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Dreams & Dreaming
Oct. 16th, 2011 12:41 pmI usually have weird dreams. Bizarre "Escher meets Lewis Carroll meets Gene Roddenberry" adventures that no one would ever write on purpose. The most memorable ones are often frightening, too; the spiders on every surface, including between the layers of Kleenex in the box, or the one where flying alien pancakes that secrete human-dissolving acid interrupted Commander Riker's (yes, that Riker) class on swimming in a church gymnasium that has never held a pool but did for that dream. (Think Reign of Fire with flying acid pancakes instead of dragons and you'll be pretty close - and yes, in a totally bizarre anti-climax, we humans succeeded in fighting back with forks) Occasionally they're even simple scifi, like the one about the super-human girl and the anti-government rebels surrounded by the dictatorial government's forces and struggling to find a way to get everyone out to fight again another day; that one I typed up, at least in part, and my dad keeps asking when I'm going to finish the story, because he liked it a lot. I've posted about my weird dreams once or twice, but I don't think I ever mentioned the prophetic ones.
I say prophetic because I don't know a better word to refer to dreams about things that later come to pass, but it seems awfully pretentious for the level of events I usually see in those dreams. It started a long time ago, when I was in grade school, and let's face it - having your mother sign an absence form for when you were sick doesn't seem important enough to be worth dreaming in advance. In college, I dreamed about hanging out with friends I hadn't made yet. It's pretty much always been minor things, little snippets that are just enough to know, 'hey, I dreamed this before it happened!' but not enough to make a difference in any way. It's not like I have a chance to change anything based on these dreams, because it's always just a single moment in time, a snapshot featuring people I may or may not know. I won't see it coming in real life until it happens; the people I don't know yet in the dreams are vague and indistinct. More annoying than anything, really, so I've had no patience with people who hype it up: "I dream about things before they happen!" "Yeah, so?"
Last night (or this morning, I suppose, since it's the dreams right before waking that are memorable) I had another dream. I was at a clinic, with my indistinct husband (who, oddly enough, felt like an afterthought here), and I was pregnant and scared. A lot of the details are fading, as is usual for dreams, but weird as it was, it felt like one of the prophetic ones, which leaves me torn, and a little freaked. I mean, sure, deep down, I really want to be loved (who doesn't?) but I've already officially given up on the whole romance-and-marriage thing. The chances of finding a guy who both interests me and is interested in me are infinitesimal - it's never happened before (don't get me started on the ex-BF-in-love-with-love), and I can't really see it happening in the near future. For this dream to come to pass, it would have to be the near future, because it's only a half-dozen years until I turn forty, and unless God plans on repeating miracles, pregnancy after forty is...unlikely at best. There's a reason it's newsworthy when forty-five and fifty-year-old women manage to give birth (though why someone would choose to start at fifty is beyond me; children run around a lot - it's exhausting even when you're twenty-something). I run away from guys who interest me because I'm sick of making a fool of myself. I misinterpret everything as interest from a guy I find interesting (I don't notice at all if I'm not interested, unless he gets really obvious, like telling me directly and asking me out, or being skeevy and leering at me) and I can't help reacting, even though it makes me look pathetic and clingy. (I've found some of my old crushes on FB and IRL, but I'm too embarrassed about the past to ever contact them) It's safer to just run away. Loneliness hurts, but it's easier than repeated humiliation. Dreaming of a future pregnancy leaves me fighting hope and fear, that part of me that desperately wants to be held and treasured facing off with the part of me that put up locks and walls to block out anyone who might attract me. There's a reason I identify with the protagonists of Skip Beat and (Kaicho wa) Maid-Sama. I'm really confused right now.
I say prophetic because I don't know a better word to refer to dreams about things that later come to pass, but it seems awfully pretentious for the level of events I usually see in those dreams. It started a long time ago, when I was in grade school, and let's face it - having your mother sign an absence form for when you were sick doesn't seem important enough to be worth dreaming in advance. In college, I dreamed about hanging out with friends I hadn't made yet. It's pretty much always been minor things, little snippets that are just enough to know, 'hey, I dreamed this before it happened!' but not enough to make a difference in any way. It's not like I have a chance to change anything based on these dreams, because it's always just a single moment in time, a snapshot featuring people I may or may not know. I won't see it coming in real life until it happens; the people I don't know yet in the dreams are vague and indistinct. More annoying than anything, really, so I've had no patience with people who hype it up: "I dream about things before they happen!" "Yeah, so?"
Last night (or this morning, I suppose, since it's the dreams right before waking that are memorable) I had another dream. I was at a clinic, with my indistinct husband (who, oddly enough, felt like an afterthought here), and I was pregnant and scared. A lot of the details are fading, as is usual for dreams, but weird as it was, it felt like one of the prophetic ones, which leaves me torn, and a little freaked. I mean, sure, deep down, I really want to be loved (who doesn't?) but I've already officially given up on the whole romance-and-marriage thing. The chances of finding a guy who both interests me and is interested in me are infinitesimal - it's never happened before (don't get me started on the ex-BF-in-love-with-love), and I can't really see it happening in the near future. For this dream to come to pass, it would have to be the near future, because it's only a half-dozen years until I turn forty, and unless God plans on repeating miracles, pregnancy after forty is...unlikely at best. There's a reason it's newsworthy when forty-five and fifty-year-old women manage to give birth (though why someone would choose to start at fifty is beyond me; children run around a lot - it's exhausting even when you're twenty-something). I run away from guys who interest me because I'm sick of making a fool of myself. I misinterpret everything as interest from a guy I find interesting (I don't notice at all if I'm not interested, unless he gets really obvious, like telling me directly and asking me out, or being skeevy and leering at me) and I can't help reacting, even though it makes me look pathetic and clingy. (I've found some of my old crushes on FB and IRL, but I'm too embarrassed about the past to ever contact them) It's safer to just run away. Loneliness hurts, but it's easier than repeated humiliation. Dreaming of a future pregnancy leaves me fighting hope and fear, that part of me that desperately wants to be held and treasured facing off with the part of me that put up locks and walls to block out anyone who might attract me. There's a reason I identify with the protagonists of Skip Beat and (Kaicho wa) Maid-Sama. I'm really confused right now.
