Another Military Dream

This dream was different from the beginning. In my previous military dreams, I’m usually arriving and lost, or establishing order and structure. In this dream, I found myself finishing and leaving. The dream was mostly about me showing my replacement all the equipment and introducing him to our processes and procedures. In a parallel action, the colonel who was the commanding officer, was handing over command and moving on. This individual was a real-life person who later retired as a lieutenant general. We’d worked closely together during my final assignment. Now, in the dream, I ran into him. Both of us were in good moods. He was hungry. I told him that I could get him pizza, which he accepted.

It was very hectic, with much going on. I was constantly fielding questions, introducing people, and hurrying from point to point. During this, I saw a young airman watching. I grinned and waved to her, and then asked her what she was doing. She told me that she was watching me and that I just amazed her with my energy and authority. I laughed and joked that that was all surface appearance, that underneath it all, I was a quivering mess. She rejected that, telling me, “I know you, and you’re always like this, in control of everything and getting it all done.” The flattery pleased me.

Dream end.

The Guests Dream

My wife and I lived in a small place in this dream. It was outside and had no walls or roof. Nor, I later learned, did it have a private bathroom.

As said, it was small, tiny, really. It was all about the kitchen, dining room, and living room — without walls, which I didn’t think odd at all. Guests arrived, including cousins. Among them was one a few years younger than me who passed away in 2002 from a heart attack. He was there and in good health and I was pleased to see him. I realized that the guests meant that I needed more kitchen space. Of critical concern was that I make a place for them to make coffee and sit and enjoy the coffee — and BTW, Christmas was on the way, according to my guests. Some began putting up colored electric lights and other decorations.

I set up what I thought would suit the guests, a small, squared off space with an elaborate coffee maker on the left, and a sitting area on the right. My deceased cousin complained about it IAW his nature. I deflected his complaints with good nature. His mother arrived and made observations and suggestions. As I began explanations about the arrangements and my logic, I cut myself off. “Wait. You’re right! That would be better.” I commenced making the change.

Finishing, I stepped away from our square, wall-free, roofless, ‘home’. Around us was a park with swing sets, seesaws, and slides in use by screaming, laughing, chattering children. After surveying them, I turned and spotted two huge bears lumbering by. Worrying about the children, I turned to warn them. They’d spotted the bears. Quieting, they’d climbed bleachers and were waiting for the bears to leave. The bears left without incident.

I went to use the restroom. In dreamstyle, I turned and stepped and was upstairs in a white building. This, I knew, was a stick and wood building three stories tall. I was on the third floor in a hall. A square antechamber was on my right. I faced white doors spread out in the hall and antechamber in an odd and haphazard fashion. Black numbers labeled the doors one to five. The bathrooms, I realized. As I went to select number five, I realized there was a sixth and shifted toward it. As I did, a young woman in loose black shirt and pants accosted me, explaining that the rooms were shared and she was scheduled to use one of them to give a massage and a bath to a client. She said, “You need to reserve the room for your use.” As she talked, she crossed to a wall and took a clipboard with a yellow shirt of paper on it. “We use this to reserve the rooms. I suggest you use it as well.”

I countered with another suggestion, which were cards by the doors, which indicated if they were in use or available.

Dream end.

The Dream, the Cat, the Boy

No people were visible in this dream. No bodies.

I never saw myself. I faced a wide and featureless brown plain. The sky was a striking crystal blue, like a clear sky seen opposite sunrise after the sun clears obstacles and takes the stage.

On the horizon were low brown mountains, the same color as the plain. A sense of dustiness was implied but no dust was ever seen.

Three objects equally spaced apart floated above the mountains. Outlined in jagged red, their interiors were hot white gold. Black letters scrolled within the white gold. I could see they were words but couldn’t read them.

A male guide was beside me; I never saw him. He said, “Those are your choices. You need to make a choice.”

Utter bewilderment on my side met this. “I don’t know what you mean. What are they?” Staring at them brought no elucidation. I half woke and thought of them. Drifting back into sleep, the scene returned, except I was much closer to the mountains and the three objects. They seemed larger to me. I still couldn’t read the words. The side boundaries were jagged but the top and bottom borders were smooth half-arcs. The guide mentioned choosing them. I replied, “Can’t I integrate them?” No answer.

I drifted from the dream toward consciousness, working on recalling what I’d seen and then returned to it. I was much closer. The objects were huge. Instead of being spread across the horizon, they were stacked. I said, “I think I can move them, but I don’t know what they are. I don’t know why I’d move them.”

The cat, Tucker brought me out of sleep. The dream stayed with me. Tucker did something he’d never done that I can recall. He laid down opposite me, his face facing mine, his head on a pillow. Purring, he stretched his front legs out, put his paws on my shoulder, and kneaded me. I drifted back to the dream. No changes manifested. The words kept scrolling, like the lines in a book. I still couldn’t read them.

That dream moved to my mind’s right side. The guide was with me but silent. On my mind’s left side, another dream arose. I was a young boy, sitting on the ground in a field of green weeds by a barbed wire fence. I clearly saw and knew it as me. The sun was rising to my right, and I turned and looked toward it.

I stirred myself into waking. Both dreams remained, one on the right, the other on the left, slowly receding. Both remain, faint and distant as galaxies in the sky, present on either side of my mind.

Chaotic Clothing Dream

Everything whizzed by in this dream. With few exceptions, chaos ruled.

I began by entering some sort of dark, busy pavilion. Plants hung down from the rafters. The inside was filled with tables. It could have been something like a flea market but I never knew for certain. As I walked around, I visited with a dog, petting and talking to him. Coming to another entrance, I then encountered a large, black dog. I reached out to visit with him. I snapped his teeth at me and then began growling. I shrugged it off and walked. The dog followed me, growling me. I turned and told him to stop and then threatened to hit him with a sock I had in my hand. The dog backed off.

I continued. Some people (hazy) asked me questions. I seemed to know them. I answered and then told them that I need to change my clothes. I went to do this and realized my clotherees were in suitcases. After finding one, I realized my other suitcases were elsewhere. I knew exactly where, though, and rushed to them. But then it was like, okay, what will I wear, oh, the underwear is in the other suitcase, there’s the light blue sweat I wanted, all while answering others’ questions as they walked past me or stood behind me.

Dream end

An Odd Dream

I had an odd dream. My wife and I were in our house. It’s not our RL house nor any place where I’ve lived but I know in the dream that it’s mine. For some reason, there’s a small black kitten there. All legs and ears, with a short, pointed tail, he’s an energetic whirlwind, battling everything, prancing and spinning, on the attack, crabbing and racing around. It delighted me. “Look at his energy,” I said. “He’s amazing.”

Friends were moving away. My wife announced, “I want a new house. Come on.” I began protesting about it, asking, right now, looking for reasons why, etc. She was non-communicative. I get in the car with her, still trying to talk with her about it, and she ends up saying that she wants a smaller house, and she wants us to drive around looking for it. I have a small off-white kitten with me. The cat is basically sleeping on me.

We get to place where she wants to stop and look for a home. After parking, we’re walking to the place when she thinks she sees someone she knows. She just wants to say hello, she says, rushing off. I tell her not to be too long because I know how she is. Then I wander into a place.

It’s pretty non-descript. I put the white kitten down. It runs around, playing kitten games. Meanwhile, a young girl comes up and strikes me on the back with a flat metal object. It’s not quite a sword or any weapon I’ve ever seen. A young boy comes up and tries doing the same. The boy then explains that they’re playing a game, it’s part of a bigger game, and they get points by striking people. I take them on, encouraging them to strike more boldly and quickly. After a little of this, I recover the white kitten. The kitten and I lie down under a blanket for a nap.

My wife finally returns, calling for me. I sit up with the kitten. My wife tells me that she ‘still has feelings’ for this other person, someone she’s not seen in decades.

I just explode. “Fine. I’m tired of this,” I say. “Do what you want. I’m gone.”

Dream end.

854 Cars Dream

One of the weirder dreams experienced last week stayed with me. This was from last Wednesday.

I’d entered a large building on some business. I was in a hurry and a little annoyed when someone hailed me. The young man in a suit confirmed my identity, increasing my annoyance, and then said, “I wanted to ensure that you knew your cars were here.”

People hurried around us. “What cars?” I asked. Given with great impatience, I waited for the answer so that I could explain that I’d flown in. It also seemed odd that he said ‘cars’ instead of ‘car’. On the other hand, maybe someone had provided me a rental.

“Your cars,” the young man replied, as if that explained anything.

I told him that explained nothing.

He looked at me like trees were growing out the sides of my head. “Your cars,” he responded and then spit out with haste, “Your cars were shipped here.” He spoke like he didn’t believe that I didn’t know this. “You have eight hundred and fifty-four cars.”

I repeated that number back to him. It was a ridiculous number. When he confirmed it, my mind looked for explanations and figured, oh, he means model cars or Matchbox cars or toy cars, something like that. Smiling, I asked, “Where are they?” I’d see them and then I would pursue understanding of how I’d come to have eight hundred and fifty-four cars. Someone was behind this, doing it as a joke. “Can you take me to them?”

Joy lit the young man’s expression. “Yes, sir, right this way, sir.”

We were in one of those convention centers attached to hotels, or the other way around, and had to cross a wide space. We entered a garage filled with cars and stopped. I waited.

“There are your cars,” the young guy said.

“Where?”

“There.”

I knew the guy meant all those cars in that garage. My vision roamed. Chevies. Ferraris. Fords. Mazdas. Mercedes. Jaguars. Porsches. A Jeep.

The guy asked, “Is everything alright, sir?”

I explained that I was surprised. I didn’t think these cars were mine. I thought there was a mistake. The other kept insisting, these are your cars, you are the right person and explained that they’d gone through great lengths to verify who I was. “Who did that? Who is they?” I naturally asked. No coherent answer was given.

The young man and I walked among the rows of cars. I verified, eight hundred and fifty-four. He confirmed that and then went on, cataloging the cars’ abilities, amusing me. He said, “You have fast cars and very fast cars, new cars, and old cars.” He was pointing at cars as he spoke and I was turning, gawking at the collection, stunned beyond further thought. Many famous and rare models were present. I eyed pretty green Mustangs that I was sure were in movies, silver Ferraris, and red Ferraris, blue Porsches, and a yellow Jeep. A low and wide Lamborghini and a stately, dark Rolls Royce. Old cars, new cars. All were in great shape.

The dream ended with me standing in the garage wondering, where did I get all of these cars and what was I going to do with them?

Reading this after capturing it all doesn’t give insight into how rapidly this unfolded. The dream was a torrent. I guess that’s the mind, rationalizing explanations of the scenes and images, trying to develop something cogent, and failing. Cheers

The Affair Dream

I dreamed my friend’s wife offered to have an affair with me. She’s not a person I know from RL. I knew her in the dream from previous visits. After this visit with my wife, she asked me to walk her home. I agreed, to be polite. She said good-bye to my wife and the woman and I began walking. As we were walking, she began singing “Close to You”. The Carpenters had a hit with the song in the last century.

I didn’t think anything of it. When we reached her place, we hugged. She didn’t release me. That’s when she proposed the affair and told me, “Wasn’t it a clue when I was singing the song?” I admitted that it wasn’t. She was very attractive and I was interested. I asked her how it would work. We ended up parting ways with a promise to see one another again.

I went to a friend’s house. Other women were there. I heard them talking about having affairs with different friends. They were apparently paying the men after they broke off the affairs. One woman said emphatically, “I give them three weeks and then I’m done with them. They want more but I won’t give them anymore.” Another woman answered, “They always want more.” I didn’t know any of these women.

I went back to my house. We were preparing to have a dinner party. I found that my wife had moved all the furniture out of one bedroom and planned to make it the master bedroom because it was larger. The house was light blue and the interior walls were white. Both bedrooms were very large and ensuite. I didn’t like the plan, reminding her that she didn’t talk with me first and that there were reasons we’d made the decisions which we had about which room was the master bedroom. She told me that her friend, who’d proposed the affair, had made the suggestion.

I went off to do a task, which was to etch a line in a glass so I could break it off and splinter it. A friend arrived for dinner and asked what I was doing. I smiled and explained, “I’m breaking glass. We need broken glass.” He replied that he thought there was an easier way to get broken glass.

The affair friend arrived. She talked me into going into another room with her where we ended up passionately kissing. Hearing a noise, we broke it off, separating and leaving the room.

I went to another friend’s house. He wasn’t there but several other friends were. They were helping him to submit a manuscript for publication. I stepped up to help, listening as the friends spoke. They said this was the last time they were helping him. As they talked, I checked out the box they were using. Opening it up, I found a poorly typed manuscript and several mailing labels. The labels weren’t affixed to anything. I commented on it, telling them that the labels needed to be fixed. They ignored me, closing the box and taping it shut. The tape was old and kept breaking and wouldn’t stick. They were still talking about how they’d tried to help him for yours and was tired of it because he didn’t seem to be making an effort. I’d been about to appeal to them for help but decided they weren’t very helpful.

Dream end.

Wednesday’s Theme Music

Sunshine rolled over the horizon and onto the ocean at 5:43 AM. It’s Wednesday, the mid-point for the week, July 13, 2022. Marine layers and stout winds asserted their presence yesterday. I was cleaning sand out of, ah, everywhere last night, again and again, fine, gritty sand. The marine layer has retreated for today. The wind is on break. Sunshine warms a blue sky. A faraway thule layer rests on the ocean’s deep blue horizon. Current temp is a cool but pleasant 15 C. Won’t get much past 66 F today. Sunset will take us into night at 9 PM.

A wild night of dreams is in my mental rearview. The Neurons extracted “Cover Me” by Bruce Springsteen from the dreams and planted it in my morning mental music stream. “Why?” I asked. Yes, why?

The Neuron smirked. “Use your brain.”

“I thought that’s what you guys are.”

The Neurons snorted. “Think again.”

So, it’s “Cover Me” for Wednesday’s theme music. Stay posi, test negy, etc. I’ve already had my coffee, thanks. The Neurons demanded it before they’d even speak to me. Hope you have a wonderful way wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, short of hurting others, right? Yeah. Let’s be reasonable.

Here’s the song. Cheers

Cars & Book Dream

I was staying at an exotic luxury place in a high-end location in the center of some city. I knew these things in my dream. No reason for being there was ever given. Everything was very fancy, chrome, blue windows, steel, and muted white furniture, modern, and new, although never named. I’d been put up in the place and was newly arrived and just familiarizing myself with it. A ground-floor location, several parts of my huge place was open to the street, something that I didn’t find odd, but enjoyed.

Background done, the action began when I walked across the place and accidently kicked a can, sending it out into the traffic. Dusk was settling in and lights were just coming on. Exasperated, I resolved to retrieve the can because everything looked so clean and gorgeous. As I went out to get it, a car hit the can, sending it flying further down the road where another car coming from the opposite direction flattened it.

More irritated, I hastened to get the can. I could see a line of cars accelerating up the double lane toward the can. I would need to rush.

I didn’t make it. Forced back by the oncoming traffic, I then saw a stream of such flattened cans in the street under the cars. I was disgusted.

“Asshole,” someone shouted. I saw two men. Both were white, with mustaches and long brown hair. One was tall and the other was short. One of them had yelled. I thought they meant me.

Seeing me seeing them, they chuckled and said, “We weren’t calling you an asshole. We were going whoever threw their can out an asshole. Unless it was you who did it. Then we are calling you an asshole.”

“No,” I answered, “I didn’t throw a can.” I explained what’d been going on.

They noticed a small hardcover book I carried and began talking about it. An older book, the tome was about three racing drivers, but the novel was considered ‘literary’. The two men highly recommended it. I responded that I was a novelist and the book enticed me because of its literary reputation, but I’d also been a racing fan.

We were walking by then. I was looking for my place and couldn’t find it. They invited me to join them at a restaurant for a drink. I agreed and we went into a red-theme place — red carpet and bar, red leather seats, red lights, red walls and curtains, red neon. As we chatted, the tall one went off for our drinks and the short one said that he hoped I was serious about what I said about the book and that I wasn’t just going along with them.

I told him, no, and we started chatting about racing. I told him that the late sixties and early seventies had captured my deepest racing interest. I enjoyed the three-liter Formula 1 cars of that age, especially Lotus and the 72, but also the Tyrrells, the Indy cars dominated by the Offy and Ford engines, the sports-racing cars of LeMans like the Chaparral 2D, and the Can Am cars like the McLarens, the Lola T70, and the 2J. (Yes, I actually said all of this in the dream.) They remarked with smiles that it sounded like I really knew my cars. The tall one said, “You should meet my sister.”

We’d finished our drinks and I decided to go. The dream’s final sequences involved me retracing my steps, looking for where I was staying, and then finding it.

Dream end. It was all quite vivid and sharply remembered.

The Paris Detective Dream

I was a detective in a trench coat. American, I didn’t speak French, but I was working with French detectives. Although I didn’t speak French, they understood me when I spoke English and I understood them when they spoke French. This startled me in the dream, causing me to pause and ask, “How is this possible?” I didn’t have a chance to pursue an answer because there was a crime to solve. I zipped around Paris with the detectives, flashing my badge, interviewing people, asking the other detectives questions, and answering their questions. The crime and mystery were never definitely stated in the dream, yet I knew what it was. The dream ended with me looking at the Eiffel Tower, as that’s where the clues led.

I think the dream arose because I’d watched a dose of The Sommerdahl Murders before I went to sleep, though why I ended up in Paris with French detectives isn’t explained. Haven’t been to Paris since the last century. All in all, a mild and innocuous, pleasant dream, although this detective dream left me with a mystery.

But don’t they all?

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