eventually, I find my shoe.

One thing that struck me as I remembered and posted this (very annotated) version of the dream. I was carrying the shoe and worrying about them because that’s all I had, yet, I was on my property, and inspected it. I thought the shoes were important, but I missed things going on while obsessing about them, and the world changed around me as I went back and forth with the shoes.

In a way, I think the shoes represent my connection to the past. I’m carrying them into the future, but it’s changing around me, and I think I’m warning myself, don’t get stuck in the mud of the past because the world I know has changed.

* All typing errors in this post belong to my cat, Quinn, who insisted that he help me type by getting on my lap and head-butting my hands, arms, and chin while purring, and sometimes trying to nibble on my ear. It can be very distracting.

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Tuesday’s Theme Music

Laughing to myself, as I almost put Tuesday’s Dream Music as my post title.

Last September, I had a dream and awoke with “The World I Know” by Collective Soul in my head. This time, the song was in my dream, twice.

The first time, I was discussing it with my youngest sister and a cousin. We were talking about the words, and then we sang it. Afterward, I continued through the dream, and came upon my oldest sister.

My oldest sister can claim to be the shortest of our family, but she was taller than me in this dream. I mentioned the song to her, and she said, “Well, it becomes kind of maudlin, which isn’t what you want in a song.” I said, “That’s true, it does, but it ends in an uplifting manner.” Then we sang it together, and then I continued on through the dream.

So, here it is again. You can imagine my sisters and I singing it. It came out the year I retired from the military. Wonder if there’s a connection for me and my dream in that?

 

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