Two Dreams
‘I’ wasn’t in this dream, which was more like the ‘television dreams’ which I sometimes experience.
Three people were renting a place together for vacation. One was a gay male. I don’t remember the other two much, as ‘the camera’ mostly focused on him.
It was the vacation’s final day so they were talking about leaving. The house was cluttered and messy from their time there – pizza boxes and take-out food containers, dishes on counters, etc. They were being vague about what to do but when remembered seeing a move-out checklist. Remembering roughly where it was on the counter, they pulled out a typed-up two-page checklist.
The group began reading from it. One of them took a half-eaten piece of pizza from a box and began eating it, disgusting the others. He mocked them, saying, “It’s only a little old and hard.”
They were then outside, walking back and up toward the vacation place. It had a broad glassed-in overhang above a double garage with a cement drive.
Large, thick tree branches were on the drive on either side. They discussed that the branches probably fell during a storm a few days before. The gay guy wanted to chop up the branches and remove them as a nice gesture. He seemed very excited about doing it while the others hung back. Getting an axe, he lined up a branch to cut it apart and took an ineffectual swing.
Dream end
Second dream…a short time later…
Very messy dream. I was there, and my wife, and others, but many were coming and going. We were preparing to go out, and it seems like we were investigating something but as a social group. I think there was a core of three to give but things were weakly framed.
We were in an apartment. My neighbor, Wade, was in the opposite apartment. We were dressing, and I was dressed first, and was wearing a light gray suit, I think with a light yellow shirt. I remember thinking it odd.
To both kill time and because I had an idea that I thought would help, I went to Wade’s place. I was doing it furtively because I didn’t want the rest to know. I also was ambiguous about being in Wade’s place. He hadn’t given explicit permission, but I felt that he would have if asked. But, that hadn’t been asked, so it felt like a gray area.
But I knew Wade harbored a device to create a sort of document which could help us. I went over to use that. I was trying to be quick but things went wrong and the device wasn’t as easy to use as expected.
While I was in there, another person arrived and ‘caught me’. I explained that it was Wade’s – which they knew – but tried avoiding explaining why I was there, trying to put things back to how they were.
I then went back over to the apartment, where my wife was ready and talking about doing something. Another had some stuff. They said if you shake it over your eyes, it reveals that there are some insects there. My wife was eager to have this done on herself and me, saying that it was something that she wanted to do for a long time and disparaging me because ‘I never wanted to do it’.
The guy came over, told me to close my eyes and kept them closed. He then sprinkled stuff on them and then said, “Oh wow, look how many Michael has.” It was sort of gleeful in a horrified way. I asked, “What do I do about them?”
Then I looked in a mirror. I confirmed some small black insects were crawling around my eyes but I was horrified with how my hair looked. It was wet and sloppy, so I tried fixing it.
I think there was a little more to the dream, but this is what I remember.
Thursday’s Theme Music
Ashland, Oregon — Thursday, March 5, 2026.
We’re winding through winter’s last days toward spring in Ashland. History provides us reminders that Ashland often experiences late winter to mid-spring snowstorms. I’d like more snow in the area, especially in the Cascades where our snowbank resides.
Today, it’s overcast with uncertain, flexing sunshine. 48 F, it feels neither warm nor cold, and our high is arcing toward just 50.
My phone has developed problems with receiving text messages all of a sudden. I’ve added fixing that to my todo list. I did get some updates from my siblings about Mom before the system went tango unform on me.
Mom is reverting to the behavior displayed in January. I drift toward remembering who she was and the complex relationships my sisters and I have with her. I contrast what’s she’s enduring with who she was, what and who she was trying to be, and where she arrived as a person. Much of it now is beyond her control. Doesn’t stop my sisters from getting angry about it. But we saw this pattern emerging. There was little we could do, which we learned with time, because we tried to do things to change the course.
I smile at some things, like her potato salad. My wife insists nobody makes potato salad like Mom. My wife tried but when she asked for a recipe, Mom was more about the ingredients and less about the measurements. One thing I learned from helping her make it sometimes was that Mom depended on tasting it and how it looked — color, texture. That’s hard to translate through recipes.
I was just settling into checking on prices, the war that Republicans don’t want to call a war, and other matters when breaking news arrived.
Trump replaces Noem at DHS, taps Mullin for job
I think at first, “about time”. Her arrogance and attitude doesn’t fit with what I look for in public servants. I temper that, though, with the understanding that she was carrying out Trump and Miller’s policies, and generally working as a functionary for Project 2025. It’ll be interesting to see how much this change will actually manifest as change.
On the heels of that thinking, I scoff, but of course Trump has replaced Noem. She’s become a lightning rod for negative impressions about Trump. With his popularity falling, he made her his scapegoat.
Today’s music is “Wild Horses” by the Rolling Stones. When The Neurons first settled it into my morning mental music stream, I sang it as “Wild Kitties” for Papi’s entertainment. He did not seem entertained.
I’m not sure why the song is playing in me. I can see how its themes and melody is about yearning for another time, for a different outcome, even for hope. I suppose that’s where I reside now — wishing for other things than what now exists. It also came out in 1971, when I was fifteen, so I suppose remembering the song stirs some nostalgia for being back there — young, with Mom, facing a bright future.
I’ll close with best wishes for you and us to stay safe, be healthy and find new ways toward a peaceful, prosperous, and inclusive future.
Cheers
Till When
Just goofing around. “Linger” by the Cranberries floated into the mental music stream. I recalled my youngest sister once saying that she loved that song, and thought about how she had changed and how life had changed. This came come out whole a minute later.
And here’s the sweet song, “Linger”.
Cheers
A Car Dream
My wife and I were our current age and traveling in her 2003 Gray Focus. I was driving.
We stopped somewhere to eat. It looked like a good choice but after we began looking around more, it turned out to be a mess. Tables were set up as if they were in a fine dining room but it was outdoors, on uneven fields of uncut grass. Many other people were just like us, trying to figure out WTH was going on.
My wife was very hungry and said, “Screw this, I’m just getting some food.” Then she stalked through the grass, where the food was in silver serving bowls among the clumps of grass. Finding some food, she took it to a table.
I was trying to tell her, “Wait, I don’t think that’s what we’re supposed to do.”
A harried young male waiter hustled to her, asking for her order. She replied, “I’m eating this.”
The waiter turned to me and asked, “What are you ordering?”
I was bewildered. “I don’t know what’s available. Where’s the menu?”
But as I looked around, I saw another family doing as my wife did. Noticing scrambled eggs in a bowl on the ground and a red plate, I picked them up and said, “I’m having this.”
The waiter looked both dejected and smug. Writing something on a pad, he left.
Eating some of our food but not happen with it, my wife and I returned to her car. It was cold outside by then, so I started the car to warm us up. I noticed ice inside the car and told her, “Look how cold it got.” Then I opened windows to let the ice out and continued running the engine to warm the car and clear the windows.
The dream ended on a view of us in her little gray car, waiting for the windows to clear.
Friday’s Theme Music
Ashland, Oregon – Friday, February 27, 2026. Fifty degrees F outside, the sun is burning away some final blue and gray tendrils, delivering a summer blue sky. Today’s highs are expected to be kicking the upper sixties. I appreciate that weather for today, and the chance it gives us to be outside, in sunshine and fresh air. Plants are blooming and blossoming out there. The march toward spring seems to have begun.
The Mom front continues to be quiet. It’s a question of is this ‘no news is good news’, or the calm before the storm?
Not binary, it could be both. We want Mom to be as safe and comfortable as possible as her days wind down, but she’s fought us. She wants her independence and the home where she lived for the last thirty years plus. We all have tried hard. There’s not blame to spread so much as understanding of the multiple variables and facets.
So many news stories to read today. The news overall continues to trigger worries and growls. One story ends with me shaking my head.
Melania Trump chairing a UN Security Council meeting. I don’t know how symbolic this is, or cynic that I am, just more White House distractions from other events.
The meeting is about “Children, Technology, and Education in Conflict.” But how many children have been detained by Homeland Security via ICE and the Border Patrol? Before we go off to tell others what need to be done, why hasn’t — or why isn’t — Melania Trump doing more for children being detained and held in detention centers in the United States? If she was really concerned about children, wouldn’t she be front and center for taking care of them, rather than making a documentary about moving into the White House?
It’s another one of those places for me where the administration expresses concerns but then takes actions which seem completely contrary to their stated concerns. It’s like how Trump tells us he’s for freedom but then attacks others for criticizing him or making fun of him and demands they’re fired. Or how he thinks he knows more than history and economic experts about tariffs being the best way forward. There’s a body of incoherency about Trump and his processes that make me doubt and question every damn thing he does or says.
The Neurons supplied the morning mental music stream with “Over the Hills and Far Away” by Led Zeppelin. They got suckered in my thinking about what I know. The song contains the lyrics, “Many times I’ve lied, and many times I’ve listened. Many times I’ve wondered, how much there is to know.”
I hope you weather, your day, and your life all go well for you and your family. I’m going to start with a cup of coffee and build from there, reading more news, going on.
Cheers
On Mom
If I come and visit
Will you know my face
Will you talk to me
Like your son
Or lace your words with hate
Will your texts ever change
From anger and demands
Will you stand and hug me
As you kiss my head
Can we sit and laugh
Remembering what we ate
Playing games of Tripoli
Hoping for a good hand
Or will you stare
Not speaking
Leaving me
In silence
Another Michael Dream
I was at some resort/business conference, mixing business with pleasure. Younger, I was traveling alone but had met with a group, mostly male, but a few female acquaintances. No relatives were present.
Everything was going smoothly. Prizes were being given out, assignments made, directions planned. While off on my own to one side, sitting, I ran into a former female boss. She asked about my health. I told her about my tendon surgery, showing her where the incision had been made. Then I reminded her that she’d known about that. Agreeing, she wished me well and moved on.
I then moved to another place, a tall table with a chair, to wait for friends. A man passed. I knew of him – elderly, with silvery gray hair, dignified, and gay. I also knew his name was Michael, same as mine. We exchanged nods as greetings.
My name was called to pick up a package, I went to a counter cluttered with packages. One was given to me. As I looked at the name, I saw the first name was Michael but a Spanish surname followed. I knew it was the dignified man’s name and pointed out that this wasn’t my package. I was told that the other guy had turned it down, so it was being given to me, and that I should take it and like it because it was a better package than what I would get.
I went off with that and ran into friends, explaining the package thing with them. Then I returned to the tall table and chair.
The dignified Michael passed several more times. I chatted with him, flirting with him about his plans. He was amused but kept quiet.
I then went to be with another group. More prizes were being given out, and I was again given dignified Michael’s package. I then commented that I kept receiving his package instead of mine.
I stripped off my clothes and was in a neon orange speedo. I decided to walk a back over to where food was now being given out. Although I was almost naked and was drawing attention in my bright speedo, I was comfortable, and heard women whispering how good I looked, which made me grin inside. I then got to the counter where I was given a third, larger package for the other Michael.
Dream end.
Wednesday’s Theme Music
Ashland, Oregon — Wednesday, February 18, 2026.
Our big snowstorm is over! We’re melting out of it. Sunshine rules although washed gray clouds coil and twine on windbound courses of the snowy mountains. More snow is expected tomorrow morning, and rain is forecast for tomorrow afternoon.
How many inches we got yesterday depends on what part of town you’re in. One section saw twelve. We saw seven at our house, sunshine reduced it to three fast.
It’s 35 F now. Three hours ago, it was 26. The high is expected to be 41.
Ah, time. Enormous time was spent texting sisters about Mom’s situation. We’re frustrated and sad and often feel helpless. I think the people at the hospital and the social workers understand this and are doing their best. I think Mom is, too. As someone commented, there’s a lot of relationship history built into this moment. Mom and Frank were firm on their choices; they were not moving into assisted living.
‘Water under the bridge’ is the easy way to dismiss it all, but that water runs deeper than it first appears.
Things will be resolved with Mom but it won’t be a resolution that any of us want to own. It won’t satisfy anyone involved. At least for now, the short term. Perhaps, in a year, it’ll be different. What am I saying? It will be different. The greater question is, how will it be different?
I spent a lot of time this morning reading about the EPA’s Endangerment Finding EPA decision. While it’s an agency decision, deeper implications arise about short-term and long-term effects and the government’s role and responsibility to mitigate them. Beyond that, we have established history of how the Clean Air Act helped us become healthier. When we’re healthier, we’re happier and more productive. Yet — here we are, mired in controversy.
My views about what’s going on politically are also tainted with his use of the military. I don’t approve of that.
And my views are tarnished because history says what tariffs will and won’t do, and the majority of economic experts agree. Yet, Trump and his administration is doing the opposite.
It’s the same pattern with COVID-19, and now the same with vaccinations and the measles outbreaks. I ask myself, what will it take, and end up, nodding, yes, FAFO. That’s just how some minds work.
I’m disappointed, too, that MAGA supporters lambast President Biden for what they perceived as his mental and physical limitations, and yet treat Trump as though he’s a gift from God. And yes, I understand the role of social media and information bubbles, and news spin. But understanding those doesn’t alleviate my disappointment, conversely enhancing my frustration and disappointment.
I feel like I’m on the sidelines in many ways, watching, commenting, but removed, and maybe too insulated and isolated. It’s no surprise that The Neurons brought John Lennon with “Watching the Wheels” into my morning mental music stream.
May peace and grace get through to you and carry you on through the fray to better times.
Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 