I’ve been obsessed with my dreams since I was a kid. I’ve never understood how your brain can conjure up such powerful imagery, good or bad, as you sleep. Like, what’s up with it and how do we have the capacity to feel things in our dreams? My obsession was fueled around 5th grade when my mom told me that I was a pretty “active sleeper.” Um. Ok? I guess it started when I was pretty little – around 2 or 3 years old. Apparently, I regularly exercised the ol’ vocal chords while sleeping, making some interesting sounds that couldn’t be explained. My mom decided to invite my Pentacostal (don’t get me started on THAT…) grandmother over to listen to me talk in my sleep. Apparently according to her (the whack-job grandmother), I’m some sort of genius sent from the lost planet of Zargon who was “speaking in tongues” (I made up the Zargon part to be dramatic – but the grandmother really is a whack job). Now, I’m not here to bash the Pentacostal religion…I just come from a place that considers toddler mumbo-jumbo during slumber nothing more than an inability to say actual words……but hey, maybe I am from Zargon…..that’d be sweet — I should get in touch with the Indigo Children and see if we’re cousins.
My dreams have always been exceptionally vivid. I feel things. I’ve woken up thinking I was actually in anaphylactic shock, with my airways closing. I’ve felt a cramp from being shot in the leg and cried in such hysterics that my pillow is wet from real tears. The emotional connection is incredible. And sometimes, I dream in black and white while always speaking Japanese? I heard that you only dream in other languages if you’re fluent in them. But, I’m not fluent. I took six years of Japanese in school to get me out of having to take P.E. because screw P.E. I come from the mountains of Korea. We. Don’t. Run. We also don’t give two shits about push-ups, sit-ups, or those stupid-ass scooter races. If P.E. would’ve included competitive eating of the hot-lunch pizza squares dripping with grease and cheese though, I’d have been first in class.
I guess what really continues to amaze me is the emotional connection to people that is felt during and sometimes long after waking. How do you explain a feeling of love that manifests in your slumber? What does that mean? Am I some psycho that just loves a bunch of random people? How are people from the far past brought forth into your mind and played out in a dream? And what about people that you’d rather not think about? Why is my brain suddenly playing out scenarios with these folks that I’d rather see shipped off to Zargon? The power of the love felt with people always leaves me asking a ton of questions. Most of the time, I see it as a sign to reach out to them and tell them hi….because why else would they randomly pop into my head? But those losers that I don’t care for anymore? I’m not tryin’ to keep in touch with them….so the universe should just stop it.
(Are you bored yet? You can stop reading – I don’t blame you. I’m just droning on about shit I don’t understand.)
So then there’s the creepiness of recurring dreams. Why am I back in my childhood house, searching for something? Why do I keep being transported to some foreign country where I’m running across stepping stones in the center of a water-garden, that feels like home? Why do I have dreams of screaming at my mother and waking up so violently angry, when she’s one of my favorite people? Where do the dreams of being cheated on come from and why do they recur? WHY do I keep falling in love with people? Where the hell did I place that stupid term-paper that I’m supposed to turn in?! And why am I back working for that lame company that I loath? I like to think (not intelligently, but) that maybe there’s something hidden in these messages that I’ve not yet settled in my waking hours and that that’s why they recur. But who knows.
Recently, I’ve started noting pieces that I remember and then turning them into short blurbs of coherent writing. Some of them, cool. Some of them, not-so-cool. But it sure does make for an interesting piece to reflect upon, after the fact. A year ago, I dreamt about being back in Rome, on top of some rooftop, with some random person that I was in love with, watching the sun set in the distance (…are you at all surprised with me being in love with some rando? ‘Cuz you shouldn’t be…..remember — I apparently fall in love with everyone in my dreams). I’m happy though, with the short piece that came out of it…so I thought I’d share it here. Don’t make fun of me. Or make fun of me. Whatever. When you post crap online, you’re just asking for criticism….so pony up, me. In any case, logging your dreams is an easy way to entertain yourself.
March 2017:
…we stood on the rooftop, watching the sun dip below the horizon, sending orange and pink dancing across the sky. Stone arches perfectly framed the city — ancient structures, sprawling out in different directions, colorful rooftops dotting the scene. I walked down, out from under an arch, approaching the wall, soaking up the detail like desert sands soak up rain.
You’re here. No words being spoken, just a shadow in my periphery and a presence that makes my heart long to reach out….reach out and touch your arm, skim the back of your neck with my fingers, run my hand down your spine, and hook my arm around your waist — to claim you as mine.
I wander from corner to corner on the stone rooftop, searching for new views, quietly recording this moment in my mind to replay later. I stare at The Colosseum. I’ve seen it before, just as you have, but revisiting it now, in this capacity, it feel like more. More grand. Like it was placed here simply to create this moment, for us.
We’re side-by-side now. We look up. The night sky is seeping down rapidly, like paint running down a canvas. It’s inky and purple with the heavens on display amid a smear of twinkling stars. Those stars. They’ve bound us. Only we know and understand the feeling of the vast beauty of the night sky and its call deep within our soul — the feeling of being connected to God, to life, to each other.
And then, like a scene transition, everything fades slowly to black. I’m pulled into the light, but refuse to open my eyes. I grasp at the feeling of you, near enough to touch….and will myself back to sleep.
12 A.M. Truths 