Somewhere around here we’ve got one of those little reference books to help you interpret your dreams. You know the ones — structured sort of like a thesaurus, so when you look up a word or phrase (“coffee,” say, or “horror movie” or “lava lamp”) you get an instant read on what that object or experience represents. Especially if you look up more than one dream-thing at a time, and combine the interpretations. (“You are concerned about sleeping too much” + “You need more Citizen Kane and less hockey-mask Jason in your life” + “You vaguely remember your life of 30-40 years ago” = “Dude…”)
I need to find it to look up my two most recent (remembered) dreams. At least they were on different days, so there’s no chance (is there?) that they’re related. Both had a curious visual quality to them — not quite animated, and not quite like viewed as an old scratchy film, but not not quite not animated or scratchy, either.
Sunday morning, minutes before waking
I dream that I am lying in bed, and that I am in that pleasant half-conscious state where one has the option of getting out of bed right that moment or drowsing a little longer. In the dream, I opt to get out of bed finally when I hear dream-voices.
In the dream’s master bathroom, our next-door neighbor (whom I will call Mrs. L) is discussing something with The Missus. Mrs. L has a clipboard in one hand, which she consults or annotates from time to time, and I get the distinct impression that Mrs. L is our landlady (although we don’t rent this house).
My dream-self gets out of bed. Uncharacteristically — so uncharacteristically that I know this must be a dream — I’m not self-conscious about standing there in my underwear. I kind of give the women a little finger-wave and then, because I obviously can’t use the master bathroom at the moment, I walk briskly down the short hall to the guest bathroom.
But you know, there’s something odd about this guest bathroom. Or rather, some things.
The tub is gone. There is no sign a tub ever occupied that part of the bathroom: the wall is blank, the tile floor extends right up to the wall. There is nothing at all in that roughly 3’x6′ area. Nothing hangs on the wall. It’s just… empty.
There is no toilet.
The vanity is lower, only about thigh-high or so, and not as broad as the real thing. It’s like a two-thirds-scale model vanity, in fact. No mirror is on the wall above it.
Everywhere — around the edges where the vanity meets the wall and floors, between the tiles — the grout is fresh.
“Uh, honey?” my dream-self calls. “What happened to the guest bathroom?”
The Missus materializes at my side. “Oh,” she explains, “the pipes were clogged.”
And that’s when I woke up.
In the wee small hours of Friday morning
I am dead.
Or rather — this doesn’t feel like quite the same thing — I have died. At least, everyone around me seems to think so; although I am going about my usual everyday life, they all seem sad and distraught. They keep talking about me in the past tense.
Oddly, although I’m there with them and talking to them, they can’t hear me.
I’m in a big empty warehouse of some kind, with one of my sisters. Apparently we were planning on buying or renting this warehouse and this is the inspection tour we never got to take, now that I am dead (have died). She’s talking to me as though I’m actually there but she’s not actually talking with me: she’s talking at me, over my interruptions and asides and replies.
Then I’m on the shoulder of a two-lane highway, somewhere out in the country. It’s a sunny day, not especially warm, and although I’m not by nature someone who tries to hitch rides with strangers — and besides, I’m dead (have died), so no one would stop for me anyway — I’m vaguely hoping that someone will stop and offer me a ride. As if I knew where I was going.
Finally a big black car — mid-20th-century vintage — pulls up and stops. I open the passenger-side door to the front seat and get in.
The driver is my father, but obviously not my father. He died in 1988, after all — died for real, I mean. And it doesn’t even look like him. You remember that guy — I think he was an ex-football player — the big blond crewcut guy, who starred in those TV commercials with Teri Hatcher for… was it Radio Shack? The “Dad” behind the wheel of this dreamcar looked like that guy.
We pull away from the side of the road and we head down the highway.
As with my sister, “Dad” talks to me as if I’m really there, and (as with my sister) I am frustrated that he’s not able to hear me in return. But one sharp difference marks this conversation: “Dad” talks to me as if I’m really there because he knows I am. He knows, too, that I can hear him, but that I can’t make myself heard. This saddens him as it does me. He tells me he knows how frustrated it makes me, that it will be all right.
And then, as if in a movie, the point of view switches to that of a person standing in the road, watching as the big black car dwindles into the sunny distance, trailing dust.
And then I wake up.
marta says
I love reading dream books, but have a hard time believing them. Dreaming about water probably means different things to different people–what it means to me having grown up in Florida as opposed what it means to someone who grew up in Montana. Or Russia. Or Japan.
Then again, last night I dreamed that we were late to my son’s birthday party and all the guests had left. Don’t need a book for that.
What’s your take on where dreams come from anyway?
Love those Triplets of Belleville by the way.
recaptcha: awaken 5
no joke.
John says
marta: Well, on one level, I know that dreams (or anything else that goes on between our ears) are “just” artifacts of electrochemistry, neurons (mis-)firing, and so on. On another level, though, denying that dreams might (not necessarily must) mean something feels a little like denying that metaphors exist (or that they work). A common rejoinder to Freud goes, “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar” — which below the surface also grants that a cigar can mean many things besides, er, cigar-ness.
What I like about dream books is that they offer “Well, consider this…”-type suggestions in cases where no meaning is evident.
Years back I had a dream which featured a cat, and it felt important that I at least come up with some theory why. The book said something like, “Cats in dreams often represent the feminine” (I don’t think this was meant with a wink and a nudge). When I read that, the entirety of the mysterious dream — at least, the part involving the cat — zoomed into sharp focus.
I’d been reading about Triplets since it came out — and had the poor Oscar luck to be released the same year as Finding Nemo — but we didn’t see it until last year (thank you, Netflix). Great film.
Jules says
Wow, how intense the last one must have been. I’m fascinated by life-after-death stuff. I know that you and I talked recently about that episode-long life-after-death moment of Tony Soprano’s, such a well-done episode. That seemed to be some kind of impending purgatory for him.
Dreams play a big part in Sam Phillips’ songwriting. Sure, sure, I’m a huge fan, but Sara Holmes recently posted about dreams, too, and inspired me to get out the ‘ol Sam CDs and listen with a theme in mind. “Living between time and choice, my soul’s free/I’m awake, but my dream keeps dreaming me” are some of my favorite lyrics of hers.
I wonder why the Radio Shack guy was there.
John says
Jules: Checked out Sara’s post, also very eerie. I don’t know if you remember the commenter here who goes by the handle The Querulous Squirrel — you said you liked that name. Anyhow, as it happens, Squirrel blogged yesterday about a dream, too. Something in the air!
Dreams often seem to get a bad rap as subject matter for writers. Critics/Reviewers say the experiences are too subjective, and/or too easy to manipulate as conveniences to a story. (Especially as a device for adding superficial Significance where none exists otherwise.)
But I just finished reading Neil Gaiman’s American Gods. The guy knows what to do with dreams.
Suppose, just suppose, that someone who knew Sam Phillips only through your frequent allusions were interested in finding out more first-hand. Where would be a good place to start?
Jules says
Ooh! Ooh! If you mean CDs, I could talk forever. It’s hard to recommend which one to pick, because for a while, she and T-Bone Burnett (to whom she was once married and with whom she had a daughter) made these crazy-good, highly-produced CDs, proving—once and for all—-that she’s the fifth Beatle. “Martinis and Bikinis” is the very best of those, and it. is. fabulous. on many levels. That was ’94. I’d say give it a listen, esp. for the lyrics. It is, as someone else once said, the greatest album the Beatles never recorded.
But then there’s another sound. Ten years after that, they decided to go for music a little less highly-produced, looking at more old-skool ways of producing, Sam trying to find her own voice, so to speak, on guitar, even if technically her playing were wobbly. She describes it as inviting listeners into her salon. Quieter, more introspective stuff (though that’s not the fairest description — “Martinis and Bikinis” is very introspective, too — just way more produced). That brought about “The Fan Dance,” which is utterly amazing. I definitely recommend that. The title song, a mysterious, little beauty, is also my favorite song in the entire world and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to post the lyrics on a Poetry Friday and ask for others’ thoughts on it, but I figured folks were tired of me talking about Sam Phillips (see what happened when you asked here?!).
She calls the CD that came after that, “A Boot and a Shoe,” the evil twin of “Fan Dance.” It was written post-divorce, and it is lovely and wonderful.
Despite all that, though, if you were going to START one place, I recommend her very, very latest, “Don’t Do Anything.” Brilliant.
John, if you want, I’m HAPPY to make you copies of these CDs, if I can figure out whether or not my burner works (my husband’s should, if mine doesn’t). I know, I know, I’m an idiot for saying this online, esp. a former Information Science major, but ah screw it. The thing you’d be missing, though, is the wonderful lyrics and CD-packaging, but I’m still happy to do it.
She’s a true poet. And a master songwriter.
John says
Jules: That was, well, enthusiastic. But just rational enough :) — in other words, what I’d hoped for when I asked.
Judging from the Amazon reviews, she’s a performer people either love or hate. (I know, I know: Amazon’s reviews aren’t always a — ha — hotbed of neutrality.) And things get even messier because some people love the “old” SP, and hate the new one, while others vice-versa.
I think I’ll start with the most recent one, see how that goes. From the stuff you’ve said about her at 7-Imp and above — but also from other musicians’ videos and lyrics you have posted — I’m not exactly wracked with doubt that I’ll like it. (But jeez, no need to jeopardize your credentials for admission to Info Science heaven; I’ll download from Amazon. :)