dream log: living memory

Strange, my most engrossing dreams come after retransmission - when I awake momentarily, but decide to reenter the dream state. I remember those. Probably because their still fresh in mind.

The realm of dreams is an indulgence I'm uncertain I need to bridle. I love living under the sheets. But the dreamworld keeps me too long, and it seduces hours from the real, waking life - a place where change needs me.

Most of my dreams channel 2 emotional narratives: romantic heartbreak and the disturbing macabre. Outside of a few very revelatory dreams, I'm not sure what dreams of mine are recurring. They all seem to posses pieces and elements and variate only slightly, all sharing the same root. Originality is an illusion in reality, so why not so in dreams where truth is more honest?

The world of my dreams has been existentialized for some time. The process of my dreams is cinematic in every sense. I am the auteur of my dreams, always having one foot in the experience and the other observing it. I am always conscious that I am in my dream's story - simultaneously, the puppet and the puppeteer. I'm not sure if it's always been that way, but I only vaguely remember when it wasn't, and I'm not sure even then if it wasn't, maybe just less so. I've gained an understanding of my dreams to influence them, manipulate them, but I don't actively try to. Surrendering to your dreams is just more interesting.

From an early age, I was plagued by very intense nightmares, night terrors. But, I don't recall the last one I've had. I no longer have them. The nearest thing to nightmares I have now are the ones where I lose my vision or hearing. Those ones so visceral and terribly affecting. But most of the dreams leaning toward the macabre I take on with an excited sense of adventure. These dreams usually typified by a binding theme: us as metaphorical vampire/zombie - insatiably lusting. On some, very rare occasions, however, the moments in the dream become a little too eerie, a little to ominously intense for me, and I decide to leave it, abort. I had one of those dreams this morning.

It's a difficult task to articulate certain dreams thoroughly. They live in such a carnivalesque world of reason. A world where the rhetorical carries less sway, and space-time has not been labeled. But I'll give it a go.

I'm living in some quaint, rural place. Stepping out onto the driveway of my one-story, brown-tiled, 60s-style house, I can see the mountain range in the distance. I feel younger, teenaged. The evening is fleeting into night, and a thick, almost paranormal, layer of mist begins to envelope the surrounding area. That same kind of blanketing mist as you might encounter on those certain late winter night drives home in Orange County. I enjoy those drives. They make the city-suburbs seem so mysteriously venturous, like the concrete hasn't quite sucked all the magic from the world yet. Then, the night becomes day, or rather, just is. And the mist has retreated back to the distant mountain range, but again making its descent toward us. I fixate on this picturesque view of the mist and the mountains. This image seeming so overglossed, the colors popping so baroquely like 60s musicals. It seemed so Frank Darabont a la his recent adaptation of Stephen King's The Mist (which I've only seen trailers of) - so overproduced and overstated. Intriguing how fractions of your waking life integrate into your dreamworld, even the most insignificant things. Every brushing piece a detail that develops your life vignette.

As I watch the mist maneuvering and descending closer, I can't turn away this distinct feeling that something is wrong, that that mist signifies something threatening. My dad, who's working on a domestic project in the garage (which is one of those old-school pull-out garages), is oblivious. I express to him this unsettling feeling I'm having, "this feels off, this feels like a Stephen King movie." His reaction gets lost in the dream's shuffle. Probably because he was apathetic about my cautionings. To transition into the interior house, the dream takes a break from the building suspense, and revisits one of my most constant dream-state sub-narratives:

I'm in bed, having a dream within my dream. In this "hyperdream", which ensuingly becomes the dream I make a overwhelmingly profound connection with a brunette-haired girl. But, this dream doesn't feel imagined or manifested. It feels as if this girl and this moment when I met her was a memory forgotten and now reclaimed and remembered. It feels that way, but I'm uncertain which is the case. When I wake from this hyperdream, I am still unsure in my dream if this girl really exists or is only a manifestation of my dreamworld. But, it feels so genuine and palpable not to be real. I try calling my friend, Nathan, to confirm if this event, this moment happened. But I can't get a hold of him. I try dialing several times with no luck. Finally I do, and he confirms her existence as a person, that she is not merely a beautiful concept that I drew up. I feel a refreshing relief hearing this reaffirmation. Then, I wake up.

I wake up, and inevitably I feel the letdown, as it's not the case. She's not yet a part of my life, a part of me. Yet, if the human mind can conceive it, then that is proof of its possibility.
"Man is a tiny replica of the Universe. If two things are naturally associated together in the human mind, which is the image of the 'mind' of the Universe, this is evidence of a real connection between the two things in the Universe."

-Cavendish '67, The Black Arts

So, I reenter my dreamworld, seeing if I can continue the dream, milk it a little more. I am in the house. Nathan is with me, and we are talking about that girl, that moment. At the same time, I am getting more and more uneasy about that unsettling feeling I had earlier. I go around the house making sure all the windows are shut and secure. I beckon my dad to close all the gates that hedge our house. He ignores the request. The texture of my dream's images becomes more bleak, more saturated. My mom is introduced to the dream, running around in a foul mood, trying to straighten up the house. Except, my aunt has substituted in the dream for my mom - an aunt I find too caught up in the cogs of The Machine. Her eyebrows overly-shaped and plucked to clown-like proportion. I try to warn her of the impending threat, but she's too busy making sure everything looks nice. Nathan and I here the scurry of 2 strangers in one of the rooms, and in our startled haste somehow a large ceiling bulb falls and shatters. My mom gets more angry. The strangers turn out to be 2 adolescent White girls, who are there and gone from the dream in a glimpse. This is the only symbolic confusion I have about this dream, what was their purpose? The tone continues to intensify, correlating with my mom's malcontent with the condition of the house. Pillow cases and blankets are eerily configured on the sofa by unknown hands. This spooks me, poltergeist-style. My mom sees this mess and becomes, not disturbed, but more irritated, "Where's your father? Why don't you ever blame anything on him?" There's 4 pictures magnetized on the fridge. One of me, my mom, and my dad. The fourth of a celebrity. She throws a dart at my dad's picture. I contest, "we're only supposed to throw those at the celebrities, not each other." She asks for my father. Another pillow heap has appeared on the sofa. She tosses it all aside. My dad, who has transformed into Iggy Pop, lies there. The space-time of the dream begins warping into a slow, drunken-like pace. Celebrities begin appearing around the house. Their faces and skin decaying and the soul behind their eyes vacant. They inescapably surround us. Hannah Montana circles me, looking like she was buried alive and has risen from her grave. I ask her name, and without life she mutters back, "Hannah Montana." This is when I decide to get the fuck out.