Fiction Writing Is…
Such Weird Dreams
I haven’t been posting about my dreams in the last few weeks. There’s a plethora every night, but these two from last night seem so strange, I felt driven to share them.
In the first dream, I was at a competition. Dressed in dark swimming trunks, my team mates and I were standing in water up to our chest. I was in my mid-teens and white; the others were likewise young, but were people of color, and all male. No females were in this dream.
For our competition, we had to launch some small toy projectiles on the sandy sea floor. I’d been experimenting with it and developed some insights into how to set up the little plastic launcher for the best results. The launchers shot out small items like pebbles, marbles, bottle lids, and crayfish. They didn’t go far, and nothing was harmed.
What was odd to me as we practiced was that we were standing up in water to our chest, but bent down to the ocean floor to set up and launch things. We did that without putting our heads under water. I realized that in the dream, and keep thinking about it: how were we bending down in four feet of water without getting our heads wet?
The second dream found me experimenting with missile launchers. These were supposed to provide trains proactive protection. I was at a very large conference/school working on this. Working alone, I pursued ideas that were outside of my realm about taking one product and using it in an unplanned way.
It worked! Excited, I attended a large morning briefing where the top guy was being briefed on projects. After the formal briefings finished and the meeting was breaking up, I made my way to the top exec, sat down and told him my plan, how I tested it, and how it worked.
He was impressed. “Really,” he said. “You did this? I’m surprised I didn’t hear about this.”
Eagerly I explained how I’d procured and modified the parts, and then tested them…
…in my dream….
The admission and realization stunned me.
He was staring at me. “You did it in your dream?”
“Yes.” I was mortified. “I tested it in my dream.” I almost mumbled the words.
“But you haven’t really tested it.”
“No.” I stood.
“I thought I would have heard about it,” he said, and then turned to go on with other things.
Humiliated, I left. I found a place to sit and think alone, but people kept looking in or passing by me. I knew from their glances and snippets of comments that they’d heard about what had happened. They were stony-faced and silent when they looked at me, and avoided meeting my eyes.
I vowed to leave there. Day was beginning. The main body of workers were arriving. The place was noisy with busy, energetic people.
Dejected and angry, I didn’t want to be there. Packing up a box of personal items, I went and found one of my team members. I called her to me. She was just beginning to start her work day. “I’m going home,” I told her. “If anyone asks, that’s where I’m at.”
I hid my face when I spoke to her so that no one could read my lips, and spoke softly so others couldn’t overhear me. Those circumstances forced me to repeat what I said before she understood.
She was concerned and sympathetic, asking if everything was okay. I didn’t want to explain, and left without saying anything more. As I did, I kept thinking, it was only a dream. I’d confused it with reality, and had acted upon a dream like it was real. That worried me about my mental state, but also worried me about how others perceived me, and what was in store for me for my future.
Expected
The things I expected to do and see,
were not the things I saw and did,
so what’ll become of the things I expect to see and do now?
The Prize Dreams
I dreamed of prizes last night. There were at least dreams, or prizes, involved.
Awakening to Papi the ginger cat’s request to enter, I remembered the dreams. But after tending to him (and the other cats who were roused by the activity) and taking a whizz (of course, since I was up, is what my bladder seemed to say), the dreams were sharply recalled. I thought about them as I returned to bed and sleep. But, awakening this memory, I found that I’d suffered dream amnesia. I remembered I’d dreamed about prizes, and there’d been three dreams, but I only remember one prize.
The prize was part of a game. Doing activities in the game earn you points. Most activities earn you one to four points. But the prize I won was a collector bill. Considered extremely rare, it was worth one hundred fifty points.
Bummer that this is all I remember, other than grinning like mad when I won it. Perhaps more will return to me later.
The Pre-writing Walk
A northern wind slices off some of the sun’s warmth. It’s a surprisingly clear, bright sun, the kind of sun that appears after storms dump inches and feet of snow.
But there’s no snow today. Snow is as rare as found diamonds this year. Ashland’s traffic is light. Town’s energy emanates a feel-good vibe. Restaurants are gearing up for lunch. Enticing aromas tempt and tease on every corner and most doors. I identify grilled burgers, French fries, and grilled onions among the scents. There are others that tantalize but leave without identification. We have a lot of good eateries and abundant offerings. Fortunately, their plot to capture me is avoided.
The writer, editor, and I discuss today’s writing plans, works spoken only in my head, so others don’t pin unwanted labels on me. The plans are fully developed, and I’m eager to get to them.
Still, I walk, thinking about last night’s dreams. One in particular trots alongside my thoughts. I was doing dishes, and I had a plan, but I was falling behind…is that about writing, life, or something else? It involved a POTUS but not the current guy. Others want to step in to help me, but a woman instructs them, “Let him go.” I struggle, turning in different directions, becoming thoughtless and distracted about what I was doing. It occurs to me that the sinks in my dream were full of dirty dishes and hot, soapy water. I slip a reminder into my head to look that up.
Lifted by the day, I walk longer and farther than planned, but finally make the turns necessary to reach my office away from home, the coffee shop where I write. ‘My’ space is available, and I take to it.
Time to write like crazy, at least one more.
Dream Fulfillment
When I was young, I imagined great careers for myself, glamorous and exciting vocations, like rock star or racing driver. Didn’t come close to either of those, but fulfilled one of them in last night’s dream.
Yes, I was a racing driver, an unknown in Formula 1. Being unknown bothered me not. I was just happy to be there. I was with another rookie driver. Short, he was from somewhere in South America. This was the season’s second race. He’d won the first race. I wasn’t in the first race, but the media was mobbing us because we were rookies, especially him, winning that first race, and his F1 debut.
The time for the current race arrived. There wasn’t any qualifying for reasons I don’t know, and I was starting from the back. (I think this was just a dream contrivance as a metaphor for how I view myself and my life sometimes.)
Then, just like that, I was surging through the field, was at the front and gone. My wife was in the pits, watching, and was mega-impressed. (Yes, I was given that view.)
“Where’s the other guy?” I wondered about my fellow rookie while the race was still going on. That question permitted me to view a screen in my car that showed the car’s relative positions, a setting that you can sometimes select in video racing games.
There was my car, in light blue, number one, and well ahead of the pack. The other rookie, in red, was fifth from last. I was exuberant for myself, and sympathetic for him.
I won, of course, amazing all. My wife’s excitement seemed to equal my own. If only life could be more like my dreams….
Peace On Earth
He was dubious, but —
He’d been doubtful about the whole thing for months, seven months, when he thought about it. The dream had only been once a week then, but he’d begun to have it every night, ever fucking night. He’d hunted for its meaning on the Internet. He couldn’t find that, but then, popup ads advertising the dream-catcher showed up on his computer. What was it…? What was the dream catcher…?
After realizing it was a spider, he’d avoided thinking about it, but the damn dream seemed to be creeping into his waking hours. Something needed to be done. So he clicked on an ad…and followed the instructions….
He’d bought the spider and brought it home. Black, with neon blue stripes, it didn’t look like any spider he’d seen before. That scared him. It could be poisonous. It looked menacing. Its shiny black body was as wide as a penny. Its legs, mechanically slender and perfect, tripled its diameter.
The spider moved around the jar. The sound its legs made against the glass seemed amplified. Hearing it, he felt his scrotum grow tight with tension and his heartbeat increase. As he sipped wine and watched, the spider settled directly opposite of him. Its eyes faced him. Drawing its legs in close, it crouched down.
It’s watching me, he thought.
To test it, he got up and moved to the other side of the table.
The spider walked in parallel to him. When he stopped, the spider stopped.
His resolve splintering, he shivered. He’d bought the spider to catch his dream. He wanted to know what it meant, and make it stop, but —
He had to use it. He’d paid a hundred dollars in silver for the spider. He was not a wasteful person. One hundred dollars was an extravagance. He could buy two or three pairs of shoes for one hundred dollars.
Several glasses of wine became a bottle, which became two. The alcohol helped restore his determination. He picked up the jar.
The spider watched….
With shaking hands and dry lips, he unscrewed the lid and placed the jar on its side on the table. “Here you go,” he said in a voice he barely heard himself, a voice slurred with alcohol. “Do your thing.”
The spider scurried out.
Stopping, it looked at him.
“I don’t want to know,” he said to the spider. “Just do what you’re supposed to do.”
The spider raised two front legs and rubbed them together.
Thinking he heard a high, sustained note, he hurried from the room.
He left the light on, though. Just…in case.
Later, the wine’s influence and warm house relaxed him. He fell asleep in his recliner while watching “A Christmas Story” on the living room television.
Later, he awoke. He was drooling. The television was on but made no sound. He heard…scratching.
He looked up.
The television’s ambient blue light lit the spider above him. It was spinning a web. Stopping as he watched, the spider lowered itself until it came down on the bridge of his nose. He wanted to jerk away, scream, or get up and run, but he was paralyzed.
Sweat dribbled down his neck. The spider moved. Each spidery step made him shiver and shudder. He lost sight of it, but felt it go across his forehead. Pausing at his temple, the spider turned and trekked down the side of his head.
The spider reached his ear opening. It stopped. He held his breath. After a moment, the spider entered his ear.
He thought he’d hear or feel its steps, but it was like the spider had disappeared. Waiting for something to happen, he reflected, this was how they’d told him it would be. Nothing was left to do but sleep and dream, and then wait for the spider to tell him what the dream meant.
Maybe then, he would have peace.
A Dream in Four Parts
Today’s dream was clear and detailed. This could be attributed to how it was processed.
- I dreamed it.
- I awoke and thought about it.
- I fell asleep again, and dreamed about thinking about it.
- I dreamed about writing about it.
That sort of repetition reinforces matters, you know?
The dream’s four parts were interesting. It interested me, at least, because I was the star.
- The dream’s first part featured two officers with whom I was assigned at different locations.
- In the second part, I was diagramming a layout to provide a place for people to survive.
- With the third part, I was teaching another how to use a computer to document the diagram I’d created.
- The fourth part of the dream found me exploring deeper levels.
The two officers were Major Andrews and Captain Knot (fake names). I was assigned with one in Japan, and the other in Europe. One was a C141 pilot and the other flew Hercs.
Knot is a foot shorter than Andrews. But in this dream, Knot had instructions. Andrews was supposed to receive them. But Knot, the short one, teased Andrews the tall, holding the instructions up and behind him, preventing Andrews from reaching it, vexing the much taller Andrews.
In my analysis during my dream, this made me laugh. Part of me was keeping another part of me from having something. Here’s the twist. Andrews was an authority figure, the officer-in-charge, and I worked for him. Knot was a buddy.
Yes, lots to ponder there, no?
The diagram involved an enormous bunker. We were pre-positioned personnel, preparing the facilities as a sanctuary for the others who were to come. I was one of many, but an indeterminate number. I was given a space and the mission brief (the instructions that Knot kept from Andrews). Enthusiastically, I plotted how my space was to be used to help others. The results pleased me. I shared them with others, and they began copying my design.
The official coordinator arrived. Her task was to document the diagrams on a computer for them so higher authorities could approve them. But she was unfamiliar with her computer. I knew it, however, so I sat down and explained to her how to use it. The computer depended on touch screen technology and soft buttons. She didn’t know these terms, and had never used equipment like that. I walked her through their use. She picked it up quickly.
Then, I was off, exploring with Knot. The facilities, made of white cement, had multiple levels and doors. I began exploring with Knot reluctantly following. Going deeper, I discovered more subterranean levels. They connected to other places, like malls, airports, and government buildings. Discerning a pattern to the levels, doors, and buildings, I gained rapid familiarity with how to get around. Several places were marked with red doors and warnings not to loiter in the area and to stay away from those doors. That didn’t deter me but Knot was worried, and urged that we leave. I didn’t leave until one red door opened and a large man in a black uniform came out to speak with us.
At that point, I returned to the original level with Knot behind me.
Although I thought about it, and dreamed I wrote about it, I think I’ll need more time to fully process it. The aspect about deeper levels to explore intrigued me. I associated that with my self.
Overall, the dream was a powerful and uplifting experience. In a striking juxtaposition, it matches my feeling the day after winter solstice that a weight had been lifted from me. I’d had a feeling for a while that I was on the precipice of a change. After solstice and this dream, I feel that I’m moving on to something else.
That has me excited and hopeful.
Total Sense
After finishing one chapter, I bought a fresh cuppa coffee and began the next chapter. I’m excited. I know what to write, although, again, imagination and characters have taken me into unexpected directions.
Mixed in with my thoughts about writing this novel are a host of other matters to attend. I’ve been procrastinating about them, and worrying about them, even as I urge myself, “Just fucking do it.” And then, without warning, my dream about the cookies, and the job interview (to sell cookies) comes into focus. Understanding blooms. I know what it means, and it surprises me, but also makes me happy.
It’s just fascinating how our brains and minds work on so many levels. Been a great day of writing like crazy. Just a little more to do today, and then I’ll call it.
Symbols
You ever have a dream, and awake and wonder, now what does that mean? Then you search for meanings of things that appeared in your dreams?
Yeah, it’s cookies for me today. What does it mean to be offered a job selling cookies, in a dream?
Michael Seidel, writer 