Saturday, November 24, 2012

Dream On

A poetry class I took in college once challenged us to write based on a dream we had. I think it's a great idea, since it's from your imagination anyway, provided you can get something coherent out of your dreams. Mine are usually pretty weird.

I like sleeping with music on. It's a nice way to fall asleep and wake up. The unanticipated side effect is how it affects my dreams. One time I had a dream that I thought was strange and unrealistic only to find out later that it was actually something real I heard on the radio!

Not all music is the same. I've discovered that when I listen to Hunter Hayes' CD I always have pleasant dreams. This works even when I listen to it like three nights in a row. A few nights ago I listened to the Phantom of the Opera soundtrack. That is a challenge just to get on a comfortable volume, because some songs are soft soprano ballads and others are pretty intense. (Do you have the organ music running through your head yet?) I was curious what this music would do, and it didn't disappoint. The bits of dreams I remembered were pretty weird and alarming and interesting. Plus it had at least one person I know (no, it wasn't you) and a celebrity. This is a scene I wrote from it:
The sun beamed down on the occupants of a roofless car as it motored past perfect houses along empty roads.

"Normally I don't mind driving drunk. Or after I've had whiskey," said Robert, somehow holding both a glass and the steering wheel. "But not today. Not on the anniversary."

I didn't ask him to explain, though I would have liked to hear him tell the tragic tale. Instead, I was going to tell Robert that he didn't seem incapacitated and that he could probably get us home. But just then he pulled the car over to the side of the road. It took me a moment to realize we were at the station. It looked like we'd be taking a train the rest of the way.
 Robert is the celebrity, so feel free to guess his last name.

The next couple of nights I just listened to Q102, and ended up having dreams where my life was in danger. In one I was waiting to have my throat cut. They drew lines on your neck with red lipstick and then followed them with a blade. If you had three you could live but if you had four they'd kill you. I was supposed to have three, but my lines got smeared so you couldn't tell if it was three or four. Fortunately I woke up while I was still waiting. Phew! The next night my dream wasn't that bad. It went like this:
I found myself in a bathroom that got progressively decrepit. The first stall didn't close because the lock was broken. Gillian told me that she had a friend hold the door for her. Instead of asking Gillian to hold it for me, I tried a different stall. This one closed just fine, but it was pointless because on one side of the stall, instead of a wall there was a shower curtain that was not big enough. Then when I went over to the sinks to wash my hands, there were no lights, even when I tried flipping the light switch. I decided to bring my flashlight when I came back the next night, but then I decided I might not come back at all since this bathroom was so far from my room and the quality was clearly not worth the trip. Despite the dark I was able to find a bar of soap and wash my hands. I never got the chance to discover if there were towels, because at that moment we heard a loud, earth-shaking THUD. A guy at the sink next to me (suddenly this wasn't a girls-only bathroom) said we had to hide in our cars or a tree. I didn't have a car. I considered running back to my room. THUD. I realized I didn't have time. I followed the guy and his girlfriend outside into the night since he sounded like he knew what he was talking about. They went through a hole in a chain link fence I knew he'd cut ahead of time. I passed the hole but then went back, found it, and squeezed through. THUD. I ran toward a line of pine trees along the side of the bathroom building. I wasn't sure why it wasn't safe to hide in there. THUD. I knew we had to hide in trees that were 20% smaller than the rest of the trees, although I didn't know why. I knew this guy trimmed these trees everyday so they'd be a safe size. THUD. What I didn't know was if I was supposed to hide at the base of the tree or try to climb up inside it. And even more curiously, I didn't know what kind of monster was pounding its way closer and closer. THUD. And just as I was getting close to safety beneath the trees, I woke up.
What do you think the monster was? I thought it was either a dinosaur like in Jurassic Park or the smoke monster from Lost.

1 comment:

jesstexter said...

oh my goodness this was craziness! first of all "no it wasn't you". Thanks for answering that question, and I'll just assume the person it was does not know you have a blog. second, I want to hear the rest of these stories. so get cracking. the second story reminds me of a ted dekker type thriller. Maybe Monster with Peretti?? And lastly, I don't think you should listen to Q102 while sleeping anymore. :P