Friday, February 8

While You Were Sleeping

Part of the downtime I have been forced to take because of this illness, has been spent sleeping. Part of that sleeping time has been drug induced napping, but no matter, I have literally spent a lot of time in bed the past few days. Not altogether a bad thing, generally, but still...
I woke from a mid-morning nap yesterday with a heavy dream still lingering, and it has taken me awhile for it to distill and come into focus in my mind. I don't know if my interpretation of the images and experiences in my subconcious are correct or thorough, but I am intrigued by the way this dream is hanging on in my psyche. Like it came to teach me something.

I remember having a dream with this kind of impact a few years ago as well. It was just after receiving an email from my second sister, an email which arrived in my inbox just before we moved to Holland, in which she basically announced that she was cutting her ties with me. She didn't want to see me/us as we made our visiting rounds to family and friends before our departure, and she wished me a nice life.

It was an email equivalent of a dagger to the heart.

I spent days wrestling with the why's and the what's of such a communication and cried buckets of tears over its message.

Then one night, at my parent's house in Texas, I had a dream. I was driving down the road, when my car received a crushing blow from a huge, swinging apparatus. Immediately, I stopped the car and climbed out from under the crushed aluminum and began banging at the crumpled metal. I tried with all of my might to pull or push the pieces straight again, to flatten them out, and to make the car whole. The whole time in the dream I was sobbing and banging and wishing with every thing I had that I could make it better. That I could fix it. But I couldn't. Not by myself. There was no way I could fix the car without help from someone else.

I woke from that dream so sad and confused. I mulled over it for hours, days even, before a meaning presented itself clearly to me. It was a message about my sister. My relationship had survived (albeit barely) a crash, and no matter how much banging, or pulling, or weeping I did over the wreck, I wasn't going to be able to fix it myself. I had to wait until someone else could help me. Specifically, I believed I must wait for my sister's help.

I am still waiting.

But yesterday's dream still has me guessing a little.
I was exploring a theater building wherein I was supposed to be performing, or running a show for others, and I was confused and slightly overwhelmed because I wasn't really sure where I was or what I was supposed to be doing there. Then, as a dream is wont to do, suddenly I found a staircase which seemed familiar. So I descended the steps and instantly I knew exactly where I was. I was standing in the basement corridor of the Capitol Theater in Salt Lake City. It was the performance venue of my youth, and I was there in the dream, surrounded by familiar sights, sounds and smells. I knew this place and felt completely at home there.

But the message which seems obvious on one level is still eluding me on others. Or perhaps it isn't and I am not quite ready to embrace it fully yet. But it has me wondering.

And thinking.

And that can never be a bad thing.

Tell me your dreams.

*****************************
On a less contemplative note: I have just had a dream fullfilled.
More on that later, but only because I love keeping secrets
and I really love surprises.

16 comments:

  1. Hey Jenn,

    I hope you are starting to feel better and that the pain has gone away!

    I also hope the relationship with your sister will get repaired some day. I really do. Sisters are important in one's life!

    As about dreams: I usually don't remember them and if I do, they don't make sense at all. To me they are all a blur of impressions, thoughts and feelings I've dealt with or are still dealing with. but I don't really think they teach my anything. I believe it's my brain treating all this information in its own way.


    your last less contemplative note makes me so happy and hopefull....I don't know if I'm guessing correctly, but is SMID on its way to you? That would be so awesome!!! Oh the thought of that possibility makes me totally excited for you!! Remember that Leuven is only a 2 hour drive away ;). (also if my guess is totally off...)

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  2. Ok, I'd typed some dreams here but having to sign in with my new page address nuked it.

    Anyway, I dunno if you and SMID are old time friends or blog friends meeting for the first time (I'm a new-ish reader to your blog), but in any case, have a great time!

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  3. I sure hope you feel much, much better soon!

    I'm sorry about the rift with your sister. And with certain rifts it really takes both to make it whole.

    I'll write you on my dreams...

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  4. You're very perceptive about your dreams. I usually wake up thinking "what the heck?"

    I hope your sister comes around - that must be so devastating.

    As for my dreams... I had a dream that one of my best friend's husband's was painting my kitchen last night. Pretty boring.

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  5. I dream a lot but rarely remember anything other than the fact that I dreamed. However, one dream that I do remember has stuck with me for almost 40 years.

    I dreamed that I had wings and that I could fly. No biggie, right? Lots of folks have flying dreams. But this was very realistic and very accurate because my wings were big - big enough to carry someone my size. I had to constantly be careful about hitting stuff with my wings when both flying and walking, I had to be careful about them dragging and getting dirty on the ground, and I didn't need blankets when I slept because I could cover myself with my wings. And when flying for any distance, I remember my stomach muscles would get sore from holding up my legs and my chest would be killing me from flapping my wings. But the flying was awesome!

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  6. I hope you get in touch with your sister again, people need their siblings. I know I do mine anyway.

    I rarely remember my dreams, I have only two sorts of dreams that I can remember, one recurring dream, about me running in front of a truck that is trying to hit me. I can never see the driver's face, but I know he's smiling.
    The other dreams are usually dreams about me being at home doing nothing in particular, just sitting or walking. In other words boring! :)

    Dreams about flying are so cool! Wish I had them. (Or in any case, remember them...)

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  7. Hope the plague releases you soon.

    So that's where the red boots are going?? awesome

    I always have really vivid dreams and I'm sure i'll remember them but by the time I've gotten out of bed and done anything they're gone.

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  8. Hmm - the timing of your sister's decision is intriguing to me . . .

    Although I don't agree with one of my siblings in many areas - we have kind of agreed to tolerate each other's differences. As long as we don't delve into any conversations of substance (political, religous, child rearing, etc.) . . . we are good. It does make me sad that he clearly thinks I am a lost sheep - but for now our tolerance for each other must suffice.

    Oh yeah - as far as dreams go - I remember them when I wake up and then they fade out!

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  9. I had a dream that you and SMID were hanging out wearing red boots and purposefully excluding me and I cried and cried.

    Okay, no, not really... But i do have this sneaking suspicion that fun is being had without me...

    Oh, and I feel ya on the sister thing. But you know that. Because you know way too much about me. I sorta feel like I oughtta apologize for that. haha.

    And I had a good snicker over the Capitol Theater. I think I know that basement corridor...

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  10. I'm still open-mouthed about your sister's email, which isn't the point of your piece but I don't understand how people, siblings, can be so mean.

    What dreams you have though. I haven't been remembering many dreams lately. Perhaps that explains why I'm such a nervous wreck! :}

    Although I did get a terrific night's sleep just now.

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  11. well..... thanks to your delightful story about your youngest sons toileting issues yesterday i was just treated to a wonderful dream about Andrews toilet trips!!!!!!!! Oh the joy of my job just never ends!!!!

    I too am sorry about your sister, i know how important my relationship with my sister is and i wouldn't trade it for the world however my relationship with my brother leaves much to be desired and i long for that to be different.

    thanks for last night it was fun
    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

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  12. The timing of your sister's announcement certainly raised its affect a few notches--time does heal, though, so stay open to some gesture from her some day. I know my brothers have surprised me after some years, with emails "out of the blue"--and I have been very grateful for that.

    As for dreams . . . as a counselor, I tell people to keep a dream journal (usually has to be right close to the bed, and at least a few scribbled notes so a person won't lose the content of the dream). I feel they're a way your inner self tries to put things together and express them--so you don't keep things bottled up, or hide them from yourself.

    The body does most of its repair work while you're sleeping--makes sense that your psyche would take that rest time to do the same.

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  13. I had a dream last night that my DH and went to Hawaii with our daughter and my parents. (Hawaii is a VERY big trip when you live in Israel) We couldn't find any Kosher food there so we had to eat pop-tarts all the time. Paradise and pop-tarts, how funny.
    (I googled it to find out, but there is actually kosher food in Hawaii, just not very much of it)

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  14. I've had lots of very strange dreams - sometimes induced by lariam which gives you a whole other kind of dreams. Lately some other drug-induced ones. I think they mean something - not literally but metaphorically as your car crash dream did. I have lots of flying dreams - where the plane is really doing strange things. I'm told I feel a loss of control. But over what?

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  15. Wow, Jenn. The whole thing with your sister just blows me away. I hope your relationship will be healed one day.

    As for dreams, I have many and I probably read way too much into them most of the time. Here's what's really funny - in my dreams, my husband is HORRIBLE. He does the most horrific things. We call him "The Bizarro Husband." I've actually been mad at Dave all day for something he did in my dreams.

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  16. The story of yur sister makes me very sad. M sister and I had a very poor relationship, but after 4 years we came together strong. I hope it will be the same for you two.

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