Ashes

The dream takes place in a house. I think it’s my house as it was on Castlemill but more formal and with additional rooms. But i’m pretty sure i’ve dreamed this version of “my” house before. The kitchen is open to the dining room and the table is set for a formal dinner. I’m in the kitchen with mom when dad comes in from being outside. The ashes are coming and we have to prepare. It comes in three waves and dad thinks we should begin getting rid of the ashes at the first wave and stay ahead. It seems reasonable to me and we all get a tool (i think it’s a paint scraper) and begin removing the very thin layer of ash that’s settled on the tops of the surfaces of furniture and counters. After a little bit of this “scraping” ii think that it’s overkill. I go into the living room and close the vents. The furniture in this room is beautiful dark wood and rich colors of upholstery. The vents are ornate brass things and close with a nice clang. After i close them all, i get a square of cloth and begin dusting off the ash that’s come into the room. When i get back to the dining room i tell mom and dad that i’ve closed the vents so no ash can get in to the other part of the house and that we don’t need to scrape the ash because it comes off just like dust. I’m polishing the dust from the dining room table – it’s empty now, and the table cloth is gone so that i can see the texture and grain within the wood. The edge of the table isn’t smooth and even. It’s inlaid pieces of wood that give the edge a kind of jagged star-like appearance. It’s hard to clean and i wonder where this table came from because i don’t remember our table having a jagged edge and i’m wondering is this really the table i want to inherit or do i want the other one in the kitchen which is smooth edged and less “fancy”…

Now i’m sitting at an old fashioned wooden bar on backless bar stools. It reminds me a lot of the bar in The Rockford. There are two men to my left and one to my right. I have my back to the two on my left and i’m listening to the one on my right talking. He say’s something about ?? (some type of liquid to drink as a shot but like lighter fluid). As soon as he says it, i say in “Only if it’s in Jäger!” while the guy behind me says in unison “Only if it’s in Meister!” For a moment i wonder if i’ve said the word i meant to say but then realize Jäger and Meister mean the same thing. We’re both laughing hysterically at the meeting of minds. I lean back into the man behind me and he puts his arm around me. The heaviness of this arm feels comforting. The two guys behind me and i go outside the bar. It’s a playground. There’s a swing set and one of those metal ‘merry-go-round’ things, a teeter-totter. The man still has his arm around me and the other guy (it’s Thai Jay!) is swinging on one of the swings. He’s much too big for it and we’re laughing. Jay’s big smile makes me feel happy.

House represents self. I like my house, the furnishings are very nice. Nicer than i ever remember it being. Clearing off the ashes to see the beauty it covers and hides. Closing off access to the outside to keep ashes out. ? The meaning is not leaping out at me. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust? Or Playground…. Jay is a picture of youth and vitality. A Puck-like character. Youth. Joy. Ring around the rosy, a pocket full of posies. Ashes, ashes, we all fall down…. Remnants of a plague. Life/Death. ?

One dream, not two

The dream seems like two different dreams but now i think maybe it was just one running two parts simultaneously. Either way, i’ll write how i remember.

The dream takes place on the property where i currently live except there are no other homes around the property and there are no trees. The workshop may or may not be there, but the house and barn are. Even the grassy places are just dry and dusty places. The driveway is gravel and comes the same path as it does in real life but at the garage there’s a big gravel cul-de-sac. It’s kind of desolate looking. Inside the house it’s all different. I don’t recognize it from any house i’ve ever lived in at first but in thinking about the layout, it’s exactly my current house. I don’t know why it seemed different to me in the dream. I’m in the kitchen and there are clean dishes in the rack by the sink that i want to put away. As i’m going that i look out the window and see over to the right of the property, an old shack. It’s not big but apparently it’s a house where a couple live. There’s an old pickup truck coming up the main road. I can see the dust trail even from so far away. It turns up the road that leads to the shack. Inside the truck is a scary redneck looking man (kind of Billy Bob-ish) and a younger man who looks okay. I think the younger man is the scary rednecks son. They drive up to the shack and the shack people come outside and yell at the redneck to go away and leave them be. The shack people look ancient and wild looking. Long white hair, pale white skin. Fragile looking. They remind me of trolls. Kind of knotty and gnarled. The redneck laughs at them and drives around them making a lot of dust. I’m mad just watching and wonder why the shack people don’t call the highway patrol and wonder if maybe i should call them myself. Cammie comes into the kitchen and is getting two Klondike bars out of the freezer to eat. I tell her to put those back and eat real food first before she has those. I ask her what she wants and hand her a plate of something. Greens? She hands me a can of powdered potatoes and says she wants some of that. I ask her if she knows how to make it because i’ve never made them before and she tells me 4 tablespoons. I spoon the powdery stuff into a big plastic mixing bowl then walk out to the garage for something. When i go out in the garage that old pickup truck is parked outside and the redneck is in the garage stealing something. I run up and grab some kind of hose or tube out of his hand and hit him with it and tell him to get out immediately. He gets back into his truck. Just then his son comes running up with a big metal pipe “joint” of some kind. BIG. The circumference is probably ten inches and the pipe joint is so long he has to carry it in both arms. I take the pipe from him and guess that it’s from the barn. He also jumps in the truck and they take off up the driveway. I’m furious that they’ve been to the house and figure it i hadn’t gone into the garage they would’ve stolen a lot of stuff, including my bike. I check my bike to see if it’s got the cable lock on it but it doesn’t and as i’m trying to remember where i put the lock, dad pulls up in his truck. I tell him about the redneck thief and how they were stealing from everybody along our road. We walk to the barn. I’m still thinking about calling the police but can’t remember if i’m supposed to call 9-1-1 or the sheriff’s number. The horses are fine and safe in their stalls and everything is “locked up” as well as can be in a barn. I suggest we let the dogs loose to roam around the outer part of the barn but realize as i say it that the fence wouldn’t keep them in because the boards are too far apart. I know the dogs won’t stay in the pen and don’t want them running loose outside the barn. As we walk back to the garage i see a large spider has made a web inside by the door. There’s a kind of illumination to it. As i look at the spider – it’s very large, the size of a man’s hand – a face superimposes over the spider. It’s the face of a beautiful person. Arab or Indian i think. Dark hair and eyes and olive complexion. The face has beautiful lips that i want to kiss. As i look it goes from face to spider and then back to face. Then the face flickers like a computer screen and bits of commercials display (very Max Headroom-like). Now it’s spider, commercials, face all random. I think if i can figure out the timing i could kiss the lips even though i know it’s really the spider the whole time. I go back into the house and Cammie is still waiting for me to make the potatoes and i can’t even remember why i went into the garage in the first place. I put water in the powder and the dream changes to a new dream.

I’m taking care of a man’s pets. He’s a professional football player. Giant black man, dressed very nicely. He has to go attend some important event. His pets live in a large cage. I can see a half-dead lizard on a branch and a spider as big as a fist with large sharp black pinching horns (like on those big beetles) and a turquoise back. It’s beautiful. The spider is aggressive though, and it scares me. The creatures haven’t been fed in a while and it looks like the spider is going to try and eat the lizard. The lizard can’t defend itself. I look in the refrigerator to see if there’s something in there i could feed the critters. I find a grasshopper in the lettuce drawer and realize that’s what they man feeds his pets. I cup one of the grasshoppers in my hand but another one escapes the refrigerator and hops away somewhere in the room. I take the one i’ve caught and put it inside the cage. The spider POUNCES right on it and begins to eat. I’m not sure what to do about the lizard but i know i need to replace the water. I’m really afraid of that spider and know that it will hurt me if i give it the chance. The dream changes and i’m back in the dusty place from the other dream again. Dad has the spider and is trying to cut it in half lengthwise with a circular saw. The spider won’t hold still though and as dad pushes it onto the saw one of its horns gets cut off. It hurts so bad and i am overwhelmed with a feeling of pity for the poor thing. I feel terrible. The creature is moaning in pain and fear and i can see where the horn was amputated is pink healthy looking meat. The horn is just lying on the table by the saw and i don’t know what to do. There’s nothing i CAN do. The spider isn’t scary anymore though because it’s helpless and in pain.

That’s all i remember. Poor spider. The other spider though, is the message i understand. It’s religion. The spider is god. The human face is so that people can relate to and love god even though it’s not the true face of god. Wanting to kiss the face of god. That's what Jesus' appeal is to Christians. But that's not the true face of god. Only a mask. The commercials flickering on and off is the man-made commercialism of god that keeps people from both the façade OR the true face of god.

The message from the other spider, i don’t understand. In one of the earliest spider dreams i ever remember, when i was still afraid of spiders, it was the beautiful big spider with the turquoise jewel-like body that appeared. Even later, when i had the spider in the treetops dreams, they were big jewel-spiders as big as cars. The treetop dreams were the ones that made me stop being afraid of spiders. So for my jewel-spider to present itself as scary and monstrous…. i don’t understand. Maybe it’ll explain itself eventually. Or maybe it was a false spider! Because spiders don’t have horns and don’t hurt people. And (for me) spiders and fear are at opposite ends of the spectrum. False gods? False beliefs? Maybe it's the commercial "face of god" after the commercialization has completed its cycle. Don't know. Poor spider. Poor god.

ship of fools

I'm on a large wooden multi-leveled deck of a big house. There's a party going on and there are lots of men around me. We're on the top-most deck and i can see the blue of the ocean beyond the rail. It seems like a military event because all the men are wearing faded camouflage fatigues. One man comes up from a level below. He has a shotgun and rushes into the middle of the crowd and shoots himself in the head and is dead. As the crowd is murmuring and talking about the suicide, another man comes up from a lower deck. He has a 22 rifle. I try to stop him from shooting himself because i know that a bullet from a 22 will only maim him but as i try to get through the crowd to get nearer he shoots himself. The bullet makes a clean hole from between his eyes out the back of his head but he's still standing and conscious. I can see through the hole in his head. He picks up another bullet from the ground and drops it into the barrel of the rifle and shoots himself again but there's no force behind the bullet and it doesn't even penetrate his skin. He tries to load the rifle again the right way but his motor skills are failing and he keeps fumbling the bullet. I pity him and want to help and i'm shouting to the other men standing around "Help him!" but they don't understand that i mean for them to help him die and end his suffering.

My perception or belief is at odds with the masses? My inability to communicate with the general population?

all downhill now

The dream is work related? Or it seems to be at some place where i am employed but not my real life work. It’s lunch time and i’m going to go up the hill to where the shopping center is. There are hundreds of bicycles outside of the building. They’re for the people that work in the building to use. All of them are exactly the same. Black cruiser style bicycles. I take one and ride up the hill. The place i go is a ?store with a restaurant/grill. They’re serving breakfast. Some of my co-workers (except some are classmates from facebook really) are there and invite me to join them. Sandy. Lana. Sharon? and one other. We have to wait. The place is not very big and all of the tables are either occupied or need to be cleaned. I see a table in a booth that we could sit but we have to wait. I’m watching a couple eating. A man and woman having a leisurely breakfast and coffee near the edge of the dining room floor. There’s a line at the counter buying products from the store. There are a bunch of booths behind the counter where lots of people are seated in booths, eating and talking and enjoying themselves. A waitress comes and seats my party in a booth but the booth is very small. My four companions are seated and chatting and laughing and i can see there isn’t space to include me. I feel bad and want to eat but my companions don’t seem to notice that there’s no room for me. I decide to leave because i don’t want to make a scene since my friends don't seem bothered by my absence and i don't want to eat by myself at the counter. I walk past the line of people and out the door. I get on the black bike and head down the hill back to work. As i’m riding i realize the seat is way too high and i can barely touch the pedals so i lower the seat. It occurs to me that i’ve taken somebody else’s bike and wonder if i should go back and find “mine” but decide that since all the bikes are for everybody, the tall person whose bike i took can just grab mine and raise the seat. As i’m coasting down the path next to the road i pass people walking up the hill and others going down. The path is pretty wide but not paved and i have to negotiate carefully so i don’t run into the people because i’m not very confident about my control of the bicycle, but it feels so good to be riding down hill.

Being invisible. Not wanting to inconvenience others. Story of my life.

Opals and diamonds

In the dream, there is a woman on a ?table. Some people are discussing a piece of jewelry they want to get for her. I see a very large opal surrounded by diamonds. It's a ring i think. The opal is extremely beautiful - full of the opal fire underneath the blue and green flecks. The people tell the 'man in charge' that that's the one they want to get her. Now the room is dark but with a bluish light shining on the lady on the table. There are two tubes putting something into the lady and a man by a machine. X-ray machine maybe? Something disturbs the woman and she moves her arm. The man in charge charges in to find out why she moved and says "don't move or the diamonds won't be able to be set" and i see a vision of a galaxy like from Hubble and realize it's the opal being injected into the woman and i can see the little flakes of diamonds floating with intent as if they're being placed in a circle around the edge of the opal by an invisible jeweler. The people are concerned that it won't be right but i know that the movement didn't interrupt the process and the circle of diamonds will be perfect.

not all that glitters is gold

I’m at work at the Wycliff office building and all the CSC people are dressed really nicely in their business suits and i’m wearing my jeans. I think that maybe HP people should dress nicer too but then realize it doesn’t make any difference because CSC won the contract and they're the ones that have to make the impression, not us. Then i’m in what looks just like the same building but it’s a mirror image – everything is backwards. This building is kinda cool because everything is round. The offices are round, the furniture is round. I go into a conference room and there are several people sitting around the oblong table. It appears that they’re working on writing the response to an RFP. I pick up a the response that CSC submitted thinking that i’ll review the business requirements and solution and maybe i can get a job with CSC when the contract i’m on comes to an end. Now i’m wearing my red suit i used to wear and look really sharp. I begin reading the bid and it’s more like a children’s pop-up book than a business document. There are pop-ups and little windows that you have to pull open to read the response. It’s very cool but doesn’t really say anything. I notice that under one window is actual patient data and i’m surprised that the State allowed that because it’s obviously a violation of privacy rules. As i continue looking through the proposal i come across an example in the “mouth system” and the patient’s name is Lesley Olson. I laugh because i know that SharonB worked on this proposal and she never cared much for me because i don't blur the truth like she does. I want to show Betty the CSC response so i go down a corridor that’s on the outside of the building but part of the building and find two doors. I open the one on the left and it’s the conference room. I open the door on the right and Betty is inside. Betty’s office is also where she lives. There’s another person in the room but i can’t remember who now. KathyR? I have to pee and go back to use the toilet in her bathroom. The bathroom is tiny and archaic. I’m peeing so hard that urine is splashing back out and on me and i’m using the toilet paper to wipe it us as i’m going. ??


This dream was influenced by the big new CSC sign that was installed on the front of the building i work in yesterday and the news last week that an ethics complaint has been filed against Cansler. ‘Bout damn time. The guy is raping the system from both ends.

CSC and their big red sign. All fluff, no substance and the customer (DHHS) are inept and crooked – hence the pop-up book illustrating a system that won't meet their needs but that they paid billions to buy. SharonB was fired by my company years ago and has been picked up by ACS (when they won the contract but lost if for failing to perform) and now CSC who i expect will also fail to meet contract requirements. But that’s not my problem! Both companies have a relationship with Cansler and his wallet.

Ah! I get it! Piss on it all! Funny dreaming brain.

same song, different rhythm

Scott and i are standing outside with a lot of other people. Some kind of ?courtyard behind a chain-linked fence. We all have wooden type chairs to sit on but some people are standing, holding their chairs. All of the chairs are different – like they come from hundreds of different kitchen table sets. Some are colored and some are just brown. Some look like the chairs from school desks. We’re in some sort of alignment like maybe a zigzag formation but with some people sitting and some people standing, holding chairs, it’s hard to tell. Scott and i are sitting in our place in the line. An opening in what seems to be “further up” the line is open, against the fence. Two people holding their chairs make a break for it! One is an old woman with white hair and the other is a young woman with long light-brown hair. I watch, curious as to what will happen because they’re both going to reach the spot at the same time. I’m wondering if the younger woman will defer to the elder but she doesn’t, she slams her chair into the space and sits down. I’m a little bit annoyed that the younger woman didn’t allow the older woman to have the space but then i decided it didn’t matter because there’s no reason the old woman can just set her chair down anywhere and sit in it. In the meantime, the old woman has worked her way to what is the very front of the line, still holding her chair. I comment to Scott that she’s made a good move because now she will be the first one in. Apparently we’re seeing a concert but the gate hasn’t opened yet. Sure enough, the gate opens and the people begin to stand and move into the auditorium. I’m amused to see that the girl who got the vacant spot is even further down the line than Scott and i so even though she got the spot and sat down in her chair, she was further from the front and wouldn’t get as good a seat once she got inside. I feel no animosity towards her, just witness to the fact that her greed didn’t gain her anything and the older woman “won” that little battle. Scott and i get into the auditorium and i race down front to help the old woman find the best seat. I’m thinking that she would want to sit front and center of the stage but she tells me she’d rather sit back a few rows and off to the side. I help her get situated then go back to find where Scott is sitting. He’s center but a few rows back. Good seats. He’s sitting to my right and a girl i don’t know (might be the young girl who got the spot but i’m not sure) is sitting to my left. The band starts to play. It’s 10cc (i’ve never seen 10cc and i don’t know if the men on the stage were any real people or not but in the dream i BELIEVED it was 10cc). They’re playing a song that’s very layered and complicated. Beautiful. The girl next to me is rocking sideways – side to side – like a metronome. I’m confused because she rocking to a fast beat but the rhythm of the song that I’M hearing is slow and calm and reminds me of wind. I notice that Scott has two cans of beer (Budweiser i think) in his hands and i’m wondering if he got one for me but as soon as i think it i realize that one can is empty and he’s drinking from the other. I’m a little disappointed that he didn’t think to get me one but then the lead guitar player/singer pulls off his little John Lennon glasses and sticks them in a ?cup holder in the table sitting in front of the front row. As he does it he looks directly at me. He then moves to the side of stage that goes up the left wall (the stage is ‘L shaped) and he’s playing beautifully on his guitar. I notice that Scott now is also rocking side to side to the same rhythm that the girl on my other side is hearing. I listen closer and realize i can hear the rhythm they’re hearing if i choose to but i don’t want to. I prefer the slow calm wandering rhythm that reminds me of breezes rather than the metronome quality rhythm that they’re listening to. Strawberry Fields wakes me.

Chaotic 'lines' of people, chairs available but some electing to hold the chair while they stand. Different rhythms perceived within the same song. Behavior that appears selfish but really isn't. 10cc. The dream strikes me as very Henry Thoreau - "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them..." People don't hear the song i hear but i think the song as i hear it is much nicer and less confining? No doubt THAT's true. I don't need the dreaming mind to tell that to the waking mind! So maybe there's something else i'm supposed to get? Acceptance? Stop expecting people to see things from my perspective and accept that the way they perceive works fine for them even though it seems pre-packaged and unimaginative?

trading flash for quality

All i remember from the dream is that i trade cars with BettyA. My car looks like new (silver ?sporty car with a spoiler) and is pretty nice but i’m worried it will be needing a lot of work to keep it running. Betty wants a flashier car and mine is that. I tell her she can buy my car for $350.00 and her car. So we trade. Her car is a late 70’s model ?Lincoln. It’s in good shape for its age. It’s a dark red or burgundy with a brown leather top. It drives just like my old ’77 Thunder Bird and i feel very pleased with the trade and tell Betty so. As i’m telling mom about the “trade” i realize that i’ve sold her my car for way under price because i forgot to account for the phat stereo system i’d had instilled. I tell her that my car has a CD player but it doesn’t work. She gets annoyed but i remind her that she didn’t pay for the sound system and there’s still the radio and cassette player. She realizes i’m right and gladly takes off in my car and i realize it really is a good looking car. I take ‘her’ car out for a drive (now i’m at my VA house) and as i back down the driveway and turn up Trails End and get up to speed i realize how powerful the old car is and i’m very happy with our trade. I’m on a highway and i check to see if the radio works. I’m pleased to find the car has a cassette player. I wasn’t expecting it to because of the cars age.

Loved that ol’ ’77 t-bird. Underselling myself. Trading flash for quality. Other than that, not sure what this dream means. BettyA represents acquaintances that don’t know me well but trust and like me?