-Found & Lost
I yanked it from a dream like a stubborn weed and emerged to morning half-sleep in triumph--25, 36, 47. As I rolled around and came to myself, I fought to remember, to take the code with me into the day, feeling it was vitally important somehow.For me it isn't the comeuppance of final exams after no study, or of finding myself in front of a packed assembly with no clothes on. My back-in-school dreams have always consisted of standing in front of a bank of lockers in an impossibly long hallway. With my books trapped inside and class starting, I stand spinning the dial right left right to no effect. Though no bell rings, I know I am late. No-one surrounds me. I find an office and see only faceless bureaucrats behind walls of glass, and blank, yawning monitors on desks whose chairs are empty.
But then, in dreams colored by the drugs that now only half work on the pain, my locker opens, finally. It's easy--25, 36, 47, right left right and open it swings. A breakthrough, and even in sleep I know it. Alone still, I crouch at the open door. Left-behind things litter the floor of the locker, chaotic, anonymous--featureless texts, too-small gym clothes, mismatched socks. I don't know what I'm seeking, what to take away.
So I pulled from this dream that which has always blocked me to find myself in a different place, but no further along, faced with a collection of blurry useless things. As I opened my eyes and considered it, much of the triumph evaporated. I take what remains of the feeling and cherish it for now. Life presents few such moments lately. Perhaps I've gained some control over the direction of my dreams, if that means anything.
Positive is hard work, now. I search to find meaning in the numbers, in the rubble they reveal to me. All I see in them, or in these words you're reading, is myself alone in a long hallway, between other places that I could be, should be. The more it seems apt, the more I must stretch and groan to make it so. I wasn't sure I'd end up here when this started.
I found no schedule in the pile. Somewhere a bell rings.
posted by Tom Morton at 5/15/2006 06:49:00 PM
3 Comments:
I used to have a similar reoccurring dream.
In it I can't remember the location of my school locker or I can't remember the combination to the lock. Sometimes in the dream I know that I have already graduated from school yet I am still there. I always translated these dreams as anxiety dreams about career choices or major decisions in my life. I don't know what the significance of the numbers in your dream is, but the fact that you knew the sequence and remembered them might mean you are happy with where you are right now. It may be subconscious confirmation that you made all the right decisions. You should keep a journal of your dreams. I did for a while during a transitional part of my life and it was very informative.
I have this a similar dream as well. In the dream I am always still in college and have been skipping a particular class all semester and as I near graduation there is no way to make up all the missed work. In the dream I come to the choking realization that I am going to fail and there is nothing I can do. This has been happening about once a week and I wake up sweating needing to tell myself that it is over. I guess I still don't feel as though I am caught up. I look forward to a time when i stop having this dream and a period of peace and calm.
To me, you are such a thought provoking and scholarly writer. You mentioned in a comment to one of my blog posts that my words seem to flow readily and sometimes, when I’m in the mood, the words come out and I am powerless to stop them.
However, when I read your words, I wish I had the ability to “write smart stuff”. There is nothing wrong with wrestling the words out, because you leave behind a beautiful treatise of your mind.
Now, before you tell me that I too can “write smart”, please note that I have no intentions of trying. I love the crap that I write, especially when I am pounding out an utterly ridiculous tale of horror. It makes me happy.
You asked once how one should begin writing a book. The answer is, begin. Commit your words to paper and keep going. Don’t over think your ideas, don’t obsess over what you have written, and don’t deny your abilities. I think you are gifted. I think one day I will walk into Barnes & Noble and see prominently in the middle of the store a display of the novel, essays, or short stories you have written.
I’m not saying what I am saying because you are a friend of mine. I’m saying it because I hate wasted talent and if I were too choose one person I know who could earn a Pulitzer Prize, I gotta say it’s you.
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