Dream Translations

I have a bad case of insomnia and sometimes I can go for 24hours before I even feel sleepy. Then when I do go to sleep, it’s only for 4 hours. But it’s as if my mind makes up for the hours by cramming as many dreams as it can into my sleeping state. This morning was a perfect example.

I checked my phone at it was 5:31am before I finally drifted away to sleep. I wear earplugs so I give myself the best opportunity for undisturbed sleep, yet at 9:31am, I was awake. I got up did my morning ablutions then my head rewound the crazy dreams I had. 

I had three different dreams; each one was like a 30 second commercial. But it led me to wonder just how accurate those dream translation websites are. After all, dreams are just our subconscious sifting through our conscious minds and trying to sort them out. I like to think that our subconscious are to our conscience as Dali is to Lichtenstein, it’s still art.

So here are my dreams and my theories, version the internet’s translations.

1)      I was Elsa from Frozen, standing on an old fashioned train as it whipped through a winter landscape while singing ‘Let It Go’.

a.      Internet:

                                                    i.     Train: to be on a train wearing a dress (I WAS Elsa!) indicates my legacy and what I want to be remembered for.

                                                   ii.     Winter: signifies ill health & sickness

                                                  iii.     Singing: signifies happiness, harmony and joy

b.      My theory:

                                                    i.     Train: I like train rides

                                                   ii.     Winter: it was hot last night and I wish I were cooler

                                                  iii.     Singing: it’s the song, not the action; the song is a North Korean conspiracy to numb the world into complacency.

2)      I was checking into a hotel where the registration desk said for an extra $2, I can get upgraded into a better room and it was already approved by my company. I turn my head and there is a buffet breakfast in the hotel restaurant

a.      Internet:

                                                    i.     Hotel: signifies a new state of mind, undergoing a transition

                                                   ii.     Buffet: signifies trying to work through guilt

                                                  iii.     Restaurant: difficulty in too many decisions

b.      My theory:

                                                    i.     Hotel: I sleep like a log when I’m in a hotel, so based on my insomnia, I wish I were in a hotel

                                                   ii.     Buffet: It was over twelve hours since I ate, so I know I was hungry

                                                  iii.     Restaurant: I like to have someone bring my food to me since I’m asleep and can’t get up and get it myself

3)      I’m in the middle of some kind of mob action and I make my way to a car, just someone’s car that was left in the middle of the road, it was the lead car and the road was open in front of it. As I get in and drive I get pelted with rocks the size of grapefruit and they crack my windshield.

a.      Internet:

                                                    i.     Driving a car: signifies my ambition and my ability to drive to the next stop

                                                   ii.     Mob: signifies chaos and disorganization

                                                  iii.     Cracked windshield: signifies set backs on my pursuit of goals

b.      My theory:

                                                    i.     I was thinking of the Calais clashes in France since it had affected me not to long ago when I was taking the Eurostar from Paris to London.

                                                   ii.     The internet may have a point too.

Basically, it’s all a crap shoot. You can believe whatever the internet says or just make up your mind yourself. After all, no matter what anyone else says, how many degrees or licenses they have, no one knows you better than you know yourself. No one.

Now excuse me while I go take a nap.

Invisible

I had another very vivid dream last night, as with all dreams, they start in medias res. I am with a co-worker who I normally don’t see other than to a few casual exchanges in the hallways. But we are together in this dream as a team.

We are in a hotel and another co-worker has been killed in a very suspicious manner, blood and destruction are hinted at by the employees who have seen the room. For some reason, my co-worker and  I have been entrusted to investigate the killing. (Ok, I know, I just finished reading a detective novel).

Someone hands me a wooden box with a sliding cover, instructing me to lay the box in the hallway to set off a catalyst that will allow me to see how the killing took place. As I finish laying the box and opening it, a fog begins to seep out from the opening. I run to the end of the hallway and suddenly, I am holding hands with my coworker as we are plunged off a balcony and drifted off into reddish pink clouds.

We land in the midst of a crowd, she turns to talk to someone, I turn to talk to someone, we need to know where we are, what has happened, etc. But no one talks to us, and then I watch as my co-worker tries to get someone’s attention and I notice that they don’t even see us.

I come to the realization that they don’t see us because we are already dead. We are invisible.

My co-worker gets a look of blunted affect; she has accepted her death with surrender and drifts away from me. After a turn of panic and despair-will I spend eternity wandering the world dead and forgotten? I turn to my original mission; I need to find out who killed my other co-worker. I am determined.

I find my way back to the hotel corridor and see the corridor filled with smoke still pouring out of the box. I run in, close the box and the smoke dissipates quickly.

Then I watch as I stand in the detritus they have removed from the room, I wait for someone to open the door so I can go inside the room and see the crime scene. Oddly, even as a ghost, I have my iPhone which I use to take pictures of the objects they have placed in the hallway.

One man is talking, he’s throwing out theories on why the killing occurred. I can hear my iPhone’s camera clicking and I’m taking notes on my iPhone when I feel a tentative touch on my arm. I look over and it’s one of the managers at work, she’s looking straight at me. The man who’s talking turns to me, his theories were for my benefit. Suddenly I realize, they can see me.

“You can see me! I’m not dead! OMG! I’m not dead!”

End of dream.

I think it isn't difficult to interpret that dream, it’s just a resonance of several themes that have been rattling in my head lately.

There are invisible people, we see them but we don’t. We ignore them; they are the disenfranchised, the homeless, sometimes they are the people you pass who turn away instead of making eye contact.

Lately, I've been feeling invisible. I can’t count how many times I’m suddenly confronted with some car jumping in front of me as if my car wasn't already there. Or the lady who bangs her grocery cart into the back of my shins but doesn't apologize and instead glares at me for being in her way. Or the jackass who has pulled his chair out and when I pass, I say excuse me because I’m polite. Instead of him moving his chair in so I can pass, he nods at me as if he had deemed to acknowledge MY apology for disturbing his ruminations. He never did move his chair up. 

I acknowledge the fit of pique this provokes in me. But apart from walking around screaming “I’M WALKING HERE! I’M DRIVING HERE! HERE I AM!” There really isn't much I can do if people find me invisible. But I don’t have to feel invisible.

In my dream, I brush aside the panic because I had a mission; I needed to investigate the murder. Was it my insistence on doing my job, not surrendering to the despair and simple acceptance as my co-worker had that resulted in my becoming visible again?

Perhaps it is in that single line that I found redemption, at least in my dream. It's a start.

 “You can see me! I’m not dead! OMG! I’m not dead!”