Dreams are beautiful elaborate contradictions Always there, waiting beneath the surface To tell us things we would not otherwise hear, In a voice we might not ever fully understand.Dreams get weirder and weirder during times of change in my life Dreams of getting back together with exes Playing out like they actually would With reconnection followed by the same fights Dreams of normal work days inter-spliced with childhood memories I’m at work, but my coworkers are students from my grade school When I was younger I dream of falling in love with strangers my mind created Now I fall back in love with people long gone for my life
The best dream I had this week was me sitting in a diner at night Ordering breakfast at the counter The woman behind the counter says she's the owner "I took all those pictures myself, you know, just out back in the kitchen. It's actually quite hard to get the lighting just right to make food look appetizing. Take a picture from a wrong angle, not bright enough and bacon looks raw" "I'll have the bacon then" I say. She laughs and I wake up happier than when I fell asleep. The worst dream I had was getting back together with someone I had no choice but to leave. In the dream I've been forced back into their life by some unseen circumstance. We kiss and hug and live together, although I know something isn't right. I know what's coming next. They want me, and I know only bad comes from that. I wake up feeling drained and concerned.
I've had dreams that changed my life. On a full moon once, I dreamed of a girl who I hadn't known for years yet was longing for. In the dream I returned to her house to pick up the things I left behind. Books, clothes, and other objects. I went in and started collecting them in a bag. I turn around and see her standing there, tears streaming down her face as she spoke to me. "You can't come back and take what you left behind, you choose to leave it behind, It doesn't belong to you anymore." After that I let go of her from my mind. Something inside me helped make peace not just in that relationship But in every relationship I have had since.
Some of the most beautiful and cruel dreams tend to happen after breakups or losses. Dreaming of being with the person still, before all of me has caught up with reality. An unusual gift that the last time we see someone in life, Is and can never truly be the last time we will see them. We can never know what the last time will be.
Although it does seem that some of me hasn't caught up with realities that are much longer past. Vivid dreams of the house I grew to know fear in. Or walking through the exact hallways of the school I grew to learn shame in.
When I was young I dreamed of missing the bus or almost missing it every single night. I remember running and chasing after the bus, sometimes jumping onto its side and clinging all the way to school. Once I had dropped out of high school those dreams ceased.
I would also dream of being trapped in houses. Traversing through rooms by more and more complicated means. Rooms that get smaller and tighter. Pulling myself up through passage ways hidden in the back of closets. The doors that should be exits are locked tight. I am running and running looking for any escape. The first time I ever escaped one of these endless complexes I was twenty three. I was in a seemingly infinite apartment building. Running up a stairwell throwing open the doors on each landing looking for one that had windows that showed the sun. All were windowless until I found it. The room has two glass doors with white lattice over them. I didn’t stay long but I could sense that this was the apartment of an older woman. Perhaps my neighbor from when I was growing up. I ran forward and threw open the doors. It was gorgeous outside. Visually it was as if the yard was in the summer and past the road ahead was the fall. In the yard stood an enormous towering tree with a rope swing hanging from a drooping branch. I ran for the rope. Swinging up toward the sky, out over the road from summer into fall. As a beautiful orange and purple sun both rose and set on the skyline before me.
When I was a kid, I was aware more often than not in my dreams that I was dreaming. I had a lot of what I called nightmares then. They came in two forms. I was either being chased often by something unseen. Some kind of grand force of danger. An elusive villain, that it would mean my doom to be caught by. Or I was being rejected by everyone I turned to. Being cornered in rooms, being told by groups of people that I shouldn’t be there. Running over to people that looked familiar only to have them act as if they never knew me.
In time I would find myself trapped in the dreams. Self-awareness during nightmares led to a deep need to wake up. I would yell to be woken up Hoping my voice in the dream would carry into my moms room in reality.
For a while I developed a trick to wake up. In the dream I'd push open my eyelids, and in turn sometimes my eyelids would open in reality. Other times they would open into new dreams. This worked for years, until it didn't. One night I tried my eye trick, and they both fell out into my hands. In that moment I remember both seeing the palms of my hands from my eye perspective and the eyes in my hands from the perspective of my empty eye sockets. That trick never worked again, but I would continue to find ways to escape the dreams I disliked.
Sometimes just running away worked. Some part of me knows that dreams are fleeting and ever changing. If I run far enough away, the dream will dissolve along with my memories of it. Later I discovered a method of bouncing away that still works. If I jumped, and then right as I touched the ground jumped again, I could go higher. I was able to use this to travel in whatever direction I need too. I would jump and fly through vast landscapes, home towns, and cities too. That method never really stopped working, I've just mostly switched to flying now that I have the hang of it.
When I was younger I couldn't fly in my dreams much. It happened occasionally but usually very briefly before waking Often when I’d realized I was in a a dream I’d fly up and kiss the first person I could find This would also wake me up That is how I learned that certain acts would “break” the dream if I wasn’t careful enough.
Falling happened more back then. I'd fall from very high places, and unlike what I've heard I wouldn't wake up when I hit the ground. The feeling of hitting the ground I can only describe as deeply unpleasant. Somehow physically uncomfortable, even though I've also heard you're not supposed to have physical feelings within dreams. The feeling of falling was almost as bad if not worse than hitting the ground. The dread of knowing that falling from such an astounding height was something I should never be experiencing.
Flying has become almost second nature to me in recent years. All I need to do is lift off the ground and as cliché as it sounds, believe I can fly. The more I believe I am able to fly, the better, higher, faster I am able too. And it's beautiful to be up there in my mind. Disconnected from all below. A land of one's own. That must be why birds seem so proud. As they are the makers of their own provinces.
My first memory is my first nightmare. I was maybe two years old. My mother was either working late or out with friends. At the time she lived with her physical therapist whose husband was a farmer. We lived upstairs in an addition to their house where other random people would live from time to time The dreams went like this. I woke up in my bed in the corner by the window. Moonlight shines in, casting a light blue glow around the otherwise dark room. I realized my mom's not there. Her bed was large and next to mine and it was empty. I yell for her. I feel vulnerable. Unsafe. Exposed. I yell and yell and no one responds. I know I must get up and get downstairs. That's where people always are. I make my way through the dark. I leave the room and step foot on the landing. In front of me is the banister. Separating the floor from the drop-off above the stairs. It is dark, so infinitely dark. I make my way around the landing to the top of the stairs. I pass one of two light switches in this hallway I think I'll just turn on the one at the bottom of the stairs. I begin descending, slowly unsure I can see a light through a crack at the door at the bottom of the stairs. Halfway down the stairs I decided some light would really help me. For some reason, I made the decision to go back up the stairs and turn on the light from the top floor. I make my way back up. Still slowly, still unsure, still silent, still encased in darkness. My foot touches the top landing and begins to sink slowly into the blackness below the floor. Hands emerge from all around me, rising up out of the floor They do not grip or hit but push me down Flat palms against my skin So many hands Too many to count Lifting up from the floor board as if they were always there Waiting like snakes underfoot for the perfect moment to strike. I am plunged deeper into darkness than ever before Falling into nothing. When I finally awaken, I am in the same bed By the same window, in the same dark room I started in Awash in the same light blue glow of the moon I am alone I yell but no one comes So I begin to cry
I have no memory of actually getting downstairs that night But I did I found the physical therapist and woke her up. She made me tea I think Or perhaps just sat and talked with me She taught me how to play a card game I can’t remember And told me how dreams are not real, but things we make up in our head.
Some dreams like to act like they are repeated, but are not. Some are repeated but feel new every time. It is confusing and unreliable in this space I've invested myself in so deeply for so long.
My first dream of a sexual nature was in second grade about my foreign exchange French teacher. The next one I remember was in middle school. I had it about an older girl in another class. She was older which meant she was cool. I'll say at the time I didn't have a one hundred percent gasp of anatomy. So in the dream she had boy parts. I remember saying that I didn't care and that she was beautiful to me. Impulsively I broke up with my friend group after that dream I thought somehow I would have to be cool to get this girl at school to notice me I told my three friends that they weren’t cool I finally had a friend group and I rejected them They bullied and further rejected me after that for most time we were in school together I never talked to that cool older girl I was very lonely after that I would not learn about the term transgender until high school.
I also have dreams I hear others having as well. I've had every kind dream where your teeth fall out. One at a time, or all of them at once. Finger nails on occasion too. Ones where my face is full of acne Or I wake up with a full beard
I once had a dream where I had an erection that wouldn't stop growing And would eventually fall off at the end like a piece of clay.
The first year I got sober I dreamed of using almost every night. Every dream had the same theme I'd be back home on a visit Often I didn't even use in the dream Just know that I had And I'd being trying to call my sponsor And tell him I’d messed up All my rides back to the city would fall through And I'd be stuck Back in my hometown Back in my addiction Back in my darkness
I dream of my middle school I dream of my childhood library I dream of the houses I grew up in I dream in an ever shifting detail I can still walk through those places in my waking mind I remember where everything is When I sleep the spaces grow endless New rooms sprout from unseen doorways I find people who don’t belong And sometimes I find no one at all Empty but not unsettling spaces
One dream stands out besides my first I’m walking up trail on a small mountain Somewhere in California long before I had ever actually journeyed there I make it to the top of the trail I can see down the mountain Cities in the distance I sense a presence Looking up I see a bright white light It feels warm as it begins to engulf me I begin to rise into it I am now in my apartment in the city A brick lined living room A seemingly average apartment. I feel the warmth again Without looking down I know the white light is surrounding my crotch I reach into it And pull out a baby girl with one hand Her body rests on the forearm Head in my hand I smile and she cries I am now a parent I begin to do my best to take care of her In the dream this next part takes place over three days I am feeding her a bottle I go to put it in the kitchen When I return she is a year older We play and dance And every time I look back at her she is older still The first night she is still young So I hold her as we go to sleep The next day she it ten I think Talking laughing still dancing That night she is almost twenty I let her have my bed and I sleep on the floor in the living room The third day she has grown so much Mid twenties Long brown hair Deep blue eyes She is the embodiment of joy like I have never known The next morning I wake up To see her standing by the window I know it’s her time to go Time to be her own adult Time to live We are back at the mountain top She hold my hand tightly in what I feel is the hug goodbye I see her lips mouth “Thank You” And she walks up to the light And begins ascending up into it I begin to cry Wet hot tears of gratitude I feel then running down my cheeks As I watch her disappear into the white I know my job is done My child is grown She is ready for whatever it is she is meant for And that does not involve me I am grateful And I cry as the white light consumes all I can see I wake up in bed My real bed The sun shining in My cheeks are wet with tears And I am so happy
It's my belief now That I escaped to my dreams For safety For a place to be in control
My control didn’t always work Those were often the nightmares
As I grew I grew in my abilities as a dreamer
Often now, I feel like an actor in a play every night I never know what the show is going to be But I show up every night Ready for whatever may take place I don’t need to be in control all the time Because I know I’m safe Safe in my dreams Regardless of my realities.