Bad Dream 44 -- Morning of 2/25/19

I think I had this dream this morning, woke up a little bit, went back to sleep and had the dream again.  Kind of like yesterday...

In my dream, I'm playing a game with three other "people": two Unidentifiables (who are shaped like people and act like people, but don't have faces) and a Pirate, who is all done up in appropriate Pirate garb.  

We're playing a game whereby a pair of people push a "pendulum" weight-on-a-stick back and forth to each other, while the other two people push an identical weight back and forth to themselves across the same open area.  The weight is a bit smaller than a basketball and weighs about 10 pounds.  I am supposed to push my pendulum across this open space to Unidentifiable A (the two Unidentifiables are reminiscent of the characters that showed up in that Steed-and-Emma "Avengers" episode that included dreaming).  And then Unidientifiable A pushes the weight back to me.  Identifiable B is standing next to me, and he/she is pushing an identical weight across the same open space to the Pirate, who then pushes it back to Unidentifiable B.  

When the weight comes to me this time from Unidentifiable A, I want to give it an especially hard push.  I don't know why.  Maybe just showing off or trying to enliven the exercise.  But in any case, the weight goes over to the Pirate rather than to my partner -- Unidentifiable A.  Understandably, this causes an upset in the "program," and it takes a bit of time for the weights to return to their previous pattern.

The weight comes back to me, and I want to make amends for screwing up the game with my last hard push.  So I push the weight back across the open space a bit harder -- making sure I aim carefully for Unidentifiable A and not the Pirate.  To my chagrin, the weight crosses the open space heading directly towards the Pirate.  

Bad Dream 42 & 43 -- Morning of 2/24/19 nah

I think that my sleeping/dreaming are different here in the Keys than back home.  Dreams seem to come in a torrent -- and leave the same way.  We're eating more rich food than normally and having alcohol with every dinner.  And that may be some or all of the issue.  Oh, and then there's the temperature controls, noisy air conditioner, etc. for sleeping.  

In these two dreams, I wrote down a few notes -- as usual -- expecting that when I awoke, the notes would "key" me into the rest of the data (at least more of the data) from the dreams.  Didn't work this time.  I tried just rolling over in bed and scribbling out a few words on a piece of paper, not wanting to get out of bed and write in the bathroom, as it often meant I couldn't get back to sleep and trying to work by flashlight illumination so as not to disturb Deb.  Oh well...

My note for the first dream of the morning is "All she has to do is move."  The notes for the second dream are "4 of us.  We've been drafted to solve prob." and "Deb dressed.  I'm not."

So there you have it.

Bad Dream 41 -- Morning of 2/23/19

I believe this is the end fragment of a longer dream, but I also believe I dreamed it at least twice on the same morning:

In my dream, I am lying down -- or at least very comfortable -- and about to continue reading a book that I've enjoyed a great deal.  Physically, the book is a better quality than just paperback, but the covers are black leatherette and somewhat flexible.  (There are a lot of Bibles fabricated like this, but this book is much shorter than the Bible.)

I open the book and begin to read.  The book maintains whatever literary quality it has had in the past by being a most pleasant thing to read.  But when I turn the page, I am surprised and disappointed that the book is done.  Finished.  No more to read.  I'm staring at the inside of the back cover.

As I sit here writing this out, I am frightened that the dream represents -- or foretells, maybe -- the death of someone I love.  And that it might be me.  I rarely have such thoughts and I haven't believed in the ability of dreams to predict or foretell the future.  But that's the "Aha" that I have at the moment about the dream.  And the dream did, it seems, repeat itself for me.

I hope and pray that I will re-read this in the days upcoming and be able to say, "Well, okay.  I guess I missed on that!  Thank the Lord..."

Bad Dream 40 -- Morning of 2/21/19

In my dream, I am working in some kind of office setting.  I think I've recently  been relocated from elsewhere in the organization.  And things are not going well in the office.  It's not clear to me, the dreamer, what the problem is, but people all around me seem nervous.  As if they expect something untoward to happen. 

I have a wound on my right thigh -- on the outer surface of the thigh.  It's quite round and it's about the size of an old-fashioned silver dollar coin.  I have no idea what caused the injury, but it seems to be healing well.  

For reasons that are not clear to me -- except possibly associated with the nervousness of everyone around me -- I pull up my pants leg and pull off the scab, which exposes the reddish raw flesh underneath.  It's not bleeding much if at all, but the tissue exposed is clearly subcutaneous.  Clearly, this action of mine is going to require assistance to cover over the wound and allow a new scab to form.  I know there is a nurse-level medical office on a floor above us and start to make plans to visit there and get some dressing for the wound.  

I am approached by a woman who was a secretary in the part of the organization I've just left, but it's not clear to me whether I've left that part of the organization and she's still there or whether we've both departed that part of the organization.  She is snarky with me, but I feel that's okay.  It's just her way of chatting up people she knows and basically likes.  I think she says something like "Well, aren't we getting up in the world lately?"  (Suggesting that my new job is something of a promotion.)

(My notes from last night end with a new line and just the word "Staple?" on the line.  Whether that's related to my wound or not is something I simply don't remember...)

Bad Dream 39 -- Morning of 2/21/19

In my dream, I am a camp counselor for young-ish kids. Things seem to be going okay.  

One of the activities at the camp is swimming for the kids, and there is a lake to allow this to happen.  There is a rope line around the outside of the area where the kids are allowed to swim and the rope is held up to the surface of the water by a series of floats.  It's a very small, restrictive area given the size of the lake.  And I suppose the lake bottom falls off sharply just outside the rope -- which is why the area is so small.  And these are pretty small kids anyway.

So after the kids are done playing in the water and have gone off to other activities, I decide I would like to take a dip as well.  But staying inside the rope would be quite restrictive for someone my size and my swimming capabilities.  So I ask myself -- and maybe other counselors -- if it would be okay to swim outside the line.  And not getting any straight answers (that might get someone in trouble if he/she just said "Yes, go ahead.") I decide to wade in outside the lines and listen to see if anyone objects loudly.  And no one does.  

After I'm done swimming, I am close to someone who is looking for volunteers for some activity or other to take place after the kids have lunch.  I'm not terribly interested in helping with the activity, but there are few to no other people who are volunteering to help.  I seriously consider volunteering anyway, but hold back just a little.  

Bad Dream 38 -- Morning of 2/17/19

In my dream, I am working for a company that is changing their office arrangement.  There are two buildings as part of this change -- and one of them is far superior to the other.  I have just found out that I will be assigned to have my office relocated to the other location.

I make a phone call to try and find out:
 -- why I've essentially been demoted this way, and
 -- if I can talk someone out of this and get myself reassigned to the better building.

I am now talking to a person who might be able to help with this.  He (I think it's a "he") tells me "There's no way in the world you're going to be moved to this building."  

I ask him why.  He asks me back "Would you like to know how upper management thinks of you?"  And I tell him "Of course I would."

He tells me that I am thought of as being far too casual in getting requisite paperwork done in a timely manner plus other behavior characteristics that this suggests strongly someone with poor work habits and a lack of commitment to the corporation and its objectives.  The suggestion -- not stated as such, but pretty clear by now -- is that I should consider myself lucky to still have a job, that there is little or nothing I can do to change anyone's opinion of me and my work.  And maybe I should save everyone the trouble of firing me and just quit.  

Bad Dream 37 -- Morning of 2/17/19

In my dream, I am playing tennis -- sort of -- with three other people:  one is reminiscent of Dennis Ralston,  one reminiscent of  Chris Evert, and the third is a shadowy person.

We're not on a real tennis court.  It's more of a large lawn -- slightly rolling -- but somehow reminiscent of the back yard at 1209.  I am serving the ball to no one in particular, just sort of practicing the toss-and-serve motions.  I consistently toss the ball too high -- by several feet -- and my serve motion is way out of ideal.  

Either Dennis or Chris -- I forget which -- looks at my grip on the racquet and identifies this as being the problem.  He/she tells me to rotate my hand on the grip to resolve the toss issue.  I don't see how this will help, since the problem areas are quite removed from the grip, but what do I know compared to this person?  I change my grip and continue trying to hit a serve, but come nowhere near striking the ball.  

The other pro looks at my grip and tells me to rotate my hand in the other direction.  Which I do.  With no success in serving.  

At some point in this process, Chris tells me to borrow her racquet.  Once again, I can't see why this might help, but I am flattered that I would be allowed to use Chris' racquet.  So I place my racquet on the ground in the grass -- which, by the way, is much too long to be the grass on a regulation grass court.  The thought flicks through my mind that the ball isn't going to bounce very high after hitting grass this long, but don't bother to bring this to anyone's attention.  

We decide that this is not making any progress and we should practice just rallying the ball back and forth.  Dennis and Chris are standing on one side of the "net" (which doesn't exist) and the shadowy person and I am on the other facing them.  I have the ball and strike is somewhat gently.  Much to my surprise, the ball leaps off the racquet and flies well past Chris and Dennis without bouncing and -- without losing any altitude -- sails over a (I think wooden) fence and well into the next yard.  The other three players are silent.  Clearly, it's my job to hike over there and retrieve the ball.

Bad Dream 36 -- Morning of 2/13/12

In my dream, I am standing in a store -- pretty much by myself.  Either the store is going out of business or it is making a massive change in inventory, because the shelves were either bare or the merchandise (mainly cardboard boxes) is packed up with string.  

I am walking along past the rows of packaged merchandise with a friend.  He decides, for a reason that he doesn't share with me, that it's time to leave the building and he jumps up a bit to crawl out of a window.  The window is roughly 20 inches high and maybe 3 feet wide.  It's located maybe six feet off the ground.  In other words, it's a difficult window to use as an exit, but he makes the trip look easy.  It's clear that he expects me to use the same method of egress.  I plan to follow him.

I climb up over several cartons of merchandise to something close to the height of the window.  I ponder for a bit the best way to try an get out the window: feet first?  head first?  I decide that thinking about it is not going to get the job done.  

So I put my head out the window, along with my arms and shoulders.  I realize that, if I continue with this approach, I might just land on my head and/or hands on the outside of the building.  This would be not only clumsy looking, but quite possibly injurious.  So I try to bring my legs -- or at least my hips up to the window so that my torso would be through the window.  With any luck, I will land on the ground in reasonable shape.  

It takes considerable effort to get the appropriate portions of my anatomy up to the window and through it, but it seems to be working okay.  I would like to think that this is a well thought-out process, but by this time, it's "Just get it done!"  

Bad Dream 35 -- Morning of 2/12/19

In my dream, I am at a camping/outdoors store.  It reminds me of Deb's favorite store, Trail Creek Outfitters, on 202 near Wilmington.  

I don't really need anything, but have that urge to buy something.  And I'm looking at one of the lower shelves (I have to bend over and/or kneel to see) that have pads of writing paper.  I'm considering buying be eventually decline.  

I leave the store and walk around just a bit.  Then decide to re-enter the store.  I notice that there is a long rack against a wall of heavy winter coats.  They don't look like the kind of clothing one would wear for skiing or camping, but certainly heavy enough to keep you warm in any weather.  I think it's odd to have so many heavy coats out on display, because the weather feels like late spring or early summer.  

As I find myself looking at the pads of paper on the shelf, John Spangler comes up behind me and starts talking.  He's talking about work and possibly teaching, and it's clear to me that he's going to invite me to get involved with a project that he's working on.  I like John a great deal and would be happy to do most anything with and/or for him. 

Bad Dream 34 -- Morning of 2/10/19

I think this is the ending part of a larger dream, but that's how it is:

In my dream, I am standing in an unidentifiable room with three people: a Mom, a Dad, and their late-teenage son. 

The parents are asking their kid something like: "How could you do such a thing?" and he's reluctant to answer.  It seems I am an important mediator in this family, and it seems to be okay with all three parties if the kid whispers to me the explanation of his actions. 

He leans close to me and puts his lips very close to my ear.  (I'm pretty sure it is my right ear...)  And he whispers something so softly that I can't make out any of the words.  Now, this creates a problem for me: if I ask the kid to speak louder, his folks might hear what he's saying -- and that might turn out to be a Bad Thing.  On the other hand, whatever the issue was, it's created serious concern on the part of the parents.  But I trust all three people to be playing this one pretty honestly. 

So if the kid feels he should be given absolution for what he did, I believe it no matter what it is.  So I tell Mom and Dad: "It's okay.  I think what happened was really okay and nothing to worry about."  Or words to that effect.  And all three people seem to be relieved. 

I feel that the faith that the parent have had in the kid remains intact (a good thing) and the kid understands that whatever-it-was could result in serious consequences and he should think very carefully before doing it again.  Whatever it was...  

Bad Dream 33 -- Morning of 2/9/19

In my dream, I'm walking on a city street -- a viaduct that carries the road over other roads that travel under the viaduct.  I'm carrying a large roll of D-size drawings and I've just come from some kind of meeting or presentation.  I cross the street so that the concrete-and-steel railing is right beside me.  And on the other side of the rail is a drop down to the other road underneath the viaduct.

As I cross the street, out of the corner of my eye, I see three grown men in suits crossing right behind me.  It appears pretty obvious that they are following me.  They hurry their steps a bit to catch up to me, so they are right behind me. 

One of them moves up beside me and bumps my shoulder with his.  Pretty hard.  I think he's just trying to elicit some kind of response, which would enable him to increase the physical confrontation.  One of the guys (same or different, don't know) grabs the roll of drawings and tries to pull it away from me.  I clutch the roll tighter, and he can't get them from me.  At this point, I'm surrounded by the three guys, and they appear to be preparing themselves to beat me up.  One of them, I think the one that tried to grab my roll of drawings, says to me: "You're dead." 

Being surrounded, I can't get away from them.  I try to prepare myself for a serious beating -- and maybe dying as a result.

Suddenly, a guy starts walking towards us from the opposite direction.  He calls my name.  It's one of the guys from the meeting/presentation I just had. 

The three guys disappear as the newcomer and I begin to walk and talk.  I don't care what direction he's walking in, I want to be beside him. 

I'm safe. 

What I'm learning about dreams

1. I know that I do a great deal more dreaming than I am writing down.  When I awake -- whether it's because of a dream or just it's that time -- I can "feel" the dream I've just had slipping away.  Literally "slipping."  
2. There have been several occasions where I've felt that the dream is gone from my memory, but then I recall a single piece from the dream and it all comes flooding back.  But I think that only works if I grab that piece of dream and write stuff down immediately.  If I let any time go by, the memory of the dream will evaporate.  
3. I guess I'm surprised that I have so few dreams which include people I know. 
4. I am astonished at the creativity shown in my dreams.  I can't imagine coming up with these scenarios in my conscious life.   

Bad Dream 32 -- Morning of 2/4/19

In my dream, I am in a room that is reminiscent of 1209 Tupelo Place.  There are a few people around that I know are relatives -- but I don't know exactly who they are by name.  The only person I know is David.

It must be Christmas season because there is a tree in the room -- all done up with ornaments.  But there is also mess of stuff on the floor in front of the tree.  The sorts of things that might be left from opening presents and eating.  I would like to clean it up but for some reason, I can't.

(I wrote a note at this point something about "laundry bag -- their clothes" that I don't recall.)

I also would like to get into the bathroom, but David is there now and he seems to be taking forever.  

I would like to talk cameras and photography with him, but am reluctant to do so.  I think because the equipment he was using in the 1970's and 80's was so incredibly obsolete compared to modern day.  And I wouldn't want him to feel bad.  

In my dream, it occurs to me that Mom and Dad are nowhere to be seen -- and that is strange.  

I think again about trying to clean up the room (because in part I've got nothing else to do), but I still can't do it.  And I think in my dream I had some idea as to what was keeping me from doing it, but I didn't make any notes about it.  

Bad Dream 31 -- Morning of 1/31/19

Yes, this is the second dream from the same morning.  I had gotten up and visited the bathroom, then came back to bed and fell asleep.

In this dream, I am in some kind of hovering vehicle -- helicopter? but quiet -- and we are holding position over the open cockpit of a jet fighter plane.  A young woman in a flight suit -- obviously a pilot -- moves to the open door of the hovering vehicle.  She pauses for a moment, then jumps/falls out and into the plane -- landing in the pilot's seat perfectly positioned.  She has executed a 360-degree back flip to get there, and this maneuver allowed her feet and legs to slide perfectly into the cockpit.   

Another pilot -- also a young woman, I think -- executes the same maneuver.  

I get the feeling that I am expected to do the same.  I feel a certain amount of confidence, but recognize that missing the maneuver by ever so slightly could be extremely painful and injurious.  

I move towards the door.  

Bad Dream 31 -- Morning of 1/31/19

This is a short recollection of a much longer dream, but it has a theme that I think is being repeated in dream after dream.  So here goes:

In my dream I am participating in an extended classroom course -- something like 10 days or so.  It's the start of a new day, and things are just getting organized to start the day's program.  

Something happens -- and my notes are too badly written to read and it's two days after the dream and I forget what that thing is.  

But whatever it is that happens, the teacher says it can be repaired, and he calls on me to do the repair.  

Once again, I really don't know what it is that I'm supposed to do, but I'm fairly sure that I feel unprepared to do it.