Thursday, September 15, 2022

Dream Genius

Welcome to the latest dream journal.  These are phrases I said in dreams. The problem is that I recorded them in my drafts over a period of several months. If it's hard enough to recall dreams immediately thereafter, imagine me now trying to make sense of it after months of additional wake and sleep cycles.  Here's what I can tell you: I remember feeling, in my dream, like I'd achieved some level of enlightenment or profundity definitely worth writing down.  As we all do, right.  Additionally, I will do my best here to do a little dream analysis to see if we can figure out just what the hey:


1. "I feel like I'm in a living fiction." 

analysis:  It feels deep. It sounds deep maybe, at least initially?  Ok, the dichotomous "living fiction" is interesting. Can something be made up but also real? Can it be a creation of thought made alive? Come true? I think so, yes. Whatever this is, it's a thinker.  I so wish I could remember this dream. I have feelings that I might have been making an observation on something preposterous going on. It's probably just a product of what our brains do every night, vacillating between the real/not real, frustratedly trying to make sense of it all.

2. "Dead by Midnight'ish."  

analysis: This was one of two brilliant ideas for book titles. Upon waking, I could only remember this one.  I actually remember sending this to my writer friend Val. Here's the screenshot:

"'ll get to it at some point...we'll see what happens, I might be busy."

I stand by this. That's a solid book title. 


3. "You Think You Did Good, But You Did Wrong." 

analysis: As I recall (also, I fortunately made a note here), this was the name of a folksy, guilt-heavy song sung in church in my dream.  Was it a hymn? Maybe. I'd like to think that it was.  Hilarious. Also, I am not sure how much religious guilt I personally carry, but all kinds of early Christian/orthodox guilt psychoanalyses could be made here. (why would I dream this)  But I like the folksy twist. Am imagining this as an alternate title to St. Augustine's Confessions. 


4. "Concision is not necessarily precision, Jerry."  

analysis: I cannot make sense of this.  I mean, it sounds true-- that concision is not precision. And cool and rhyme-y.  But what does this mean for me??  And who is Jerry?? Here's my best guess:  Concision, as a writer, is not my forte.  I'm wordy. I blather. I exist in parenthesis.  But I've always admired writers who can say the most in the least.  It's what I aspire to. But there's also something within me that pushes against this goal, either to validate my own nature/self-proclaimed talents, or because I am afraid that if we are too concise, we will miss important elements that require time and space to be revealed. That art will be lost. Humanity reduced.   (Maybe this stems from reading 1984.)  Maybe precision requires time and thought and care and room to fill. Or that's my excuse, anyway. As for Jerry, my best guess is I am talking to Jerry Seinfeld, who I feel a weird kinship with. I honestly think we could be friends. And he would challenge me, and I'd admire his work and style, but wouldn't necessarily try to emulate it, as I have my own that's worth developing, separately.  I could see him giving me tips.  And I could see respecting his opinion. And I can also see me trying to convince him there are other ways that are also good and we get into a silly argument and then laugh about something stupid. 

Sidenote: When trying to remember how to spell "concision" my fingers went berserk and a word very close to "couscous" resulted.  And now I'm going to sit for a second and think about what "couscous is not necessarily precision (Jerry)" might mean. 

5. "Heinz to recall all bottles of 57 sauce as last customer using it unable to open bottle. Remaining bottles to be drained into new bottles of A1, as usual, and empty bottles to be cremated."

analysis: This one had me completely stumped but fortunately Sean just walked in and provided some info. Apparently this was a headline from a dream Sean had.  He said it was just a headline he saw in a dream but then after he woke up he thought it sounded extremely silly and like an Onion headline.  I am rolling over this one.  We should probably submit it.  Solid gold. "As usual..."  Also, not "burned"--  "cremated."  

Well that about does it for this edition. These are just a few examples of how I'm a genius, if only in my dreams. 

2 comments:

Alanna said...

#2 reminded me of one of my favorite lines from The Pirates of Penzance when they sing, "Tonight he dies!" "Yes, or early tomorrow!"

You definitely need to write that book!

)en said...

Ha!