Xanga Post 13: Common Lucidity?

7.28.2005 __thursday____

Am I a lucid dreamer? Haha.. I was reading over my comments earlier, and I came across one that mentioned lucid dreaming, so I researched a little. You can't really teach someone to control their dreams. They can't help it sometimes, and just go with the flow. Well, I'm not sure.
I'm not a lucid dreamer because I can't control everything. But according to this web page, I have "high lucidity." xD
In my mind (both awake and asleep), I convince myself that I'm not really dreaming, but that I'm really somewhere else. Hehe.. I'm weird. But there are still dreams that make no sense to me, and I know they really are just dreams. They're complete nonsensical dreams that formed from what I've done or seen during the day. Others, I recognize places I've never visited while awake. Many of my dreams seem to take place in the same buildings, the same parks, the same rooms.

And I don't have those dreams that everyone else seems to have. The ones where "I'm flying," or "I'm being chased," or "I went to school naked" or "in my pajamas," or "I won the lottery"....I just think those are funny and dumb.

I have dreams about bells in towers that ring and clash and bring down walls. I have dreams about having to eat slugs as an antidote. I have dreams about climbing over walls and through tight spaces (beginning all my dreams), about wandering off to the same river of stale and murky water, and about seeing the same person who looks after me, who I (sadly) think I made up in my mind. And about balancing on logs in a dark red river.

HAHA!

That's so funny that I wrote that, especially after my last post on The Archidream that was about recognizing when you're given an easy opportunity to experience a lucid dream.

I stopped researching lucidity a couple of years ago. I decided I wanted to see what it's like for myself, and to find out the best way for me to reach that state of clarity. I remembered reading about how most people say it's best to have a stable sleeping pattern, and to get a good amount of rest. And to train by telling yourself what to dream as you're falling asleep.

So I tried those things, but the sleeping pattern didn't make a difference for me. If anything, having a consistent sleeping pattern made it harder for me to even realize I'm in a dream. I did try to tell myself what to dream (something as simple as, "I'm outside."), but I quickly realized that the real trick is not in what you tell yourself to dream -- it's in making sure you're mentally awake when your body is not. That's the whole purpose of the exercise.

I think I always get caught in that state before sleeping. I remind myself, too early, to be mentally awake. And I end up with sleep paralysis. It's harder to get out of sleep paralysis than it is to wake up from a lucid dream. Being stuck in sleep paralysis while knowing what you want to dream is like being separated from everything by glass walls. You know you can get to the dream, you just don't know how to. Or you have to break one of the walls to go back -- to move your body again and physically wake up.

I still don't know if everyone can be taught how to have lucid dreams. There are techniques and explanations to understand it, but I'm not sure about actually being able to apply it. What do you think?

As for the rest of the dreams I briefly mentioned at the end -- those are written down in my journals. They will eventually make their way in here.

Xanga Post 12: Sorted Out

Do you ever try to remember numbers or words in your dreams? They're usually really difficult for me to hold on to unless I write them down immediately after waking up. I don't know what they mean, but I'm always hopeful that I'll be able to look back at them later and suddenly understand.

In this case, I still don't understand the numbers. I don't understand the word, "Heritage." I don't know if I explored that further in the dream or not; I never mentioned it again. But there's a lot to say for the rest of the entry.

7.27.2005 __wednesday____

Hahaha oh my gosh
This morning I woke up a few minutes before 9, so I went back to sleep and I had a dream that seemed really long (woke up again around 9:20)..

It was about going back to school
First off, I didn't have a roster, so I didn't know what classes I had to go to, and Prendie was different. I was in this place in another dream, but I don't know if it was "Prendie" in that one. Anyway, it had two wings, and the hall connecting it looked like a ballroom. One wing's rooms were numbered 1/17, 1/18, 1/19, etc. And the other wing was numbered 208, 209, 210, etc. Above the doorway to the second hall was the word "Heritage" - I don't know if there was a word above the other passageway to the opposite wing.

I was in a room watching Channel One, before classes started - it was like a bedroom, even with a carpeted floor and a bed, and everything was cluttered. I picked up my books in a hurry to find my roster and left the room. I asked Evie to help me, and she brought me to a room next door. And there I saw Mr. Kornaki from St. Clement, and he gave me two papers. And then I dropped my books and picked them up again. And I noticed as I was walking hurriedly that I was holding a book that said something like "St. Clement Plays."

I looked at my roster, but I couldn't remember where I was going or where I even was. And then I ended up in the main hall - but nothing was in the main hall, just a huge empty room lined with tiles or something that was made to look like several doors. Everything was old and brown. And the ceiling was high. Then a woman came in from the hallway behind me and started dancing and singing. And for a moment I was shown a close-up of her feet, and as she danced like a graceful ballerina, she leaned on her toes and reminded me of a swan. Then she led me into a library and showed me around. And pulled back a curtain (I could still hear a song in the background) to show a wall lined with books. And around, on tables and all over the floor piled on each other, more books. I saw chairs and recognized them immediately - I even knew that some tables were missing, and that furniture was being moved.

Then I dropped my books again, and so I picked them up. She smiled at me, and then Anjel came in to help me gather them. I looked more closely at them to see that they weren't at all the books I needed with me. The ones I'd been carrying had titles containing the words "Gnomes" and "Gargoyles" and "Dwarves" - faerie tale books, mythical creatures. I panicked, but I couldn't seem to get myself together, partially because I knew I wouldn't get through the first day of school.. I would be marked absent because I wasn't in homeroom. "What is my homeroom, anyway?" I wondered - it was Mr. Masluk's room xD and then I got excited and wanted to tell Mary. But then I finally realized that I hadn't seen Mary at all, or any other of my friends.

So. In a summary - I had a nightmare about the first day of school as a Sophomore. lol

It's true, of course, that dream time is different from real time. I've had dreams that lasted hours or days, only to wake up and see that 1 hour has passed by (it's a great feeling). Also, the opposite has happened: I've slept for a full 8 hours and dreamt of nothing but a face and a voice. As we all know, anything can change in dreams. Time is no exception.

This is the first time I read this entry in a few years. I completely forgot about this, but reading it again brought back clear pictures, especially the main hall of Prendie. More than once or twice, I've dreamt of Prendie's hallways and classrooms....but merged with other settings, such as bedrooms, living rooms, or something similar to a convention center.

Architecturally, in real life, the combination of many settings more than defeats the purpose of a place. Can you imagine if life was full of classrooms sometimes furnished with old couches, worn beds, or kitchen counters? Of course, there are instances in which these are acceptable: culinary schools, for instance, have kitchen counters all over the place. But you would never walk into a study hall to sit on top of a small refrigerator and work on math assignments.
In dreams, though, it makes perfect sense at the time. Nothing is really too out of the ordinary, is it? So the place can be whatever you want it to be; it's anywhere. And if you keep that mentality (or at least keep yourself ignoring the rules and logic of the waking world), then you can become a lucid dreamer. Build your own world. That's just something I like to think about.

Sometimes, there is a smooth transition from one setting to another in my dreams, such as a carpet in the main hall of Prendie instead of the hard stone floors. It's not a very sudden change, but more gradual as I walk along on my way to the Old Library that has replaced the cafeteria. And in the carpeted library, once I walk through the heavy doors, all the walls and bookshelves are made of some kind of dark cherry wood. Another example of smooth transitioning is seeing a person, such as Mr. Kornacki (someone I knew from my grade school), who reminds me of another place or time that later makes its way into the dream.
Other times, the change is more sudden, like the bed in the middle of the classroom. When I dream of things like this now, I know enough that it's out of the ordinary that I feel a little strange while I'm still asleep. Like I can almost feel myself lying in bed. But I've trained myself not to linger around that idea, or else I'll lose my slight lucidity and wake up (this morning, actually, I had a dream in which I became lucid enough to project Matt as a character, completely taking the place of another person who previously stood where he was).... And if I don't notice these oddities? Well, then I keep dreaming, as I did in this 2005 dream. And I can't bring in people, objects, or places.

This dream -- a conglomeration of settings, memories, and passive associations -- screams for me to see with a lucid eye. Passive associations, by the way, are (to me) exactly that: something we associate with another, without making an effort to do so. Maybe I associate "Prendie" with "home," thus the random array of bedroom furniture and casual clutter. Or the ballerina reminded me so much of some fantasical creature that the books I was carrying suddenly had titles or key words on them: "Gnomes," "Gargoyles," and "Dwarves."

But as I was saying:
Those types of things, all those details, urge me to think of what they mean to me in real life, so that I can realize I'm in a dream. A lot of times, it's too late for me to hold on to the dream once I snap out of that puppet dreamer phase and actively take control of myself again. My heart rate goes up with excitement, and I can feel it. There are only a few seconds for me to calm down enough to stay in control; if I miss that window, I often find myself staring at my own eyelids with my eyebrows furrowed. Too much effort and awareness. I lose it. And I'm awake.

I think you're waiting for me to talk about Inception. I wish you knew how much I would love to talk about that movie and integrate the concept of familiar places with what was explained in the movie, or even to talk about time. Or, I don't know, how about dreams within dreams (the most I've had was 3)...?

But for the sake of people who have not yet seen the movie, I shall refrain from doing so. Because if I do discuss the movie, I would go into much detail.

So, there you have it. My "nightmare," going by the name for this dream as many people would describe it, was more or less a messy file cabinet of memories. It was a wonderland of triggers for lucid dreaming, but I was blind.

Xanga Post 11: Sensible Nonsense

7.23.2005 __saturday____

Just had lunch a while ago, and I asked, "Did you ever hear anything when you were half asleep and think it was real?" And I was going to explain why I asked that, but I couldn't remember everything. And then we started talking about other things.

Oh, now I remember what happened last night! I was trying to fall asleep but I couldn't, so I listened to music on my CD player (didn't really help, since it was loud -_-). I was about to fall asleep, but I was only half asleep. I heard - or imagined, I guess - a conversation going on, between a man and someone else. I don't remember who else it was. But then I heard someone shout/yell, and then I opened my eyes and took off my headphones, but everyone in the house was asleep by then (that is, except for myself - and Evie, who was upstairs in her room scrapbooking until after sunrise.. lol). So I decided that it was my imagination, since I didn't hear anything after I sat up.
Then later on that night, I faced the ceiling and put the pillow over my eyes, almost falling asleep again. Then I saw inside my mind, all these doors floating in a blackness, and among those doors I came across one that didn't have a door, but had a doorway. Inside I could see something, like stairs, but they led forward instead of up or down, and a tall, thin cyprus tree. But I couldn't see beyond that because there was a mist creeping out. Then the doors slowly shifted - or I shifted - and I was led away from it; I couldn't go back because I began concentrating on going back. When I tried too hard, all I could see were the lids of my eyes.




And my dream?
Well, I don't know how one led to the other, but everything seemed to connect in my dream. We were in a mall, and two little kids ran by Evie when she was going to catch up to me from a store - one was a girl, and one was a boy, each running in opposited directions. Then Evie started talking about "children these days" and how things would be different "if" XD
And then she stopped - I thought she was thinking of what to say next to complete her sentence, but then she pulled out a square picture frame that held a snapshot of Scout from "To Kill a Mockingbird". And then we were at a house, our house, and on the wall were more picture frames. But in places were painted outlines of more frames that weren't there yet. And she placed it in one that fit.
Then we were going to Church at St. Clement, and The Beatles came out of a car o_O... And we started talking to them.. I opened the door for them.
Ringo: *sing-song* Romney!
Me: You're welcome.
Ringo: Ooo...kay..
(I think it confused him in my dream because "You're welcome" is something said in real life that makes sense at this time, and this dream made no sense)
Then we came to another door leading directly inside the church. I opened it again.
Ringo: *sing-song* You're welcome!
Me: ... Romney ...?
(And this seemed to make more sense to him.)
Ringo: Georgie!!

And that's all I remember from that point on, except for the part when I sat down in a pew by myself and beside me were the two little children again.




wth this means nothing to me

It was around this time that I started thinking about some signs of sleep paralysis. I didn't know what it was, but I knew enough about these tendencies that there ought to be a name for it.

What I imagined hearing was something with the tone of the beginning of an argument. It started out as a regular conversation, but then the voices slowly started getting higher and louder. They were interrupted by a third voice that seemed to yell at them, maybe to stop. That's when I sat up in bed, tore off my headphones, and stared into the darkness.

Sometimes, these days, I lie still when these things happen, keep myself awake enough to let it continue, and listen to what happens....
It usually repeats itself, in loops of seconds or minutes.
I hear, "Whyyy....." in my own voice, but raspy.
I hear someone call my name in a deeper whisper.
I hear resounding phrases of music.
Earlier tonight (much earlier...), when I was washing dishes with music on, I clearly heard a man's voice in the dining room behind me say loudly, "Hey! Steph!" It was a voice I hadn't recognized, so I dropped the sponge I was holding, snapped my head up, and waited. But nothing came. It's sad that I still have to turn around to make sure nobody's there. I must look like a deer in the headlights: so obvious.

The cyprus tree, and the horizontal steps.
The steps would best be described as nothing more than triangles to climb over, like an obstacle course. But in the dream, it wasn't that at all. They still worked as steps.
The cyprus tree hiding behind a curtain of fog is the beginning of another dream I had either before or after this half-dream. I think it was after this. It took place in a topiary garden/maze -- undoubtedly representing some problem I had to work out. And what was I trying to get to, in the dream? I don't know, I never finished it. Maybe that's why I've been waiting years to have that dream come to me again.

The rest of my entry isn't that important to me. But for the sake of archiving consistently, all right.

I don't know what to say about the scene with Evie talking about children, but it's interesting that she's now working on becoming a teacher for children.
Perhaps I just finished reading To Kill a Mockingbird; that's my best guess.
And finally, the Beatles and Romney.
I still have no idea what that was about. But that name came up before I'd heard anything about Mitt Romney. Even then, why should his name show up in my dream? Get out.

All in all, my current response to this particular dream night is

still

wth this means nothing to me

To be nicer about it, and to give an explanation I'm sure a lot of people can relate to,
not all dreams mean anything. You can try to pull them apart and read into them in more depth, but I think that's just trying too hard. Most of the time, you're probably going to end up with something like, "I have a problem."
Well, yeah. You just dreamed about nonsense. I'd say you're pretty crazy.

Just kidding. I shouldn't be one to talk about that.

But most, if not all the time, dreams contain things that we've experienced during the daytime. It may not be that obvious when the dream is ongoing, but when you think about it later, it's crystal clear. Even if it's not very evident, it's there: things seen, heard, felt throughout the day. Things you want to ignore that cross your mind before you can stop and bury them again.

Dreams are so personal and intimate. If you had the most ridiculous dream but woke up with a bittersweet feeling, nobody else would quite understand when you try to explain it (and they may even laugh, as I'm sure you might have if you've read any of my other entries and wondered why I'm so serious about them). That emotion is attached to you and the dream; it probably is also attached to a memory or a thought, which is what makes it so personal. Trace that emotion back to its starting point, and you could actually find an underlying meaning in the nonsense you've dreamt up.
You've already done this. That bittersweet feeling I mentioned -- you know what it means when you first wake up. But then it escapes you. So either hold on to it, or try to hold on to the emotion and trace it back.
Have you ever stopped think about how vulnerable you are when you sleep, both physically and mentally?

Vulnerable to everyone, including yourself.

Xanga Post 10: Denying

Okay. Well, first of all, I apologize for the neglect of this blog in the past month... It started out as a lack of inspiration and, unless I'm writing for a grade, I really don't see much motivation in doing something as analytical and detailed as going over my past thought processes and personality.

Then I was actually busy with things around the house, and then Independence Day weekend came around, and then ---- - - - -- I got lazy.

But after seeing Inception once, I wanted to write again. After seeing Inception for the second time today, I decided I had to get this thing moving along. I mean, come on. Lucid dreaming, architecture, people formed by your subconscious, absolutely no limitations as to what can happen and what our minds can create.... Take what you've seen in that movie, and think about how much more we can dream of that can't even be recreated by computers and special effects. Colors we don't have names for, time fragments overlapping yet making perfect sense.

Too many times, I've started something and haven't followed through with original plans. Projects, papers, stories that stop after 2 chapters (the farthest I've ever gotten in a fictional story is 15 chapters.....it's lost somewhere in a floppy disk). The only things that I know I've completed time and time again are my treasured journals. And while there are things that I will never share with everyone on the Internet so obviously, I will share myself in a different way, even if still as completely.

One day, I will tell you more about the Waterfall. For now, let's continue, shall we?

7.15.2005 __friday____

My dream was very... It.. It told so much about myself. I don't know myself because I want so much to be someone else. The only reason I can think of that I don't know myself is that I refuse to believe it. But I know..

In my dream last night... This boy - after not seeing him for a long time, I met him again (you can decide if this sentence has to do with my real life or my dream - or both). And I thought it would be fine. I thought I'd be okay with it, that I got over it, but I don't know if I did. Maybe that's one of the things I refuse to listen to when my inner light says something.

Anyway.

In the dream, we were just hanging out. I don't remember where we were, but I think we were at my old house. And something happened. So I became upset. And I didn't want everyone else to know, so I went up to what was my room. I didn't expect him to follow me, but he did. And I shut the door, and turned around to see his concerned and inquisitive face watch me, and I knew he wanted to know what was the matter...

I really had no real reason to be this angry. I had no reason to lock myself in my room and sulk. But I told him my secrets about myself and opened up to him like I've never done before, whether in life or dreams. And he hugged me, but at the same time he was still sitting on the edge of the bed next to me, staring at the floor. Then he helped me pull myself together.

Then time went by and the dream skipped the rest to go right to the next important part. (But in my head, I knew what happened in the time skipped - after much talking and sharing secrets with each other, we felt like we didn't even need to talk, and just sat there in silence - but not an awkward silence.) We were still in my room, but he was asleep and curled up on my bed. I was sitting on the farther end of the bed, left with my own thoughts. Had I been alone, I would've been talking out loud.. But since he was there (even though he was asleep), I didn't say anything. Even in my dream, I was thinking about how I don't know myself, and how even I didn't expect to tell him that much. Then I stopped thinking altogether and waited. I don't know what I was waiting for.

Then someone was able to open my locked door.. And made me wake him up. He looked like he was never asleep, because he woke up easily and wasn't groggy. He looked at me and gave me another hug, but again, at the same time, he stood up and led the way out of the room. Then we went downstairs. I noticed by the time the dream was fading out that he had his arm around my shoulders to comfort me and let me know he was there for me. I was thinking that he wasn't really doing that, just like he might not have been hugging me. But he was.





But he wasn't.





And then the dream ended.


-----------------
Does anyone else seem like English, in dreams, just doesn't work? Do you have a different language? Because.. I do.. am I just weird? There are feelings and explanations that can't be translated into English, and that's why my dreams to me make so much sense, but I can't decipher it in the language that all of you would understand. And that's why I always wish I could capture them straight from my "imagination" and literally show you my mind..

Oh, I know there's my whole life that's contained in that one dream, and I can put to words only so much. And even if I tried for a day, I couldn't explain it all to you. You know, I'm a lot more than you think I am. I know because I have many different faces. And I only show less than half of them. The others are in my words. And blank stares. If you've been able to pick them out, thank you.

Later on in my entry, I mentioned that the boy in my dream was not Alex. But when I think about it, I vividly remember sitting beside a boy who looked and acted like him. He wore a white T-shirt, blue jeans, had dirty blonde hair, and deep eyes. He would be the one to silently remind me of reason and keep me calm. If I try to recall other dream characters, familiar and unfamiliar alike, I can't quite pick another one out who was as reasonable, sane, or reassuring as him. Like I mentioned before (or perhaps I haven't yet, here): he was my protector. He'd keep me from dying, from being caught, from being seen. Who knows what I was running from?

I do.

(or i think i do)

Matt is very much like him when he needs to be...

I also do remember dreaming of my old house. No longer am I unsure of what the setting was in this dream from 5 years ago. It's as if it's a memory from last year. I was in the living room of my house, with the furniture set up as it was a couple of years before we moved out. There was a house party going on, with aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins everywhere. And the boy.

There was music playing, people were laughing, and the smell of food was in the air. It was mid-afternoon when I remembered something from my past (even in the dream, I thought of things that actually happened), and my disposition turned sour. It was dangerous, I thought, to remain in the company of all those happy people, so for their sake and, I guess, for my own, I went upstairs to the bedroom I shared with my sisters and walked across the floor.
After I turned around and saw Alex standing by the dresser like a curious, sympathetic cat, I let him come inside and locked the door. I wasn't quite sure if that was the right thing to do or not, but it was the safest thing for me to do.

The rest of the dream is accurate.
Again, it's easy yet difficult to explain the issue of overlapping instances of time. Easy, because obviously I could find the words to describe it as best I could: it happened, but it didn't.
Difficult, because..... well, can you imagine it without exerting a lot of effort? It happened. But it didn't. He hugged me. But he didn't. I'm not being figurative at all. He literally (well, "dream-literally") hugged me, and yet he was 5 feet away from me, sitting on the carpet.

One more thing I've noticed this time around.
Thinking about my subconscious, isn't it a bit strange that I wanted to hide something from people who weren't real? People I created in my mind? I was hiding from myself.
I used a similar vocabulary in the first paragraph of that original entry, but I don't think I understood it the same way. I just saw myself as wanting to hide things from people in real life.

Now I see myself as having attempted to hide things from none other than my self.

Denying who I was. Possibly, who I am.

When I began typing tonight, I didn't know I'd end up writing these things.
This dream blog is getting dangerous.

Xanga Post 9: The Nature of Religion and the Religion of Nature

I'm sorry for the lack of posts. It seems that once I get started on updating regularly, something comes up that keeps me busy, or tired, or uninspired. All three of those have happened over the last few days. Just so you know, when I say I'm going to update in a day or two, I really mean that I intend to update in a day or two, as do all people when they say things like that. But in my case, I seem to jinx myself every time. Maybe I should just stop.

I said I was going to continue analyzing the waterfall dreams. I WILL.

..... tomorrow. Because I need a book (a dream dictionary and encyclopedia) to help me argue my points. This book is in another room where there are sleeping people. :/

So I'll come back to that, once again.

Continuing on.....

7.14.2005 __thursday____
When on the highway, I look at the trees that have been cut off from each other by roads, and see the walls that were built around them. But the walls and roads seem like they won't last long at all. Vines and branches of trees are growing over and around.
I feel like climbing over the wall to the other side, under a canopy of trees. But maybe farther down would be more roads, more civilization. Or a cliff....leading to a river below. And keeping an eye out for that one river, I end up thinking that it's on the other side of these man-made walls that line the highways that we take. It could be right there, and I don't know it.
And all the trees seem so animated and alive, somehow. I almost expect them to move without the wind helping. In my head I've come up with my own explanation that these were once mythical beings, like wood nymphs, that have permanently turned to trees while they were dancing, when they saw humans were cutting and building and tearing. Might sound dumb to you, but it makes more sense to me when I don't say it out loud for everyone to hear. It makes sense when it's not written down. Which I have done, so now I'm thinking twice about it.
I don't really know if what I wrote so far has meant anything at all.



For some reason, I fell asleep last night and woke up this morning with this on my mind: What's a Satan worshiper's heaven and hell? If he worships Satan, does heaven even matter to him anymore? But if he's to be punished, what would be his hell? Would it be all the things he hates, combined in one? Because it's not always a place. But what if everything he hates is heaven? Would he be placed in a fake heaven? But...if he was to be punished, would Satan be proud of him? So.. would he automatically go to hell?




don't worry, it's not like i worship satan

I don't.
So I thought about this again, and the answer is obvious to me now: his heaven is his hell, and his hell is his heaven. They are one and the same -- because how can he deserve a "hell," since that would mean he is answering to God instead of to Satan? That's like saying, "Oh no, I did a good deed today...." My point being that it's easier to sin than to do good, most of the time.
Then again, what is sinning to them, and what is good?
So Satan's followers must believe that there's a heaven, since we Catholics/Christians believe that there is a hell. It's just a matter of which "side" you're on, I guess.

All right, that's enough discussion of that. I don't know much about it, and I don't feel like researching on it. It was merely something to think about that always ends with me greatly appreciating my religion, as I like to do.

I did a lot of imagining when I was younger, sitting in the back of the van and staring out the window. I pretended that rolling hills were the backs of hibernating dinosaurs and if you dug into them with backhoes and such, they were killed. I also listened to the different sound that the car would make when the wheels go over concrete sections; it sounded like a shrieking dragon in the distance.
So when I had these waterfall dreams, I always tried to look for it. When driving on the highway, I would look at the tops of trees as if I could recognize them in a split second. I never did, but I always told myself to look for them. Sometimes, I was so sure I saw something I knew that I wished we would pull over on the shoulder so that I could climb over the wall and see for myself. I would go to sleep reminding myself to pay attention to the foliage above my head if I happened to dream of standing on the ledge by the waterfall, but I could never remember.
And one day, I stopped actively searching. If I do it now, it's more of an afterthought.

As for the "mythical beings, like wood nymphs"....man, that does sound dumb. But hear (read...?) me out.
Think of them as Pan's Labyrinth-type creatures, or those of Greek mythology, frozen like Dr. Who's weeping angels, with movements as slow as the Ents of Tolkien. Someone's always watching them, or around them, so they can't move. They only way they can move when we look at them is if the wind is passing through. And wild trees are different from those that we grow and plant, lined up as soldiers or guards ready to serve.

The image in my head of what nature looks like and how it really works eventually leads to the thought of the inevitability of ruins. It's going to happen.
Think about how much effort is put into the maintenance of local roads, highways, buildings, and landscapes. I love to see plants growing over the walls and rails of highways; sometimes, it's simply a wall of green. Seeing abandoned buildings overrun by overgrown grass and vines, or little trees growing in gutters of dilapidated structures is more intimidating. If plants can break rocks so delicately, they'll have no trouble in squeezing through crevices between bricks where old mortar crumbled away. Nature poses a constant battle against us and will one day claim the planet again. We'll be gone, and we'll be covered up and forgotten.

< / The Happening >

jk I watched like 3 minutes of that movie and then decided to watch the newest episode of Community instead.

Before I fall asleep...

I just wanted to let you know that I will write a real update soon, continuing my most recent post. I also have a hell of a lot more to write (I have something like 30 total dreams just from my one Xanga; don't even get me started on how many I wrote out in journals or typed up in my other Xanga). I'm afraid to do the math in my head according to my pace in writing recently, but let's just say that if I continue writing only a couple of updates a week, then this little project of mine is gonna take.... . . . .

... . . . . ..a long-ass time.

At least you, the reader, know that you'll have plenty to read for a good number of months/years. And yes, I have been dreaming new things since I started from the beginning of the archive. I've been jotting them down or typing them up, so they're being recorded. I just don't want to mess up the chronological order.

So keep checking back; if all goes well, there will be something new here in a day or two! And, as always, thanks for stopping by. :) I am excited to write all this knowing that I have some faithful readers -- you make it worthwhile.

Xanga Post 8: The Waterfall Dreams

This one really needs no introduction save for the statement that this entry that you are reading is the one that explains why I've taken to writing down my dreams as often as I can.

6.13.2005 __monday_____
So here's my post about my dream for today.
For the past several years, I've had dreams by a wide river. The sky was always the same - a few cumulus clouds here and there, forming a thin blanket, but the sun's rays have always shone through, and the rest of the sky was a light blue.

There were three places I would've been at - I was either at a cement platform (actually two - one on each side of a waterfall), or on the right bank of the river (view from the waterfall) behind a small marble railing (much like the railing around the altar at St. Clement's, but older and dirtier) - in those dreams, I always climbed over the railing and into the infested waters that came up to my waist, making a boy stay on the other side, even though he wanted to go in my place and protect me from what I was going in to face.
Another place I would've been was on the left bank of the river - there were ruins of a castle, but barely anything was left besides a few pillars and a bowl carved out of a windowpane (a bowl that looked like it could be picked up). There were also winding stairs that went around the window, but when I went around it, I never saw the other side of the window - it turned into another pillar.

Anyway..
I more recently had these dreams - but I noticed that I could see myself standing at the other two places from wherever I was. And I saw myself doing whatever it was that I would be doing in any other of those dreams (climbing over the railing, running around the window/pillar, disappearing on one side and reappearing on the other, looking perplexed, looking down the waterfall and standing on the edge of the platform). There were more clouds.

In yet another dream, the sky was much darker. I was in the middle of the huge river, the water now above my head. The only way I kept myself up was by treading water. Parasites and worms would swim towards me and try to eat me alive. And they would get under my skin and surround me, but I was never pulled under. Instead, the boy came in the water and pulled me out, onto the side with the ruins. He brought me to the bowl, where there were two worms, and I had to eat them, but a certain way (both at the same time) - then the parasites left me..

O-kayy.. That was just about my past dreams. Because they're connected with this one.

I was in the river again.
But.
I was smiling, there were no clouds, the sky was as clear and as blue as ever. I could see the places I would be standing, but I didn't look over for long to find myself. Instead of treading water, I was floating worrilessly, and there were no worms of any kind - in fact, the water was crystal-clear. And I would be swimming with other people, other friends (including this boy, who held me up and threw me back down, beginning a game of tag), and we had such a great time.
I heard little kids splashing around, and I got sprayed with water.

I know my description of the setting wasn't that great, but I hope you understood some of it.
If only I could illustrate them well enough. Maybe one day.

This boy is the same boy that I named "Alex." For a long while, I thought that he was a real person that I was supposed to meet, but now that sounds ridiculous. I knew it was a strange thing to hope for, and a waste of time and energy in practical terms. I then moved on to thinking that he was my guardian angel, since he always protected me or stood by my side.
And then I guess I got too busy with schoolwork and other things that I stopped seeing him every night. It became less and less frequent, until I stopped seeing him and started forgetting what he looked like (it's difficult to remember what imaginary people look like, especially when it always seems like you're seeing them for the first time even though you know you've seen them a million times before).
And then he showed up again more recently. Every few or several months' worth of dreams, I catch him standing in the background, a safe distance away from me but ready to come running. As if I'm a child who insists upon doing things on my own, without the help of others.

I am making other connections....
He could be the person I want. He is just the product of an earlier imagination that has lasted through the years, like a reliable old technology that never becomes obsolete. Like a pencil.
He takes the form of whatever I make him out to be, without ever changing. He is a very generic-looking person, from what I can remember. Golden-brown hair, tall, pretty eyes, white shirt, jeans, an attractive smile, fair-skinned. Of course. He's one of those people you can't describe further than that. But he is different. And he is quiet. But he is serious. I've never seen him smile other than to show kindness.

These dreams aren't the first ones in which I've seen him. In fact, I dreamt of him for the first time in something more like.... 6th grade, 3 or 4 years earlier. He just didn't become a regular, familiar character until later. But I know he was the same one because when I came across him for the very first time in 6th grade, he was doing what he does best: saving my ass and telling me to hide while he fixes everything.
But that dream is for another post.

The waterfall, the ledges, the ruins and railing... the river itself, and even the vegetation -- I've analyzed it all, again and again. They each always seem to have their own meanings that I can relate to, in a general sense.
They're like timeless architecture transformed into a dream -- imagine going backwards in the process of designing something. Dreams are all ideas. This series of dreams in particular are like drafts and newer models, fixed editions and final renditions. There is an order in which they are played out, working towards a goal.
It's timeless, to me, because I could take any of these Waterfall Dreams and, after studying it for a while, see that I can relate specific time frames or situations to my general interpretations (sounds like a phony newspaper horoscope).
But these dreams almost come across as happening in some kind of chronological order. So I think of the final dream as what I'm working towards. I want that final dream.

The Waterfall Dreams are obviously symbolic; you could go in any direction and take it from there.

I thought about telling you about how I would interpret everything, whether or not it's obvious to you what all the elements mean. But this entry is pretty lengthy, and I'm not sure how likely it is for people to read this if it's too long.

Despite all these paragraphs, I feel like I've written an oddly insufficient amount; that things are only starting to make sense.
Should I dedicate another entry to further explain why I'm doing what I'm doing?

Xanga Post 7: A Different Way to See

I should've put this with my previous post, but here it is anyway:

6.7.2005 __tuesday____
I had another dream about my reflection, but this time my mouth was bleeding. I don't even know where it was bleeding from, but it was bleeding.

Tell me what it means, Charlene. :p

Charlene went to school with me for one year in high school, but we learned so much about each other, and I realized that she understands so much -- about everything (including me). We still talk, but not often. I miss her.
It's possible that she's reading this right now (hi, Charlene!!!), but it's also possible she's not, and she won't see it for a while. In any case, I hope she's doing well.

I remember I would share my dreams with her and she would tell me what she thought it meant -- or vice versa. Sometimes it was serious, sometimes it was funny. Sometimes it was a combination of the two, and it kept me on my toes and reminded me not to think that every dream necessarily means anything.

It's nice to have someone to talk to about my dreams, so that I can see how they would interpret them/me. And it's exciting for me to hear about other people's dreams in return, so that I can get a different, more intimate impression of them.

As for how I would interpret this one, I would say it's about violence.
Violence doesn't have to be physical. It can be verbal.
What a literal yet figurative dream that was, however short it seemed. It was literally a reflection of myself; my person and my being, together yet separate. That dream reflection of myself was truer than my real-life reflection. Even though she didn't resemble me without error, the girl was who I am, complete with the mouth bleeding violence that goes unnoticed during the day.

Xanga Post 6: The Thin Line

Shiel, are you reading?
Is anyone reading? lol

Well, based on the visitor counter I have on the bottom of my right-hand-side menu, I had 65 visitors stop by when I last updated, 5 of whom were apparently new. The previous record was something like 41/5. That's great news to me, I hope it keeps going up... :)

Anyway, I was asking if anyone is reading because I think you/Shiel would enjoy this post. "Enjoy."

6.3.2005 __friday____
I had a dream (feel like singing "Chemo Limo") that I was looking at my reflection. I was in my old house. While I was looking at my reflection, I noticed my reflection's eyes were closed. And I was pale. So I opened my own eyes wider to make sure they were actually open. And my reflection's eyes opened slowly.. slowly. And then they opened wider. And wider. And then when she couldn't open them any wider, she started stretching her mouth.. And smiling, a huge smile. She looked like me, but.. she didn't. And she kept smiling, and then I saw her laughing, but I couldn't hear it in my dream. But I knew what it sounded like. My reflection looked demonic.
Then I woke up into another dream. I was in the same place, looking at the same reflection, still laughing at me. But then I ran away and yelled to mom that "I had a dream that my reflection wasn't my own."
Soon after, I woke up. It was 3 am and still dark. I curled up and started praying for protection until I fell asleep. But I had the dream again.

So what does it mean? I have my own idea - but what's your interpretation? ...


The other night I kept falling asleep, but every time I started falling asleep my body would go numb. And I would stop breathing, and I couldn't move. Not unless I forced myself to and tried with all my strength that I had. I didn't want to fall asleep to that feeling. It scared me.

Yeah, I wrote (and still write) in journals and blogs as if someone's actually going to answer me.
Hmm, that last part sounds like I was still new to getting sleep paralysis. That could've been the first time I got it. I wasn't stressed, I couldn't have been in Freshman year of high school. But it was the end of the school year, so I may have not been getting as much sleep as I was used to, from studying for exams.

I remember, not too long ago, my sisters and I were talking about things we do when we look at ourselves in the mirror, and one of them was trying to open your eyes as wide as you can, very slowly.
It's really freaky. Try it, you'll feel like your reflection's another person after a while.

I forgot about this dream until I dug it up a few weeks ago to work on this archiving project.
It's interesting for me to read now, because it still applies to me in more than one way.

I don't know about any of you, but I, for one, hate being the last person to go to sleep. I also hate using the bathroom at night if I'm the only one up (partially the reason I don't want to be the last one walking around the house at night). Obviously, I still go in the bathroom ---

but I almost never look in the mirror. I look down when I'm washing my hands, and I get the hell out of there as quickly as possible. Although I keep the lights on, I avoid looking at my reflection in part because I'm afraid of the dark.

haha, that's funny that I should be writing this now, because
1. I am the only one awake in my house right now, and I'm the only one on the top floor.
2. I'm sitting on my bed in the dark; the only light is that coming from my laptop screen.

I'm not afraid right now, because my mind's not wandering as much. I'm focused. But when I don't have something to do and I can't sleep, then I get freaked out. My imagination's all kinds of screwed up, as I'm sure you noticed from some of the "nightmares" I've talked about before.

Looking in a mirror at night reminds me of Bloody Mary -- have any of you actually tried it? Because I have! I remember doing that one night with a couple of my sisters in my old house when I was like 7 (it was probably something like midnight); we had a candle or a nightlight in the bathroom and turned off the lights, closed the door fully, and stared into the mirror saying that phrase a few times. I wanted to run away, but I was curious (and I didn't want anyone to call me out on being scared).

No, nothing happened, but I probably had a nightmare about seeing the illuminated topography of our faces and flecks of white light in our pupils. I'd never considered it being a traumatizing memory of mine, but now that I think about it... evidently, it was, to a degree. But I've always been easy to scare (that having been said, please don't test me. I abhor pranks meant to scare the living daylights out of people, especially when they're played on me).

So there's that.
And then there are other things I think of possibly seeing in mirrors at night -- something behind me, something above me, something beside me, it goes on and on. But one of the things I really fear seeing is what I saw in my dream. I don't remember anymore if I dreamt this because of what I'm afraid of seeing, or if it's the other way around. Maybe I'm afraid of this because I saw it once already at night, in the dark, in my head.

I'm convinced my imagination has no limits when it comes to treacherous images. I don't even know what to expect, so I'm always surprised when I come up with something that seems credible or at least worthy of being a legend or fairytale.
Whether or not any of these are already stories in another town or another culture, I'm sometimes bothered that they're in my head at all, and I begin to wonder what I look like on the inside.

Full of organs and blood, I know.

But really -- when I'm tired and stressed, my imagination knows no limits (architecture is the worst choice for me, and architecture is the best choice for me).
First, it's usually auditory: I will hear people talking/screaming, or I'll catch a phrase of music I don't recognize, or I'll hear what I think is a really low-flying airplane coming towards my house.
Sometimes, I guess my delirium reaches a point where I don't just hear things; my brain tells me that I'm seeing things. Usually out of my peripheral vision, shapes take form: the silhouette of a man leaning against the door, as if guarding me from exiting through the only way out; a huge spider or something with long limbs climbs the ceiling; one time, I thought I saw the shadow of something crouching in the middle of the floor of my room (yes, in the dark). Whatever it is that I make up, I feel like I'm being watched in a bad way.
Inbetween the two kind of hallucinations (don't worry, anything that happens that's past the auditory hallucinations is pretty rare. I don't get dangerous), I very, very rarely get another sensation.
How to describe it....?

You understand how bats see the world, correct? Or how blind people who have sensitive ears and can get around by listening...?

I was about to take a nap one day when I heard a clicking noise, like it was coming from some animal (not sure what). But before I thought to look around for it, I got this feeling like I was going to be attacked by it, and I made out where it was, based on where the sound was coming from, and what all other noises (like traffic outside or music in another room) were bouncing off of. There was a ceiling corner behind me that I turned to face. There was nothing there, but I stared in amazement at the empty spot because I was sure I heard a noise come from there, and the other sounds continued to reach my ears as if the waves were bouncing off of some mass, like a huge, furry spider about to eat me.
I didn't take a nap.
But I was freaked out, because it happened in summer, in my house, when I'd gotten enough sleep the night before and I wasn't stressed about schoolwork. I wasn't even on the verge of falling asleep when it happened; I was still mentally awake (or so I thought I was). It was like my mind was inbetween the auditory and the visual hallucination and I caught it.

Geez, I am getting so sidetracked here. What was I talking about?

Right. My imagination knows no boundaries.
I can use it to play tricks on other people, but I can also unknowingly play tricks on myself. That's why I don't do scary movies, or do things like look in mirrors at night or look outside windows or sleep without a blanket covering me. I sound like a baby when I say things like that, but then I'll also say things like this:

I'm trying to run away from the coming night when I'll look in the mirror alone and see not my reflection, but my imagination. Seeing it in a dream would be no different than seeing it when I'm awake, if I'm physically drained enough.

I don't need your pranks. I prank myself.