zeptember

Just woke from a dream a little bit ago…

I had spent a week in the U.S. army on U.S. soil to see what it would be like. There was a whole group of us. We had loaded up our gear, our belongings from the barracks, and I had more crap than the others. In real life, I always do have more crap than the others when going camping for example…

Anyway, we were coming back from the post we’d stayed at - we were in a big tour bus, and just entering the military base where we’d disembark and return to our normal lives, when suddenly, just inside the base, we began to hear explosions, machine gun fire, and screaming death. People rushed to the windows to see. People ducked down and hid. There was a bit of panic. At first I ran to the windows on both sides of the bus to see what all was happening, but had to duck out of the way when glass began shattering. The bus sped up and hauled ass through the base. I had seen what looked like a revolt going on.

When the bus came to a stop outside of the building we were originally headed for, all was quiet. The MP had gotten the revolt under control. But it took a bit of convincing for us on the bus - many of us were hesitant to get off the bus and just wanted to get the hell outta there.

We had to sign paperwork of some sort. I put the date in the upper right hand corner - 11/##/08

I scratched out the date in the middle cuz I got it wrong, and wrote in the correct date:

We said our goodbyes and got off the bus and walked in a daze to find our cars. It looked like a war zone all over the base. My car, which had been parked on a side street on the base, had been squashed between a civilian bus and a couple other cars during the rampage. I now had to get home but I can’t remember how I did it because I had to leave my car behind.

…

I really wish I remembered what the first date was that I’d scratched out. It was a single digit, that’s all I remember. Now I eagerly await what the month of November brings, because I’m weird like that.

I’m not panicked by the dream. I’m curious.

About 18 days ago, I had a conversation with someone about how I feel it’s time the U.S. experienced a revolution from within, that there’s so many people who are dissatisfied with the status quo, the current government, the current economy, etc…and that all these things are coming together fast and can only result in upheaval. I even quoted Einsturzende Neubauten; “Destruction is not negative”.

I was at some sort of goth convergence-alike, staying in a fancy hotel. We’d gone out to one of the nightclubs and I was zoning out when suddenly I realised an African American woman on the edge of the dance floor turned and looked at me, got irritated and looked away. Then another African American woman, sitting to the left of me, got up and reached over the table that separated us as we sat, and she said something about me having gotten to that woman on the dance floor. I was apologetic and explained that I often zone out when I’m in public places like this, and before I know it, someone’s in my line of unfocused, zoned out sight. The woman who approached me was cheerful - she reminded me of my fiancé’s bandmate’s girlfriend. But I still felt bad about having upset someone by seemingly staring them down or worse, glaring at them in my moment of zoning out.

The next song that came on was either the original or an electronica remix of Eye of the Tiger by Survivor. I laughed and started telling someone I knew about how I used to love that song when I was a kid about the age of ten, and that it was the soundtrack for a recurring dream I used to have.

The rest of the dream featured me as an adult taking everyone at this gothic gathering into my childhood dreamscape. There was this old abandoned white building with white interior and lots of cascading stairways. The stairways were lined with brass or chrome staircase railings. There were large, open doorways, sometimes fitted with glass and glass doors in this building.

I was always in a race to get to one of the top floors of the building, to a room of operations held by the enemy, who wanted to do Bad Things™. It was always my job to take out the bad guys (via cheesy 80’s fist fight/martial arts), then set a timer and run as fast as I could back down to the ground floor and exit the building before it blew up.

I wish I was better at this early hour at explaining the fine details of how the building looked on the inside.

As the adult in this childhood dreamscape, I got to the top floor of operations and found the group of people I needed to take out. But this time it was different. They were dressed in suits and I wrestled with a woman who looked like she was wearing a stewardess jacket and skirt. She was trying to pull a taser and/or a gun from her waistband as I fought with her and the others in the room looked on. I can’t remember if I grabbed her weapon and killed her with it or just knocked her down and ran, but I knew the timer was on…as well as the soundtrack - Eye of the Tiger.

And now, whoever from the gothic gathering was with me in this dreamscape had to run with me for their lives. I left them behind because I knew how to navigate quickly down the hallways and staircases, often jumping over railings and such to get to the next level before. That’s how I always did it as a kid. I noticed however that as an adult, I was much slower now - not so limber - and I worried that I’d not make it out of the building in time. My childhood confidence was replaced by adult worry and insecurity.

When I got to the bottom floor, as I approached the foyer, the cascading stairs were carpeted in red, and the couches in the large lobby/foyer were red faux leather.

I did make it out of the building, and others made it out with me, but the building did not explode. I assumed that meant we made it in record time. But I also knew that in my childhood dream, the building would always explode just as I made it out, but I’d always end up unscathed. So I was perplexed as to why it didn’t blow, yet.

I was in the parking lot of that building at this point, talking with Naveen Andrews from the TV series Lost (which in real life I watch a lot of on DVD at one sitting on about a weekly basis). He was telling me about a sticker on the back of his car, which was from his elementary school teacher, who was now 94 years old and still kicking. I wondered if I had any elementary school teachers who were still alive and told Naveen I’d be visiting my hometown again in November.
We parted ways and as I walked off. As I walked away, I turned and said, “by the way, I’m not 23, I’m 37 (years old)”.
(Earlier in the dream somewhere, I’d told him I was 23 for some reason. I wonder now if the character that Naveen was involved with in the series Lost was 22 or 23. I forget. I have no idea if this is a tie or not….)
As I walked off, I hoped he didn’t feel like I had a crush on him because I knew he had a wife, and I have a fiancé, but I just enjoyed talking with him (in real life, I often worry about how men I talk to are reading me, because I’m usually uncomfortable around men. I want to relate to them as one of the guys but I’m hyper aware of the fact that I’m a chick and that just by being a chick, there can be sexual tension on one or both sides. This is why, as a kid entering puberty around the age of ten, I sobbed and begged my mother to reverse the process. I knew all too well that I’d never be viewed as an equal again by my male friends. That emotional trauma has stuck with me throughout life.)

I got back to the hotel and saw that people were checking out. I realised I did not have my hotel key on me, and my roommates had likely checked out already. I went up some carpeted (red paisley?) stairs to the front desk. They were open stairs with a brass staircase railing. To my left below the stairs was a sitting area for the hotel lobby. There were three female attendants at the front desk; the one in front of me on the right of the desk was doing something at a computer, checking on something for someone. The middle woman was talking with a customer, and the third, the one on the left, was on the phone. The phone was white and antique. I made my way over to her. She set the phone down a moment after I appeared in front of her and I told her I’d forgotten my room key. She got my info and told me that everyone had already checked out, and the room had already been emptied. She craned her neck to look over the front desk at something. I turned and looked - suddenly I noticed several suitcases and bags scattered on the floor behind me with people going through the bags to find which one was theirs. I went towards the edge of the brass railing that separated the front desk area from the lobby sitting area below, and started to sift through the suitcases and bags. I was told by another female attendant who came to me that my suitcases were in this area, as was a luggage bag, but the bag had poop in it! That’s right, she said, someone had left a brown bag of poop inside of it. I had loaned the bag to one of my hotel roommates, who was a goth boy in his early 20’s. Obviously he in his youth thought this would be funny to leave a woman nearly twice his age as a gift of thanks.

I awoke one minute before my alarm went off, having left myself in the dream having just found the bag with the poop in it. I woke with Eye of the Tiger playing in my head.

I can’t say now for certain whether the childhood dreamscape was ever REALLY something from my childhood that I was remembering, or something new altogether, made special for me in this morning’s dream…

I do know that the part of the dream containing Naveen and me worrying what he thought is a direct reaction to having had to work yesterday with the father of the child at home at the same time I was working. My fiancé had come over to drop off some money for me to catch a bus to see a florist later in the day, and he got to meet the child’s father. Because of the trust issues I’ve had (my partner’s end and my end) in previous relationships, I felt awkward socially in the presence of two males like this.
The child’s father will be home again today and I’ve not been looking forward to it because I feel like ‘The Help’ instead of being in charge on my own with free reign. The father in no way has made me to feel this way - it’s just my emotional hyper-awareness of having been reared socially in this culture that females are lesser, and nannies are lesser still. There was a time when this was so but likely it is not so in this day and age. I just carry outmoded social mores with me. Great, huh?

Risin’ up, back on the street
Did my time, took my chances
Went the distance, now I’m back on my feet
Just a man and his will to survive

So many times, it happens too fast
You change your passion for glory
Don’t lose your grip on the dreams of the past
You must fight just to keep them alive

Chorus:
It’s the eye of the tiger, it’s the cream of the fight
Risin’ up to the challenge of our rival
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night
And he’s watchin’ us all in the eye of the tiger

Face to face, out in the heat
Hangin’ tough, stayin’ hungry
They stack the odds ’til we take to the street
For we kill with the skill to survive

chorus

Risin’ up, straight to the top
Have the guts, got the glory
Went the distance, now I’m not gonna stop
Just a man and his will to survive

chorus

The eye of the tiger (repeats out)…

I was very drugged on pain meds and trying to sleep, but my man came into the room to tell me that ‘Steve’ was here to see the place. I was very groggy and tried to ask who ‘Steve’ was because I just wasn’t remembering. But my man left the room. He was busy with something and didn’t want to deal with Steve, and more to the point I got that he didn’t like Steve.
I was annoyed by this so I staggered out of bed and went to greet Steve, who was this guy with short reddish hair and a short reddish beard. He was dressed pretty normal if I recall correctly. I couldn’t place how we knew him.
I showed him around the house because I was paranoid that he might take something of value if not watched closely, simply because I didn’t know him. He refused to talk the entire time I showed him around the house. He took pictures of the place. His room would be in the basement*, so I showed him that. My friend Evil was also visiting, and I realised then that Steve** and Evil were also friends, and that Evil must’ve told Steve that we were subletting our place.

As I was showing Steve back upstairs, I shot a look over my shoulder at Evil, who had accompanied me through the house. He gave his usual smirk and shrug, and was not about to explain for Steve why Steve wasn’t talking. Steve was nice and smiled graciously and all, but just wouldn’t talk or answer questions.

We got back upstairs and I noticed that Evil was sitting in a recliner chair in the living room, and that there was a woman and young toddler in the room. They were waiting for Steve. He went to them and the woman began asking questions, and he nodded or shook his head to the questions. He may have talked to her but I never heard a sound.
The family went out the door to their van parked in front of the house, and started to pile in. I began to wonder if any of them took anything of value from our house. I was very mistrustful because my man showed no trust or liking towards them.

When I turned around to face the far end of the house (the living room became the kitchen which then became another sitting room or living room), I found my Aunt M had showed up. I was surprised by this, what brings her here, I wondered? I ran to greet her and hugged her and she hugged me back and we smiled really big at each other. And then my ma walked in (there was another entrance to the house between the kitchen and the second sitting room). What a surprise! Hi Ma! I gave her a great big hug and she was all smiles for me. And she looked great! Ma was wearing what looked to be a brown leather skirt - Aunt M pulled ma to her left side and went to zip the side of ma’s skirt, because the zipper was slipping. I stepped back and realised ma’s top was brown leather, too - a two piece. And ma was all skinny with firm taut younger skin and looked great as I said.

Next thing I knew, Aunt J was right there behind my ma, so I went to give her a hug but she was all standoffish as usual. She thrust out a card and some flowers but I managed a quick hug for her anyway.
She’s one of those people who hates but wants the affection. She’s like a cat that way. It always makes her uncomfortable but she appreciates it when people try for her.

Then my Uncle E came into the room from the same direction everyone else was popping in from. He’s a tall man like grampa was. I gave a polite smile up at him but I wasn’t too thrilled about him being there. And then who was to emerge from behind him, completely concealed until Uncle E stepped aside, was gramma***!!!!!

It was at this point that it finally dawned on me - everyone was showing up for the wedding. The thoughts ran through my head…the wedding is still a week away****. People are much earlier than they said they’d be! I wasn’t ready to receive people, yet! But since they’re here, I’ll just have to make do.

Gramma was still pretty short but her hair was big and permed like it was in the early 90’s. She smiled big for me and held out her arms. Someone held out a drink to toast the family all being here but Uncle E told us to “wait, let’s all get a drink so we can all toast”. I rolled my eyes and gramma snapped, “We just came from the sandwich shop and so you still have to work off allll THAT jazz!”
I grinned ear to ear, and gramma smiled back at me, and we gave each other a big long warm hug. Gramma congratulated me on my wedding.

Next, my brother, my dad and his wife showed up. I hugged both my ma and my dad’s wife simultaneously cuz they were standing near each other. They had their back to the living room, and when I squeezed them a hug, I looked over their shoulders to see Evil and some of my Michigan friends sitting in the living room. Evil was still in the recliner chair, and everyone else was clustered around where that Steve guy and his family recently had been.

I was just so happy that everyone was here all at once, and yet a bit panicked because I knew that the wedding was going to happen Real Soon Now!

George woke me because he was threatening to leak all over and stain the bed. I was very groggy. When I came back from the bathroom to crawl into bed, I realised I could not get the dream back. I grabbed my phone and went to call my mom, but my mind was still on gramma, and I punched in ‘g’ on the phone pad. It was only then that all the emotions spilled forth. I left my ma a very teary voicemail letting her know that her ma had come to visit me.

I miss my gramma so much. It wasn’t a sad dream. I’m still very happy. I’m still blessed with her visit and congrats and hug. But I know, emotions are strange things. I am crying anyway.

* The house in my dream was a cross between what Evil’s house looks like and my friend Blau’s house looks like. It’s nothing like what the house I actually live in looks like. And only Evil’s house has a basement.

** I still don’t know ‘Steve’ in real life.

*** Gramma passed away in 2003.

**** The wedding is actually three months away.

i was at a daycare and it was naptime or lunchtime, i forget. i was in a contained toddler room with another teacher. i guess i was new there because she was showing me around. she asked if i knew what schedule i’d been put on - i said no. she wanted to work with me so encouraged me to leave the room with her (thereby leaving the children unattended). As I closed the toddler room door behind me, a bag fell off the door handle and sloshed on the floor. It was someone’s bicycle camelbag. I hung it back on the door and followed my coworker just around the corner to a long low table which had a bunch of papers and other stuff on it. I had to find my name on a cup? And find out what number it had in or on it. My coworker asked me what number I had. I looked - I had the number ‘2′. She told me to punch the number into a small blue rectangular digital device, and my hours would pop up.

As I was doing this, a young male coworker entered the hallway we were standing in and a child ran crying from behind him. He was out of breath and trying to tell us she had to go home, now. We knew that this was a problem child. She ran to me and I scooped her up and asked what the problem was. The male coworker was agitated by this but I tried to assure him we need to calm all parties involved to get the story out. Both he and the child talked at once, the child still crying. This child had long dark brown hair and bangs, and deep brown eyes with beautiful long lashes. The skin right above and next to her right eyelid was slit in order to hold a ribbon through the skin - this ribbon had beads tied to it - it’s part of her culture and the slit was totally healed and non-problematic, like a body piercing would be.
As the child talked, she untied the ribbon and took it from her eyelid. She moved it to the other side of her face and tried tying it into her hair. My female coworker helped her tie the ribbon as she talked. This whole process seemed to relax her a bit so we allowed it (many adults would chastise a child and tell them to stop playing with their hair, ribbons or whatnot).
I never got the actual story in the dream because it was all a blurry babble going on, but as I was getting the story from both the coworker and the child, and telling the coworker yes of course, call the parents, I heard a ruckus outside.

I turned and…

Now I was back at my first childhood house - I was in the kitchen and I had turned to look out the window into the backyard to see what the ruckus was about.

My brother began arguing with my ma about yard work. My friends C and J were in the kitchen with me. I began relaying a play-by-play to them, because I was convinced they were not seeing the same thing I was and would not believe me. My mom had the weed whacker, but my brother wanted it. Ma wouldn’t give it to him so he tried to grab it from her. A fight ensued. I kept saying “This is my family. This is how my family is”.
My brother pushed my ma down to take the weed whacker from her. Other people were out there doing yard work, too. They tried to intercede but my brother and my ma were locked into their fight.

Eventually a couple of people pried them loose, and my brother and ma came up towards the back of the house, near the kitchen window. I continued to relay my play-by-play to my friends, who had also been looking out the window the whole time with me. I was still interjecting “this is my family” with disgust.

I knew that my ma and my brother could hear me talking about them at this point, so I backed away from the window and lowered my voice, and saw that my ma had put my brother in a mock choke-hold. He allowed this - he became submissive to her - and they talked it out. He as usual tried to reason his way out of his abuse of her.

I left the kitchen and turned to the left, rounded the corner and went and sat on the stairs (in reality, the stairs were just off the kitchen to the right). I sat on the stairs and began eating gummy candy out of a little brown and clear plastic bag. The stairway I was sitting on was an open banister stairway, not the closed one that actually existed in my real childhood home. The gummies were brown like the bag. I played with a piece of candy as I chewed another, and upon closer inspection of the candy, I said, “look I found a shoe!”

A girl friend asked me, “Do you know what you’re eating?”

She told me it was a famous fashion designer - Dara Dow? shoes - the small brown plastic bag was nothing but gummy shoes that were the size of barbie doll shoes. The one I was holding looked like women’s loafers. I popped it into my mouth as my friend commented something snarky - like I shouldn’t pay any money to that empire or something.

My friend C came out of the kitchen and sat on the stairs with me. I again relayed, “that’s my family.” and shook my head. He tried to make light conversation but it wasn’t working. I knew that he knew how screwed my family was because his family is really screwed up, too. So he really didn’t have to say anything. He could tell me worse stories of his own family, I’m sure. So we sat next to each other for a moment, and then I said we need to get ready, and that I’d be hopping in the shower. He said he should hop into the shower, too. The house was like a dorm in that it had multiple bathrooms and bedrooms throughout (but this of course is not how my childhood home was in reality).

C headed upstairs, and I folded up the bag of candy and took it downstairs to set back into the kitchen.

The dream ended with me waking up to my cat meowing to be fed.

I’ll analyse the dream later. My man just woke up very very grumpy - apparently he wasn’t able to sleep well all night.
But for the record, the arguing and shoving match between my ma and my brother - stuff like that really happened when my brother was a teenager (and we lived in the 2nd house, the one I call the unibomber shack).

I kept forgetting until now to record this.

On Saturday morning, I awoke from a nightmare.

I was working in a storefront daycare in San Francisco, working with toddlers on up to about four-year-olds. It was past 5pm and some of the parents were late. This is normal with many daycares, you expect that some parents will never be on time and you’ll have to stay late at work.

There must have been five or six children? It was still daylight outside. I’m sure it was summer.

Suddenly the earth shook. It started out with a jar, and then was a slow roll, which lasted for minutes. One child refused to be rounded up, so I had to go after him or her. I think it was a little boy.

Meanwhile, the teachers and all the other children had gone to shelter. I finally got the child to come with me, but just as we neared the front door and large picture window area, the whole building started to slant. The floor was rising up! The far end of the classroom also had a window - a long rectangular window. This is where the child had been playing. Now that area was lifting upwards.

It became very difficult to retain balance and foothold as the floor shifted below us. The earthquake was still slow and rolling. Very slow. Not like a jackhammer or a big wave pool at all.

Suddenly a brick or big piece of rock crashed through the upper portion of the window at the far end of the building. I dodged it. I don’t know where the child went to at this point.

Another rock came tumbling through. I scurried along the wall and made my way to the first door on the left - this happened to be the adult restroom if I remember correctly. I opened the steel door and there everyone was, safe and sound, along with the child I was trying to rescue, who got away to safety on his own. This bathroom was big like some of the ones you’d find in a gas station in the U.S.
By this time the quake had quieted down further. Everyone came out of the bathroom.

We went out through the front door of the building, and I wondered now how bad the quake had been in the East Bay where I live. I knew that both me and my man worked in San Francisco, so he should be relatively safe, I hoped. Safer than he’d be in the East Bay.
Word on the street came immediately that the quake was in fact centered in the East Bay, and the damage was far worse. I fretted for my cats. I was worried about my man, but something in the dream told me he survived just fine.
Meanwhile, in San Francisco, several people went about their daily business as if nothing had happened. I was shocked by this.

I woke up before I could get ahold of my man. I had an uneasy day for much of the rest of the day on Saturday. So uneasy that I cancelled plans to attend a birthday party and a friend’s concert.

On Sunday, I found out that a full on bar brawl broke out Saturday night. Glad I missed it, then. I just can’t handle stuff like that right now, and certainly would have cracked due to the state of mind I was in all day Saturday.

This year has been pretty stressful on me insofar as fearing earthquakes. I don’t know why - I’ve lived here for eleven years and I’ve never been as fearful of quakes as I’ve come to be this year. Maybe it’s the fact that the ‘experts’ predicted nearly ten years ago that we’re only 30 years away from The Big One. Maybe it’s cuz I know we’re drawing closer, and just because we survived one decade doesn’t mean we’ll make it through the next, not even close.

The fact that children were involved in my nightmare I think is a reflection of what I’m doing in real life now, so of course I’d be working with children at the time a quake strikes.

I can’t help but to treat this as a premonition. That’s what scares me further of course. That we got out unscathed I guess should be reassuring.

I looked up the dream meaning of earthquakes and it says, “To dream of an earthquake, suggests that you are experiencing a major “shake-up” that is threatening your stability and foundation. The dream highlights you insecurity, fears and sense of helplessness. If you find cover from the quake, you will overcome these challenges. If you become trapped or injured during the quake, you will suffer loss of your business and assets.”

Well then. Good thing I came through it, eh?

Jeebus…

I’ve been watching a lot of the series Lost lately. Our neighbor loaned us season 1.
Last night, we watched a good four hours of it, and went to bed around 3am.
The anxiety started immediately, and I found that I was afraid of the shadows, of every little noise, of what tricks my eyes and brain were playing on me. I told my man that humans aren’t meant to be up this late at night, and I told him that once I’d read that 3am - 4am is the time when humans are most susceptible to disorientation, nightmares and paranoia if they are not sleeping.
(Quick research this morning produced info on Circadian Rhythms and Human Biology for your reading enjoyment).

When I finally did get to sleep, I had weird dreams and all out nightmares.
The nightmare that woke me this morning involved me being part of some group of people on the street, camping out in the open - like the homeless but we were outcasts or something. I was still with my man but I wasn’t living with him, I couldn’t go back home to him because of this encampment I had to be associated with. He’d just finished a rock concert at a club in San Francisco, and I’d missed it because I was busy relocating to another area with these other people. It was night time. My man wasn’t really happy with me. He did not know what was going on with me. I couldn’t tell him, it was too dangerous.

At this encampment, some big company man came to visit us. I knew it meant trouble. Because of what someone had done, this man was going to start killing people in our group. He offered a proposition - the fugitive turns themself in and he won’t need to take people away. And yet he offered shiny sparkly puffy stickers to people. Volunteers offered to wear these stickers until the fugitive turned themself in. I had a look at the stickers. I was taken with a series of square dark blue sparkly puffy stickers. There were nine or twelve and the volunteer would have to wear the whole series longways on their forehead. I saw another sticker that looked like a butterfly. It had gold, copper and silver in it. It was beautiful. I asked the person in charge of handing out the stickers if people wearing these stickers would be protected or spared. He gave a slight shake of the head, while staring me in the eye. He knew I was the fugitive. I knew he knew. The whole purpose of this exercise was to get me to cave in.

But I made my choice. I knew people would die regardless. I knew I had to get away.

I went back to a house where Leah, a girl from high school was talking to someone else I knew/know. This was Leah’s mom’s townhouse I think, or the other girl’s mother’s townhouse. I told them I just needed to get something from inside and I’d be right back out. They said okay and took off to wherever it was they were going. I quickly went through the house looking for something important that would aid me in my escape. I was upstairs in Leah’s bedroom when I heard her mother come home. I heard her talking to the cat. The cat was trying to get into Leah’s bedroom! I’d be caught! In my panic I froze. The cat tried to squeeze under the door, and Leah’s mom was determined to get the cat back. She didn’t open the door though, she just held fast to the cat and tried to drag it back under the door. She kept saying the cat needed to eat.
Finally I could take no more of this torture - she was going to seriously hurt the cat - and so I stepped forward and opened the door and the cat ran away. I explained that Leah had let me in because I’d forgotten something. Then I quickly ran back down the stairs and out of the house. It was daylight during all of this.

I made my way back to my man as the concert let out, and it was night once again. I tried to tell him we had to leave now, and to please come back to the encampment with me to help me get my stuff, and then we could disappear. He refused to come with me. I begged him, then ran off in fear.

When I woke up, I checked the phones to make sure no one called for emergency purposes. Then I checked my email. I got a cryptic message from an acquaintance, demanding that I be at her house at 4pm sharp. This does NOTHING for my paranoia. In reality, I think all she wants is for me to blow off steam and spin fire with her. But in my paranoid sleep deprived state (I only had six hours of sleep when I was awakened by my nightmare), I keep wondering what more there is to her request.

I know I’m missing more details of my dream, too. I can feel it itching in the far corners of my brain. Maybe I’ll remember more later.

No more watching ‘Lost’ so late at night.

Oh, and the reason I need to blow off steam is because I’d posted in another forum about that guy who was killed in town, and she’d read the entry.

My cat was running through the house like a madman, his claws scraping against the pergo flooring as he ran and turned corners.
This activity filtered into my dreams as I slept, and turned it into a dream. In the dream, I got out of bed and interrupted my cat’s races through the house. He screeched to a halt as I called his name in scolding fashion, and looked up at me. He’d been running from the bathroom through the living room and back again. Now we both stood in the tiny hallway, and he went over to the wall heater and sat down, and began shivering.

As he did this, I saw wet paw prints on the pergo flooring. I leaned forward and squinted at the floor to get a better angle - the wet and slightly dirty paw prints were all over the living room pergo and the trail led back to the bathroom, where my cat had been jumping into the bathtub, leaping out with wet paws, and tearing through the house. The floor of the bathtub was still pretty wet from the shower my fiance had taken before work this morning. As I was assessing all this, I yelled, something like, “were you running with wet feet through the house?” My cat looked severely guilty, and that’s when he took a seat on a flat, plaid, hairy catbed in front of the heater and began shivering, back paws sticking out as he sat all the way on his butt like a dog would do. His left paw was shaking as it stuck out from beneath him, because the rest of him was shivering cold from all the water play.

The dream ended with me feeling very nauseated and waking up because of it.

Most of the dream comes from truth - my cat really has done stuff like this. Except he didn’t end up shivering in front of the heater, nor do we have one of those flat plaid cat beds.

I was in the bathroom, contemplating throwing up and wondering what was going on with me GI wise, when the phone rang. It was my future stepmother-in-law. I let her babble into the answering machine - I’ll call her back later.

TMI ALERT

Back to wondering what’s wrong with me - I was very nauseous, and it felt like a major pain episode wanted to come on, except for the fact that I also felt very constipated and yet like I was about to have explosive diarrhea at any second. Could this be the flu on top of menses?
I eventually had a movement, and was constipated, and the colour was clay. This is BAD. This means I’ve got blocked bile ducts again, possibly from all the medication I’m taking right now for the endometriosis pain. I REALLY need to not fear that stone flush program and just go ahead with it.
I really need to remember the Chi Nei Tsang procedure as well. I don’t have $100 to spend on another visit to my practitioner right now, though.
Along with the colour of the feces, it stung my asshole badly, leaving my teeth chattering and making me more nauseous. I staggered with toilet paper to the tub and got some hot water on the toilet paper and applied it slowly, carefully, patiently to my arse. This is the best thing to do - it helps with the constriction of blood vessels and eases the pain as a result. It took a few applications before the stinging stopped, and then I staggered to find my heating pads.

Now I’m sitting on a warm heating pad, and this helps immensely. The nausea has faded. I’ve taken a Tylenol3 in case the uterine pain ramps up again, cuz nausea is usually a precursor to really big clots trying to pass through the cervix.

I had dreams and nightmares all day yesterday, too. It’s from the medication. My breathing gets restricted and I sound like I have apnea when I’m on Tylenol3 and trying to sleep. That’s why I have nightmares.

Currently I’m missing my friend perform an organ concerto. I’m very sad about this. This is the same friend who was suicidal a few months ago and trapped in New Mexico. He found a way back to the Bay Area and has been doing much better. I woke up with the nausea at the same time I needed to be getting ready to go see him in concert. There was just no way I’d be able to go. I had to go through that horrible episode, instead. And now I’m missing him play.

But ahhh, the drugs are kicking in. Soon I will be sleeping again and not having pain for awhile.
This is the first Tylenol3 of the day, but after all the hours I slept yesterday, I was still so exhausted today and was sleeping hard this morning. I shouldn’t be that tired when not on the Tylenol3. But it’s a symptom of my illness. I get that tired. My body shuts down.
The meds are making me tired now though. Back later.

I refused to take another Dilaudid pill yesterday after my last journal entry. I successfully distracted myself via computer and talking with my cousin on the phone, and the Ibu eventually set in and the pain subsided.

This morning was fine for me, aside from waking up from a bad dream. I had no pain, so I went and deposited my 2nd to last unemployment check, and picked up some groceries. Well, the guy who packed the groceries put all the heavies into one bag! So I had to rearrange stuff between the two bags. That was my downfall, I think - carrying groceries to the car and from the car to the house. Not long after I got home, the pain and bleeding ramped up again. I did the whole routine again for an hour and a half - only take the 600mg Ibuprofen… and just do the exercises and Qigong.

I conceded defeat around 1:15pm and popped 1mg Dilaudid. It’s just now kicking in and the pain is fading.

In my dream this morning, I was with my man and it was morning time before work. We were both running late for work, but stopped at a bakery. I got a palm-sized cake for one made entirely of frosting because I can’t have gluten. I was really excited about being so naughty with all that sugar. It tasted so good!

We got out into the parking lot and a guy we cut out of our lives six years ago drove up in some sporty car and offered us a ride to work. B got into the front seat and I got into the back seat. The guy’s wallet was atop a black bag in the floor of the back seat, with his wallet open and a huge wad of money showing. As soon as I saw this, my first thought was, “That asshole. As soon as we get out of his car, he’s going to accuse us of stealing his money and start a huge war again.” That’s the kind of asshole this guy is in real life.
So before we even got out of the parking lot, I told him to stop, and that my car was right over there, in the back corner of the lot, and I’d just drive myself to work. My man turned around and said, “are you sure?” and I told him yes. I’m sure, and I got out of the car.

I started towards my car, but this is where the dream gets fuzzy. Next thing I know, I’m carrying a skateboard and it’s my only transportation to work, and I’m late. I take out my cell phone and with phone in left hand, skateboard in right, I dial using my left thumb. I can’t reach my workplace - the reception is bad (the reception is ALWAYS bad in my dreams).

So I started skating off on my board, and was embarrassed by how bad I was on the skateboard? Where’s my car? I’m too old for a skateboard!
But seeing as how I had a skateboard, I may as well skate it, and skate it well. So in that regard, I altered my dream and was able to skate WELL from that point on. I did this by looking back at my board in my hand again, and seeing that the front truck was misaligned. That’s why I was skating badly. Not because I didn’t know how. So I did my best to adjust the truck and the wheels by hand, since I didn’t have any tools on me, and put the board back down and took off skating.

I skated for minutes, and realised I had gone the wrong way. I was now in San Francisco, near the DNA Lounge. Only, the DNA Lounge had a huge parking lot, then a restaurant and another parking lot, and then a forest off in front of it, instead of more urban landscape. I went to skate towards the DNA but realised the parking lot had just been repaved, so now I’m screwing up my board with the slick oily crap they’ve just applied to the lot. I grab my board and wipe the wheels off on my clothes, not thinking. Now I’m late for work AND filthy. I keep walking towards the DNA, on a little hill of grass alongside the parking lot, and make my way onto a sidewalk. I keep thinking I need to call work to tell them screw it, I won’t be in today, but I’m afraid of getting in trouble.

I get to the front of the DNA Lounge to see that it’s closed. What was I thinking? It’s daytime, of course it’s closed! So I turn back around and walk towards the way I came. This time, the parking lot is dry, so I throw the board down and skate across the empty lot with ease. The pavement is so nice and smooth now that it’s been paved. I glide effortlessly and with speed.
I get to the other side, which has an embankment of grass separating the one lot from the restaurant’s lot, and I jump off my board onto the embankment. My board catches up to me and hits the embankment and flies up, and I catch it and continue walking.

There’s a trail in front of or alongside of the restaurant, and it is lined with pine and oak trees. There’s pine needles on the worn dirt path. I walk the path because I know my car is parked in a clearing in the field behind the restaurant.

As I am walking up the path, I see three young men - perhaps late teens, early twenties. I approach them but they’re standing in the way, so I say excuse me and keep walking, and brush past them. As I do so, I realise that I’ve just walked into a drug deal. I still have my phone in my left hand, and I’m still trying to dial my workplace but I haven’t been able to get through, yet.

Ok, ok, don’t panic, keep walking, I don’t care, they can do and deal drugs, not my business or my problem. But I know THEY never think that way about people who walk in on their business.

So I’m walking and I hear footsteps behind me. I can still hear two of the other guys in the distance, still on the trail, talking. I pick up my pace, and so does the person behind me. I turn my head and it’s one of the guys from the path, and his pace quickens until he’s right up on my ass, almost next to me. I tell him with an irritated voice that he can go around, there’s plenty of space, and he’s in MY space, and to back off. He doesn’t say a word.
I then spin around and clock him with my board and scream at him to leave me the fuck alone, I just want to get to my car.

This of course pisses him off, and I run for my car. He runs at me, and now his friends are running up at me, too. I look down at my phone, still in my left hand, and try to dial my man for help as I also try to get into my car. I get my car door open as the guys all pile in on me. I try to WILL the phone to dial my man, and I scream at the guys WHAT DO YOU WANT! I’M JUST TRYING TO GET TO MY FUCKING CAR!

They say bluntly that they want to kill me, and the dream ends with me trying to close my car door and not being able to.

I woke up and bolted from bed, looking for my man. He’d not left for work yet, so I gave him a big hug and told him about the dream.

Now, the contents of the dream…. I had a skateboard because I just took one of those Internet quizzes - “how girly are you” - and I scored 8% girly. The icon had a girl with a skateboard. Add that to the fact that in real life as a teenager, I had a skateboard made of parts from my brother’s and his friends’ skateboards, and we had a halfpipe in the back yard, so I did a little bit of skating in my day. Not much, but still. And so this entered my dream because of the quiz I’d taken recently.

The cake and frosting is because we’re starting to look at bakers for our wedding cake.

The fear of being late for work is because of my real life fears of having to go back to work, and of fearing that I’ll not get my assigned stuff done on time for my online business.

The guy who we don’t talk to anymore - no idea why HE was in my dream, but he can get the fuck out.

I’m also not sure about the parking lot, the DNA Lounge or the guys trying to kill me, as well as the field and dirt path… Let’s look it up in a dream dictionary:

Dirty
To dream that your body or your clothes are dirty, might indicate an illness - you should get a medical checkup. If you dream of being in dirty or messy surroundings, it is a positive omen meaning whatever is worrying you will soon come to an orderly conclusion.

Path
If you dream of walking down a quiet path, you have patience and a clear mind. If your path is blocked in a dream, you need to take more time to think about the consequences of recent actions.

Parking Lot
To dream that you are in parking lot suggests you need to slow down and take some time to relax.

Trees
Lush green trees in your dreams symbolize new hopes, growth and desires.

Forest
Dreams that feature forests signify exploring the unconscious mind for clues to waking problems.

Drugs
-A dream of giving or selling drugs suggests that you have some dishonesty around you - rethink who your current friends are.
-If your dream featured someone else who possessed drugs or took drugs, it is telling you to stop drifting and take a more positive role in your life.

Violence
Intense violence in dreams usually suggests a need for control and a fear of losing power in a real life situation.

Attack
If you dream that you attack someone, your ill-mood and temper may cause harm to another. You feel that you have been wronged in real life. To dream that you are being attacked by someone suggests that you are feeling stressed, vulnerable and helpless, or facing difficult changes, in real life.

Late
To dream that you are late for something represents your fear of change and your nervousness about seizing an opportunity. You may feel unready or unworthy in your current circumstances. You may also be conflicted with decisions about your future.

Skateboarding
To dream that you are skateboarding, indicates the ups and downs of some emotional situation or relationship. If you zip along with no crashes in your dream, it means you have the strength and energy to achieve your goals in life.

Junk Food
If you see or eat junk food in your dream, this symbolizes your overindulgent behavior.

Phone
If you can’t reach someone on the phone in a dream, you must listen to your inner voice more closely for your life to move on the way it should.

Cake
If you dream of eating cake, you will have success in an upcoming endeavor.

Yeah, that about sums it all up for me. I’m afraid to give up control of trying to get my web business running by having to go back to work for someone else. I don’t want to go back to work but for me to ultimately become successful, I need to let this happen. I can go back to work part time and still work on my business. I will become successful. I just need to stop dicking around and get more disciplined.
I can do this. My brother did it. He can do it, I can do it.

Woke up this morning from dreams of earthquakes and tornadoes. The memory I have most from dreamland this morning is of the tornadoes - I was tracking the funnels in the sky and their progress towards the ground. I can’t remember where I was - if I was in a building or a car or outside. It was all very dark grey and overcast and windy. Can’t remember if it was cold or warm, though I get a feeling that it was chilly.
I also get the feeling that these things were happening in California, not where I grew up in Michigan, as is usually the case when I have tornado dreams.

For me, tornadoes signify change. Tornadoes in California means there’s going to be a change here instead of back home.

I’m real busy but need to pause to spew this real quick

I had my first Chi Nei Tsang appt on Thursday, wherein the practitioner “moved stuff around”.

That night into the next morning, I had dreams/nightmares, mostly centered around my childhood and teen years, and high school in particular. Something I’ve never been able to get past emotionally, due to the emotional damage I sustained from my peers.

I woke up with a Frank Black song stuck in my head.

I’m not a Frank Black or a Pixies fan.

Up til today, I’ve only ever owned ONE Pixies song, and that’s because it came on a compilation.

But yet, there’s Frank Black, in my head when I woke up. I always take stuff like this as a lesson with meaning - something to learn from it - not necessarily literal meaning, but which pertained to the dream(s) and is something I can glean additional info about myself from.

It’s interesting to note that the song that was in my head upon waking on Friday was originally a Beach Boys song. But since I was never a Beach Boys fan, and had only heard the song covered by Frank Black on the radio, that’s the version that my brain held onto all these years.

Aren’t the brain meats neat?

Hang On To Your Ego - Frank Black (covering The Beach Boys)
I know so many people who think they can do it alone
They isolate their heads and stay in their saftey zones

But what can you tell them
And what can you say that won’t make them defensive

So, Hang on to your ego
Hang on, but I know that you’re gonna lose the fight

They come on like their peaceful
But inside they’re so uptight
They trip through the day
And waste all their thoughts at night

But how can I say it
How can I come on
When I know I’m guilty

So, Hang on to your ego
Hang on, but I know that you’re gonna lose the fight

And how can I say it
How can I come on
When I know I’m guilty

Hey

Hang on to your ego
Hang on
Hang on but I know that you’re gonna lose the fight
Hang on
Hang on to your ego
Hang on
Hang on
Hang on but I know that you’re gonna lose the fight
Hang on to your ego
Hang on but I know that you’re gonna lose the fight