A Dream Mystery
This was a fun dream. I wasn’t actually a participant. This was more like watching a television, a police procedural – mystery – thriller. What really struck me was the main character. Tall white man in his mid-thirties with fine gray hair. His name was Andi Houle. The name caused a pause in my dream as the neurons chased that name. They came up with Houle from the tv series “19-2” (he was the sergeant). Why Andi? The neurons shrugged their shoulders over that.
In the dream, Houle was investigating a murder. As he did, he began realizing that evidence was adding up that he was the murder. Someone was framing him. Of course, he was racing to save himself and find the real killer and understand what was going on. Sadly, I was awakened before the climax. Damn cats.
Now Watching
We finished watching His Dark Materials. It felt rushed — like, the time with the bears should have been longer — and we have some casting issues, (well, one) but it was a worthwhile entertainment.
Alas, it ended too quickly. What to watch now?
Well, we have American Gods on deck, deciding to hold off on it until we finished His Dark Materials so we’d have something in reserve. Meanwhile, my wife said, “What about Watchmen?”
She didn’t have much awareness about the show. I was familiar with the movie and graphic novels and knew they were doing a series. Sure, let’s watch.
Well, the first damn episode was gripping. Hope the rest are as good. I know of series that started strongly but then faded.
Meanwhile, I’m finishing with Dublin Murders. I’d read the Tana French books and enjoyed them, particularly the first, In the Woods. Our neighbor, Walt, didn’t like “The Likeness”. “There’s no way that a person can live with people who know them and fool them into thinking they’re someone else. I just can’t buy it.” I enjoyed it, though, and I find the series moderately entertaining, with perhaps a little too much angst. I like the casting, as I’m familiar with a number of the actors via BBC (and Britbox), Acorn, and Netflix. I recommend the series. They’re not procedurals but murder/dramas, in my mind (where else) (would we call a murder/drama a murma?)
Cheers
The Start
You’d think the start was when the body was found. That’s the beginning of the crime investigation. It isn’t, of course, the crime’s beginnings. For that, you need to slip into a wayback machine and ride time to when the killer was young and beginning their career, back to before the victim and killer had ever met, back to a nascent moment when everyone was happy and oblivious to the future.
After all, the killer just wanted revenge. Their victim had killed first, but the body hadn’t been found. At least, that’s what the killer believed.
They were always one to act on their beliefs.
Tuesday’s Theme Music
After reading some news last night and this morning, my anger spilled over. “You must be evil,” I said in my head to several of the articles’ principals, evil for how their minds work, evil for their indifference about what their actions do to the world or other creatures, evil for their willingness to rationalize murdering and victimizing.
From that came, quite deliberately, Chris Rea’s 1989 song, “You Must Be Evil”.
Multiple Dreams
I had multiple dreams last night. Most remain in pieces in my mind like debris after a storm. The essences:
- I was plotting a murder and intent on carrying it out. I don’t know who I was killing or my motive.
- A cat was the size of an American nickel. A happy little animal, he was kept in a jar. I watched over him, ensuring he wasn’t lost or injured, and played with him.
- The third dream found me playing a game that may have been a show on television. I was winning by answering questions and advancing through levels. It seemed to combine physical prowess and the ability to answer questions.
Not much further information is available on the murder dream. Awakening and thinking about it, I attribute it more to my writing muses than an intention to kill another person. I’m always thinking about escaping, surviving, killing, investigating, flying, traveling, exploring, and robbing places. They’re exercises for my imagination, IMO.
The cat dream was a simple anxiety dream. Quinn hasn’t been well. His breathing bothered us. We’d endured a summer of wildfire smoke and hazardous air, so I put his breathing problems down to that. We’d been keeping him inside and addressing his breathing issues. When he didn’t improve after the air improved, I thought I’d take him in for an antibiotic shot.
But the vet found a lump on Quinn’s neck, so we’re going through the challenge of treating him, keeping him hydrated, and feeding him. We’re not certain of his issue, yet. Never a large cat, he dropped two pounds and now weighs just five. He’s mostly perky, though, but not eating and drinking enough on his own. I take comfort and hope in signs like him rubbing up against me, jumping on my lap, stretching, trying to claw furniture, and yawning.
Meanwhile, I’m going through the process of letting him go. I’ve endured this with other pets, so I understand some of the emotional, physical, and intellectual dynamics. It’s always different, of course, and it’s never easy.
I enjoyed the game show dream. First, you’d press a button to start the big wheel spinning, and press the button again to stop it. The big wheel had activities and numbers. If it landed on the activity, you did it. Doing the activity, such as twenty push-ups, authorized you to rob a competitor by taking a token or moving them back by a spin on the punishing wheel.
If the big wheel landed on a number, that was the number of spaces you’d move. Climbing, crawling, jumping, and swinging on ropes were required to move along squares. After moving forward and stopping on a square, you were asked a question. Fall to answer it correctly — it was timed, but you had three chances — meant you faced the punishment wheel.
Come to think of it, there was a television audience cheering us on. Writing about it today prompts comparisons to an updated game of Life combined with Trival Pursuit, which sums up my writing life, I think.
Spinning wheels, killing time, chasing trivia, and hoping to advance, it’s a writer’s life.
Orange
Yes, I’m wearing orange today.
I don’t belong to a political party. I support those who will speak truth, and support freedom, justice, and equality for every person. Neither the G.O.P. nor Democratic Party does that well in America in recent years. The Green Party and Libertarian Party try, and they have some good ideas, but lack the political will.
I like what America’s founders set out to do. The Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights are fine documents, with great aspirations for what we as a nation can be. It is not a perfect document. Neither were the people who wrote and ratified it. As the Preamble says, “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
They were forming a more perfect union. It wasn’t perfect, and it isn’t perfect. It was not meant to be never changed, for the founders recognized they weren’t creating a perfect union, and built several mechanisms for change into it. They recognized that not many ideas or plans begin as perfect. You do the best you can to give yourself a place to start. If you want for the perfect plan, you’ll probably never begin.
I support the idea of a more perfect union. I want to secure the blessing of liberty for ourselves and posterity. To achieve this, we can’t support or give in to lies, fear, or oppression. To continue the pursuit of a more perfect union began over two hundred years ago, we must continue to address wrongs and injustice, and change and adjust without abandoning the basic premise that everyone is equal, and have certain rights that others cannot abridge nor abrogate. Until that level, we continue to seek a more perfect union.
Which is why I wear orange today.
Michael Seidel, writer 