I dreamed three dreams last night. There were repeats of dreams I’ve dreamed before. Like watching a movie more often, more details have developed, or are noticed and retained.

The dreams involve me to different degrees. I’m heavily involved in the first dream, less involved in the second one, and I’m almost phased out wholly by the third. The third dream is mostly about black women getting on an aircraft. The aircraft is a C-5 Galaxy. They’re happy and excited about a journey they’re about to take. I’m happy and excited for them, too, but most of my involvement is listening to them and seeing close-up shots of all those happy people going on a journey.

The first one, that so involved me, was mostly adventure. About me and a group escaping, and then exploring, the dream begins after the escape. I don’t know what we’re escaping. The group is small. We find a cold, icy place to stay until we’re rescued. Once we’re in that place, we discover there are items left behind, and that we’re in what was once a military post. Then we learn the post isn’t entirely abandoned. Little by little, we slip in and integrate, making use of things we see the military using. The military isn’t malicious or anything; they’re simply there, going about their business as it’s been on so many military bases I visited.

No family was in the dream. So it goes. I never feel threatened or frightened in the dream. I’m a little wary initially but that changes quickly as I relax and gain confidence. By the end, when I’m using the military’s stuff, part of them but not one of them, I’m a confident leader.

The second dream is a lame sequel to the first, almost like a set-up to the third. There’s abstract discussions about what happened – “We survived, we found this place, now we can help others” – and sort of a montage of things like that being done. Then, it’s on to the third dream.

I write about the dreams to understand them. Frankly, I don’t. They seem hopeful but beyond that, I can sketch any number of meanings to them. All those meetings would have strength, weakness, logic and flaws to my interpretations. I sometimes think I should devote more time to understanding them but I see that as a major investment in time. I like to guard my time and routines.

Which brings me around to my conclusion. Do my dreams need to have significance, meanings, or portends to other matters? Perhaps it’s sufficient to accept, I dreamed. My mind has cleared some clutter from my thinking. Maybe it’s like organizing the attic; “Oh, here we have some leftover stuff. Where should we put it?” “Stick it in a dream.” “Oh, okay.”

It’s odder and a little more intriguing that I have repeat dreams. Do I have some frozen synapses causing the same images, sounds, ideas and stories to circulate through my mind? Such thoughts trigger comparisons to similarities in my writing. I often address time, memory, reality, technology and alienation in my fiction writing, whether it’s the mystery series or the science-fiction novels.

This leads to insights and suspicions. Perhaps I need more outside input and stimulus. I’m in ruts of living and writing, constrained by others’ health issues, concerns and worries, and have been for some time. Perhaps my dreams are a reflection of my ‘real’ situation, and that’s why they’re repeating, and why I’m so little involved. I’m often a spectator within my own life, another rider on the train.

Not too long ago, I read an article about a woman who often fantasizes during the day. Her pattern of thought developed when she was a child but she realized she continued them as an adult, and that they were connected to regular activities. She recognized that when she does certain activities, she likewise engages in fantasies, and they’re often the same or similar fantasies.

Becoming more interested in what she was doing and why, she searched for evidence that others were doing something like this, and found she wasn’t alone in this habit.

Well, I could have told her that; I also do this.

At first, this behavior was helpful in falling asleep. I engage it and knew it as a way to shut off my brain so I could sleep and rest. Later, I extended it and began engaging to turn off my brain from other issues. I’ve always recognized it as a coping practice to de-stress, but they’re also a way to engage my subconscious mind to think, develop solutions and ideas. These fantasies are harmless, about designing survival places, trains or ships, but I can see parallels to my dreams, and to my fiction writing practices.

In a curious way, I begin to view myself as a pie. Then we can slice me up into my various activities and realms – writing, sleeping and dreaming, walking and living, interacting with others. When I begin doing that, I can see how the whole fits together in a larger pattern. I can see my limitations and frustrations, and how they manifest themselves through fiction writing, daytime activity fantasies, and yes, nocturnal dreams. I can see how other dreams were wish-fulfillment that I matter more than I do, that I have a starring role in something, somewhere, that I am not just another blink of consciousness among the trillions of blinks on Earth.

For better or worse, the dreams are part of the whole necessary to complete me. That isn’t a permanent or complete answer, nor even a deep insight. It’s just another glimpse of an entity and a life.

It just happens to be a very personal view.