At the start of my dream, I am taking an exam. It's an important one, but one for which I am poorly prepared. There are two sections to the questions one of which looks for short, simple, factual answers and the other of which looks for essay type answers. I'm struggling with the first part (but I don't remember which of the two the "first part" is...) and feel that if I can only get through that part, I can be more successful with the other part. Whichever way the "first" and "second" are arranged. And if I did that, I might score high enough to at least get a passing grade on the overall exam. But something keeps me slogging away at this "first part." Am I just being stubborn?
The other students taking the test are finishing up their submittals,submitting their papers to the instructor, gathering their belongings, and leaving. I know I have some time left before the instructor comes and takes my test away, and I know it won't be enough time to get a passing grade. In fact, if he/she gave me a week or two to finish, it still wouldn't be enough.
I don't know what the consequences of this failure are going to be, but I know it's serious.
My dream shifts to my presence in a group of people arranged in a circle. We're sitting in those industrial type chairs that are almost comfortable, but not quite. Many of the people in the circle are relatives of mine, although I don't recognize any individual. At least not at this point in my dream -- with one exception: my Grandfather (hereinafter "GF") is sitting in one of these chairs and he knows about my failure in the aforementioned exam. And while he's not pleased about my performance, he at least seems willing to listen to my version of what happened.
For reasons that are certainly not clear here, some of the people sitting in the circle are Afro American. And most everybody except GF are fairly young -- 20's and 30's. And the topic of conversation is my exam performance.
I feel that what I have to say is in the way a confession. I'm opening up and letting it all out about why I think things went so badly on the exam. I think about letting everyone know about my decision to stick with the hard part of the exam rather than switching to the easier part, but feel that would only lengthen the conversation and add more topics to explore that I don't feel would help anybody understand what happened -- and certainly not help me.
After some chatter amongst many of the people sitting in the circle, GF takes over. In a remarkably (to me!) even tone, he asks for my understanding of what took place. After all, I'm such a bright guy, why can't I ace a test like this?
And something occurs to me that seems salient: I tell the circle of folks -- but mainly GF -- that being bright was actually an important part of the problem. Being bright, I managed to get through public school and into college without learning how to study or how to do homework that was challenging. Little did I face that required me to do either.
So when I was faced with a course and an exam that required me to do at least one of those two things, I failed miserably. And the exam that was given was perfectly fair in showing up this failure on my part. As I explain this to everyone, I feel a renewed energy.
I expect my GF to come down on me like a ton of bricks. I'm fairly sure that my real life GF would have done that -- and do that because it would help shake me out of my complacency. Much to my surprise, my GF nodded slowly as if to say "Yes, I can see how that would happen. It's unfortunate but I understand it."
My nephew Jay perks up and starts talking about how this phenomenon relates to Modern Society -- and as he talks he gets farther afield from the issues at hand. But I'm impressed with his understanding of the World Around Us, and when he's done, I compliment him on his perspicacity and insights.
I then take this opportunity to launch into a story that helps confirm this analysis of mine. (As in: "I remember back when I was...") After I start, I realize that the story will be a long and boring one for the people in my circle. They won't really care and will consider my relating the story to be an intrusion of self-indulgence. But I don't think I can stop now.
But as I start plodding through the story, our circle is beset by a bunch of kids who have just been let out of school. (What school? and from where? are issues that don't show up in the dream.) The volume of noise they bring easily drowns out my own story. I try to raise my voice louder, but it clearly isn't going to work.
I wake up.
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