Tag: military

The TV Movie Dream

The dream felt like a made-for-TV rom-com. I was a clean-shaven young NCO in a pressed service-dress uniform and tidy haircut. Due to weather circumstances and other logistic problems, I was required to help a four-star general for an evening. The general was a notoriously finicky and critical man, but I accepted my assignment with an aw-shucks gulp.

He was at a conference. The evening didn’t go as planned but I managed to keep a step ahead, and it went well from the general’s point of view, if not to anyone else’s thinking. (Sorry, but details are lacking.) The general then wanted to leave – now. But his aide, chief-of-staff, and other personnel weren’t there. Nonetheless, he wanted to go now. So I led him out of the building.

It was late a cold and starless late night outside. It’d been snowing for several previous days but sunshine had prevailed that day. Much snow had melted, flooding streets with icy slush. It was messy and travel was limited. But no problem, I took to the general to my parents’ house. Previously in the evening, I’d come by and set up a place for the general in their sprawling split-level. After showing the general to his place, I went upstairs and told my parents about their house guests. They accepted it with a matter-of-fact shrugs and smiles.

After that, I checked in on the general. He was fine, didn’t need anything and stressed, he didn’t want anyone to disturb him. He had work to do and then was retiring for the night.

Good to go. I returned to the convention center and encountered the rest of his group, as hoped, because they needed to be told what’d happened. They demanded to know where the general was. I explained it all to them and answered their questions. Their hostility soothed, they admitted that I’d done well. One insisted that he wanted to visit the general. I told him the general said he didn’t want disturbed. I left them discussing what they were going to do and went home.

As I arrived home (my parents’ house), a car of young women pulled up. The neighbor’s daughter left the car. The car left with the young women leaning out of their windows hooting and waving at me. The daughter, a short brunette in her late teens whose father was in the military, came over and flirted with me, beginning, “I hear you kidnapped a general.”

I told her the story. We flirted and then I was temporarily called to the house because the general wanted something to drink. When I returned, the young woman’s older sister, a tall blonde, was there. She asked me, “What would you do with slush like this when you were a kid? Wouldn’t you build a dam?”

“Absolutely,” I said.

The older sister said, nodding, “You settled a debate. Good-night.”

She left us. The young women and I went for a walk along the slushy street, building slush dams, but also breaking one open.

The dream ended.

***

Somehow, from all of this, I ended up thinking that the dream was about the outcome was the only thing that mattered.

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Thursday’s Theme Music

Once again, a dream contributed the theme music’s selection. The dream is too scattered to remember. It had a lot of candles, blowing trees, thunder, dark clouds, running and shouting, reminding me of some drug-induced psychedelic adventure, sort of Alice in Wonderland is blended with Bladerunner. 

The dream was difficult to remember, reminding me in my efforts of web pages that won’t correctly load, incomplete and chaotic, but done at a frenetic pace. The pace brought “Welcome to the Jungle”, G N’ R, into my stream as I examined what was remembered.

I was stationed and living in Germany when “Welcome to the Jungle” (1987) was released. We worked in an old, brick, two-storied building right by the flightline. Photographs of the building with German zeppelins docked next to it were on the building’s walls. I found one of the photographs on line and posted it here. That’s the little building, under the zeppelin’s tail.

RM Zeppelin

I worked upstairs in a vault. My small ops center served as the control point for the vault. Beyond my ops center was the crew briefing room and our intelligence section. As there were no windows and things like radios weren’t permitted in the vault, we all went into the other three upstairs offices when there was down time. Several of us came together and bought a boom box so we could play music and hear the news. Guns N’ Roses was a hard rock staple of the time, getting boomed into the upstairs hallway while we pursued our mission.

I still have the boom box.

 

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J’accuse Dream

First, this has nothing to do with Zola’s letter, except the title. This is about my dream, aspirations, and doubts.

As background, I finished writing and editing a series of novels called Incomplete States. With that finished, I was moving into the next steps of what to do when you’re written a novel and want to get it published. Options are available.

My dreamscape has been quiet for several days so I didn’t think my decisions would show up in my dreams. But, boom, they came. When I awoke and thought about it, I laughed about what I’d dreamed.

The dream began with a new venture. People were expecting me and had high expectations for what I would do. I was relaxed, going about getting acclimated. As the dream progressed, I learned that I was in the military (again), involved with command and control.

Awakening, I thought, “Of course the military would be included.” I’d spent twenty years in the military. The structure helped me succeed without stretching myself. It was a comfortable existence. I often retreat to it in dreams.

Things quickly began going awry in the dream. I felt constantly behind and a little bit lost. I couldn’t find my uniform. I discovered I was already supposed to be somewhere, and I was late. Scrambling, I rushed to find my uniform, shave, dress, and get to work.

I was naked when my wife came in. “What’s this?” she pointed at my side. I couldn’t see what she referenced.

“Have you seen yourself in the mirror?” she said, and then steered to a mirror. “I think you’d better take a look.”

She pointed out several boils on my side. Horrified, I tried lancing them, and failed. The effort put me behind. Now I really had to scramble.

Awakening, I realized that I was facing my anxieties. “Have you seen yourself in the mirror?” That question seemed like I was trying to pretend to be someone else, and that I wasn’t clearly seeing myself and the situation, that I was misleading myself. And look how I’m blemished and flawed, the things I don’t see about myself, how I’m fooling myself. I took all of that about my publishing ambitions.

Finding shaving cream, I hunted down a mirror and started applying it to shave. The shaving cream was thick and brown. Crude and unfinished, I thought after awakening and reflecting on the dream, just as I worry that others will think about the series. 

Another military member in uniform stuck their head in the window. “What are you doing?” I said.

“Looking at someone using a mirror,” he said. “I’ve never seen that done before. I was wondering what it’s like.”

How absurd, I thought, but, awakening, I realized that I was questioning even the most basic aspects of myself. I remembered reading about experiments involving animals mirrors. Looking in a mirror and realizing that you’re seeing yourself is used to explore animal intelligence and self-awareness. By implying that I (as another entity in the dream) didn’t know how to use a mirror was a question about my self-awareness and intelligence.

A phone rang and I answered it. “We have an inflight emergency,” a male voice said. “We need you here to decide what to do.”

I was appalled. “But I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Then you’re not coming?”

“No.” I hung up.

I didn’t need to think much about that aspect after awakening. The message behind the words seem nakedly clear, as did the next dream segment.

A chief master sergeant that I’d worked for during my first tour called me to him. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but this isn’t working out. To be honest, I expected more of you. It didn’t work out so I’m sending you back home.”

“‘But Chief,” I protested, but he wouldn’t listen to me.

Yes, it was all there, all the doubts, uncertainty, and uncertainty, along with rejection by a person in authority who I admired.

I thought I’d mastered these things, demonstrating again how easily I can fool myself. Yes, those doubts exist. Hell, they exist with the majority of efforts that anyone does. To reach and succeed, failure, ridicule, and exposure must be risked. These doubts are always in me, no matter how many times I’ve succeeded, or how often I’ve been reassured by myself and others. That’s just part of who I am.

While it gave me a good laugh to see how earnestly my subconscious mind (and thus, me) attacked me, it hasn’t changed anything. It’s there, and I know it, but I’m stepping out.

Cheers

 

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

I can’t trace the roots of why I’m streaming this song today. Didn’t have the record, or any of this group’s albums. I knew the song came out sometime in the mid to late 1970s, but had to look it up to find it.

The airways often shaped the musical landscape then, with television giving musical groups and their hits a step up via Soul Train, American Bandstand, and a few other shows like that. FM stereo was growing in popularity, with multiple stations dedicated to rock, soul, R&B, and country genres going on air. Once songs began getting air time, they would move up the charts, gain more air time. Suddenly they were in your ears.

Nothing wrong with that, of course. When I first started driving in 1974, our area had three FM stations. You’d punch the buttons and move around between them. I don’t punch buttons now, but gently tap them to move ‘tween stations, or use my thumb on a rocker button my steering wheel to advance to the next setting. I have five FM stations that I prefer in my area, but I also play satellite FM. The satellite capability offers about a zillion stations, but I listen to eight primary music stations when I’m drivin’ ’round town.

This song, “Baby Come Back” (1977) by Player, came to me by radio saturation. The song reminds me of Hall & Oates. I was stationed in the Philippines when it was released. We only had one station, the Armed Forces Network Philippines (AFN-P). It’s an okay song, doesn’t stir me in any particular direction, but it’s part of my memoryscape.

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The Knives and Rain Dream

I was back in the military once again, but this wasn’t like any military experience of my life.

As a senior NCO, I was standing off to the commander’s right, facing the troops. They were at attention. One troop, Ryan, a former co-worker (but not in the military), stood in front of the rest. At the commander’s order, Ryan pulled a knife from his clothing. About the length of a machete, he threw it at a target above my head and behind me. I was shocked by his cavalier approach and thought, this won’t go well.

The knife bounced back off the target, striking Ryan on the right side of his front. He went down.

As I expected, I thought. I ran to Ryan, took a knee, and said, “Call nine one one.” I looked over at the commander. He held up one finger. I nodded, indicating that one knife had struck Ryan. As this took place, I realized that Ryan had thrown two knives. As I said, “One knife,” Ryan said, “No, two.”

I looked on his other side. Both knives had bounced back, striking and injuring him. An ambulance arrived. I left him in the professionals’ care.

The commander left. The troops parked their cars and assembled to take tests. They were at desks, but the desks were outside, yet arranged like they were in rooms.

I wasn’t testing, but overseeing the process. I discovered that one of the test-takers had parked in my parking space. I didn’t care, and was more amused by it, but the guy thought I was bothered. He went to move his car, telling the rest as he did that he was doing it because I was upset even as I tried telling them, I’m not bothered. When he moved his car, they went to another area of desks to take their tests. Shaking my head with amusement, I left.

I awoke up in my dream. I was in an apartment with my wife. I was worried about others outside, and open windows. Rain was falling, and the wind was blowing. Growing concerned about rain coming in, I went around, checking on the doors and windows, closing some of them. Waking my wife, I asked her, “What’s wrong with you? Why did you leave those windows like that?” Befuddled with sleep, she turned away.

I checked on our pets. They were all fine. Nobody had broken in. I realized that we’d been sleeping with the lights on.

The dream ended.

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That Damn Dream

Had another one of those damn depressing dreams again where I was in the military. I’d been out, now I was back in.

It was just in time for a military parade and change-of-command ceremony. We were dressing in our Class A, or what is also called our service dress uniforms. I was behind, behind in knowing what to do, where to go, and when to be there. My hair was shaggy and needed to be trimmed to mil standards. I was racing to get my uniform pressed and check on my fruit salad, and worrying that my uniform was still in reg. Then I didn’t know where to go. I was running behind and people were both giving me grief and being supportive.

But they were leaving because it was time to assemble until I was alone, still scrambling. I still had to much to do, racing through a shower, getting the uniform on, and then checking the hair on my neck. You can bet, on reflection, I found it ironic that I was back in the military for a change-of-command ceremony. Changes are needed, I’m telling myself, or you’ll be exposed!

So much anxiety in that dream, a perfect exposure of the imposter syndrome.

Damn.

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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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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.”

 

2

The Major Dream

The Major had a hole in his head.

It wasn’t a hole, like a hole in a sheet of paper, but a hole, like a hole in the yard that the dog had dug.

The hole took up the left half of the Major’s face. His eye protruded out without any bones to support it. But it was a clean hole, shored up inside, and smooth.

I noticed the Major, Holder by name, Army by service, when I was sent over to him.

I’d been queuing with thousands of others in a writhing river of uniformed personnel. We were preparing to go. I don’t know where. Dressed for battle, I was geared up. I, oddly, was the only one with a helmet. I’d brought my own. Others awaited someone to issue them a helmet, and many were complimentary of me that I’d had the foresight to bring my own helmet.

We finally started moving. I was impatient, as I always am. Irritation grew as I awaited movement and direction. Someone from the middle of people called, “You, with the helmet. Where you going?”

Figuring he meant me, the question and tone pushed my buttons. I was instantly pissed. Shoving through the stream, which rapidly made way for me, I went to the man who called, and stated in a hard voice – the one my teams knew so well from me – “I’m Master Sergeant Seidel.”

The man beamed at me. “Good. Here.” He thrust a piece of paper in my hand. “Take this and go over there.”

Mollified, but puzzled, I did as bid after a moment, and discovered myself in a waiting area. That’s where I met the tall and slender, good-humored Major Holder. Gray-haired and lightly tanned, he wore green fatigues and had no gear, but he was in charge of something. He addressed me, telling me to wait. I wanted to know what I was waiting for, but he turned away.

Others arrived. They began complaining about the impositions they were facing, like me, bothered by the long wait, lack of activity, and general chaos. They started complaining about how bad they had it, noting small injuries, injustices, and frustration.

“What’s wrong with you?” I asked them. “There’s a man over here who’s missing half of his face from this war. He’s not complaining.”

They were, of course, words that chastised me, too. But Major Holder, always patient and good-humored, turned and said, “Don’t worry. It’s nothing at all.”

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A Dream of Lost Identity

After twenty years in the military, I suppose it’s not surprising that my identity is linked to my time in the ranks. I’ve been retired for more time — twenty-two years — than I served — twenty-one years — so my continuing dreams about identity and being in the military disturb me.

In this latest one, storms were raging. I was the new MFWIC – mo-fo who’s in charge — and was geared up and entering a tense situation. Everyone was waiting for me. But arriving there, I discovered I lacked my military identification card. I knew I’d forgotten it. That embarrassed me. I fumed about the loss without saying anything, but none dared approach me, as all were aware of the situation. All I could so, though, was stew with frustration while waiting to go back and get a new ID.

Returning to the staging location, I didn’t need to say a word. Nobody else did, either. Everyone was waiting for me to get there. As soon as I did, a young female airman in old BDUs wordlessly went about providing me a new ID card. Once she did that, I turned to leave and begin again, more than ready to do so.

And the dream ended.

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