A Little Dream Analysis

Most of the time I don't remember my dreams, but when I do they're usually remarkable; for them to be ordinary is in fact quire extraordinary.

Last night my brain gave me a neat name for a character. There was no context to it whatsoever, just the name "Titch Gamalol" which was then modified to a more ethnic "Tich Gamaliel". I know that Gamaliel is a Hebrew name and I was hoping that Tich (which in my head was pronounced with a long E sound and the ch of chutzpah) was a name or nickname in Hebrew or Yiddish or German, but so far my research hasn't turned up anything. I hope it does, because I'm always delighted when my brain absorbs something subliminally and then releases the info to me late at night in a dream. That's how I learned that the word for cowboy protective leg gear is called "chaps". No lie.

However, I promised you dream analysis and there's nothing to analyze in a name like that. Instead, let me tell you about a dream I had last week and the analysis thereof.

In my dream I was a competitive ice skater. I don't know if I was at the Olympic or another event, but I knew it some kind of contest or championship. Everyone knew I was transgender but they didn't seem to care that I was in the women's division. Security was on high alert because there was some alleged threat about Russians -- the dream never said, but in context it was clear they meant spies or saboteurs or some other kind of bad actor, not just "people from Russia" -- and it was believed they had infiltrated the event to disrupt it in some way. I learned this from a lesbian political analyst who is my RL friend and might (or might not) have been my lover in this dream.

I know that I went onto the ice to do my routine, bu I don't remember what it was. All I can tell you is that I was wearing something cute with a fluttery skirt and it was sparkly -- I can't even tell you what color it was -- and that at some point during my routine I twisted my ankle badly. Maybe I fell and knocked myself out, because the next thing I remember is waking up in a synagogue(!) full of old Jewish people, who gently fussed over me and my injury.

Then they told me it was time to leave. I tried to go out the front door, but that was a door to a mall (and indoor mall, not a strip mall) and there were people out there and an old lady told me that we needed to go out the back door like the employees and service personnel. I was still having trouble walking, so she gave her cane to help me, and her cane was made of bones suspended in clear Lucite.

As we got ready to leave, all the men went out first. Then I was told to go next, then the women went out. I don't remember what happened after walking through the door.

So, let's analyze this.

Me being an ice skater is very unusual, as I don't know much about the sport at all. My mother LOVES it, though, and it's on a lot during the winter months so I'll see bits and pieces as I walk through the living room. I'll occasionally stop to admire a pretty girl or a cute outfit, but that's about it.

I'm pretty sure this represents my hopes and dreams -- I'm pretty, wearing a pretty outfit, considered a woman despite being trans, performing in a heavily gendered sport which my mother enjoys -- all of this is about being accepted as a "legitimate" female by society in general and hopefully by my mother in particular.

Given that I never saw any Russian agents in my dream, I think my subconscious took a leaf from the recent impeachment hearings and used them to represent a vague boogeyman who might not even exist. Given the nonstop media coverage of COVID-19 and my own conflict over what the media tells me vs. what I'm seeing in real life, I think this was my brain trying to reconcile my own pragmatic rationalism with ambient beer flu hysteria.

Speaking of pragmatic rationalism, that was personified by the conservative political analyst as she's the one who told me about the agents. I think the fact that I didn't know if she was my lover or not is important; I'm trying to be rational in these times of panic, but like the "maybe she is, maybe she isn't" love interest I often doubt yourself. So this whole thing is about whether or not I trust myself to make the right decision when confronted with rationality vs. hysteria.

The fact that I don't remember doing an ice routine just reinforces the notion that the dream wasn't about ice skating at all.

The synagogue full of old people like has to do with the fact that my dad's side of the family are old Jews who either fled the Nazis or died at their hands. The mall represents society as a whole, and the service entrances are routes of escape that aren't noticed (or known) by most people. The cane of bones makes this blatant symbolism for "Lean on who we are, and what lessons you learned from us, to get you through this". That I was allowed to go after the men, but before the women, is another "Hey, you're transgender, this is important for the dream" nod because I occupied that in-between position.

So why is the second half of my dream telling me to flee, like the Jews fled the Nazis, when the first half is about me trying to overcome fear with rationality? That's likely because the recurring theme of the whole dream is self-doubt: I want her to love me, but does she? I want to be accepted, but why do I still feel separate? How can I flee if I have a hurt ankle?

I really feel that the underlying issue which my brain is trying to process is "In the face of a global pandemic which may change your life forever, how do I survive and still remain a woman?" Because if I need to evacuate for whatever reason, I will likely need to leave behind not just my feminine clothes and makeup and jewelry, but also my identity as a woman because I'm not yet at the stage where I can pass for female without all that stuff. So maybe my brain was trying to figure out a way where I could be femme without baggage; or maybe it was trying to come to terms with what I might have to leave behind as a way to get over the shock now instead of later.

My point is this: there's a lot of scary imagery being tossed about. It's natural to feel doubts. It's natural to be worried, to feel overwhelmed. It's natural to wonder about what kind of world we're going to be entering -- I couldn't even conceive of it in my dream -- and what we'll leave behind.

We can't all be strong all the time. If you feel yourself weakening, that's okay. Take a rest in a synagogue, let some kindly old Jews fuss over you, and follow their lead -- or, put another way, rest where you feel it's safe, surround yourself with love and self-care, and listen to the advice of people you trust.

We can get through this.

My Firefly Dream

Gorrammit! I had a dream about Firefly and I woke up before it ended!

What's that? You want to know what I dreamed? Well, all right...

Cue plaintive guitar riff...

It opened with shot of one of the scrubby towns that populate the Firefly 'verse, with a subtitle that this world was called Ozark.

The camera panned to a bunch of townfolk shouting "They're back! The strangers are back! They must have returned for the gold they buried!" and then hustling off out of town in the direction of what was, presumably, the location of the gold.

As they scuttle off, we see that there was a little redheaded girl in pigtails, no older than 13, listening intently to the group of men. After they leave, she looks around to make sure no one is watching her, and she gets on her bicycle and goes the other way.

(What's cool about this bicycle is that there's a second chain from the rear tire to a spinning rod -- basically a horizontally-mounted drop spindle -- that is spinning or winding yarn out of a collection of fiber located in a basket over the rear wheel. My thought in the dream was literally "Oh, cool! As the kids ride their bikes, they're spinning wool into yarn! What a neat and totally Firefly-esque way of doing things!")

So the little girl -- who wasn't named in my dream but who I'm calling Jessie because she reminded me of the Toy Story character -- pedals to a warehouse-like building at the edge of town and sneaks inside. She makes her way through a collection of rusting farm equipment, and it's obvious she's looking for something... or someone. Her eyes widen as she sees (but we don't) what she's looking for, and there's the sound of activity ahead. She creeps towards one of the pieces of heavy equipment which is now sputtering into life and trying to idle, like it hasn't been run in a long time.

As Jessie gets next to this thing -- which looks like some kind of backhoe-forklift thing -- it begins shuddering violently before breaking down in a violent self-disassembly. She screams, covers her face with her arms, and everything goes black as the working arm falls toward her.

(This is probably where the title sequence would go.)

Can you believe that the opening credits for Firefly cannot be found on YouTube? 

I blame Fox. Anyway, this is the best I could do -- and it's nifty besides. 

Jessie wakes up with Simon tending her and saying things like "She'll be all right. It's just a mild concussion, I'd like to keep an eye on her for a few days, though," to a very agitated and rather guilty-looking Wash. Based on the state of his clothes and the grease stains, it's apparent he was trying to fix the fork-hoe and didn't do a good job. Mal, Jayne, and Kaylee come back from somewhere (I get the idea they were scouting -- Mal as brains, Jayne as backup and Kaylee as "You're the engineer, what kind of tools are we gonna need to do this?" -- and see Jessie waking up. Kaylee immediately goes to fuss over her, Mal has an expression of "WTF is she doing here?", and in proper style, Jayne goes over to the makeshift kitchen and starting making a sandwich for himself.

Then there's some dialog that I couldn't quite follow. I got the impression that this was either a sequel to an earlier episode, or this was referencing events that happened to the crew before the TV series. Anyway, what I pieced together was that the crew had been to Ozark before, and that they'd stolen a shipment of gold ore from the local mine, and that they'd used Jessie in their heist as "local kid who knows what's going on and can be our eyes and ears", and that something had gone wrong during the heist and that they'd ditched the train car full of gold in some really bad location (like, off a cliff and into a river-filled ravine bad) before leaving.

When Jessie comes to her senses, she is pissed -- at the fact that the crew left without saying goodbye! (And without giving her her share of the take.) Still rattled, she reaches into her overalls and pulls out a small lunch to eat on the counter. River helpfully points out Jayne's fixings and says "These potatoes are rust-flavored." Jayne replies, with a mouth full of sandwich, "Hey now, let's respect our guest's bad decisions." Obviously he didn't want to share his potato chips.

There's more discussion as Mal asks Jessie what's happened to her in the years since he'd seen her. She mentions that times are even harder for her folks since the last time the crew was on Ozark, and that she'd had to take a job at the local horsehouse.

"Whorehouse?" Mal asks, with murderous intensity in his eyes. "A little [Chinese word] like you? I'll kill whoever put you there." Jessie rolls her eyes. 

"No, no. HORSE house. It's like a hotel for horses. I'm the stable girl there." 

Mal has a kind of "Oh. Well. My bad" expression on his face, there's kind of a musical "womp-wooomp" as Kaylee and Simon look at him whimsically like "Oh look, we caught the big bad captain acting human for a moment and now he's embarrassed"...

... and then I woke up. 青蛙操的流氓!

Late Monday Gunday

Yeah, sorry about yesterday. I know I should have done some blogging, but I had to wake up much earlier than usual and the entire day was crappy, so by the time evening rolled around I was all "At this point I just want to kill things with my Blood Elf Warlock."

However, last night I had a gun-related dream that y'all might find interesting, because I dreamed I had my first negligent discharge.

In my dream, I was in my kitchen, and I was holstering my pistol (no, I don't know why I had the pistol out). I know for a fact that I had my index finger completely off the gun, because 1) I have to do that to holster it and 2) I could feel my hand position in this dream. And then, somehow, I think I missed the holster, and then the gun went off.

I say "the gun went off" because my immediate reaction in the dream was "Bullshit, no way!"

To be more specific, it went like this:

1. Gun goes off, bullet strikes linoleum floor, fragments of floor hit my calf muscle (I was wearing short) and that stung like an SOB. 
2. First thought was "Shit, I just had an ND!"
3. Second thought was "Bullshit, no way! My finger was COMPLETELY OFF the pistol!"
4. Third thought was "Wait, don't most people who ND immediately think it's not possible and/or it's not their fault? Maybe it IS my fault?"
5. Then I investigated and literally found no reason whatsoever that could have made my dream-pistol fire. My finger was still off the frame, there was nothing on my clothes for the trigger to catch on, etc. It just literally "went off by itself". 
6. Regardless, I was still really really embarrassed by this, because I've been carrying since early summer 2013 and I've never had an ND and that's a point of pride for me. I thought "I wonder what my friends will think of me now?"
7. I was SO RELIEVED when I woke up this morning and my gun hadn't been fired and there wasn't a hole in the kitchen linoleum. 

Prior to this, the only gun dreams I've had have been the occasional "Ah crap someone wants to hurt me, I guess I need to shoot them now" scenarios and then I pull and pull and pull on the trigger and the dude is getting closer and the trigger is apparently miles away from breaking. I attributed this mostly to worries that I wasn't confident in my abilities, and that I needed more practice and more training. 

This dream, though, is a first. I wonder what it's trying to tell me? If I had legit screwed up, I could see it being a cautionary message of "You're getting sloppy, Erin, and you're going to make a mistake if you aren't careful."  But I very very very clearly remember my trigger finger fully extended and not touching my dream pistol at all. 

So what does this mean?

Dreamweaver...

Since the last time I talked about my random dreams was well-received, and I've had a couple zany ones since, I thought I'd share. 

July 7, 2013:
Last night's dreams were brought to me by Michael Bay: awesome and spectacular, but making no sense whatsoever.

First I was a cat burglar who knocked over an oil lamp that destroyed a library, thus revealing the location of a little boy who was being held captive by a creepy evil man (possibly a lich or a vampire); then the boy's father was doing a daring rescue via an underground cavern filled with critters that swarmed like a Harryhausen flick and he had to dodge them using only infrared goggles and lamp.

Then I was a member of GI Joe and I was doing an in-flight insertion to a hijacked plane while wearing an Accelerator Suit alongside my partner, Mossad agent Lewis Black, to defeat the terrorist leader, a one-armed Danny DeVito.

And then finally, I was at a fancy dinner where a blonde Guy Pearce, with stretching powers, matched wits with evil mastermind 1990s Val Kilmer, in what was possibly the yaoi-est version of Mr. Fantastic & Doctor Doom that I've ever seen.

I wish to state for the record that even though the dream did not say, I am unsure if Lewis Black's character was male or female.

July 17, 2013:
Right before the alarm woke me up, dreamed I was some kind of viking adventurer with shield and axe and epic beard. I also had a basso profundo voice* and was singing:

Let's go
on adventure!
Let's go
on a quest to find
the BEEP BEEEP BEEEP ALARM

Dammit. I will never find out what I was questing to find.

*Seriously. Imagine James Earl Jones singing the Kalevala. It was that awesome.

Since I'm on the subject, will anyone else admit to having gender-bent dreams? I know it happens to other people, too, and I would LOVE to hear about them.

On this Labor Day...

... I give you a slightly edited and improved (for clarity) commercial I had in a dream, probably inspired by the day and this news item. 

Interior: a ledge of wooden rafters against a wall with high windows. We are made to think this is the interior of a church, perhaps Saint Basil's Cathedral in Moscow.

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (hereafter VIL) steps into frame from stage left. Instead of his traditional black suit he is wearing a tight t-shirt with slacks and dress shoes, hipster-style. The shirt is festooned with colorful designs that simultaneously suggest Tetris blocks, political graffiti, and Soviet-era art. 

VIL thoughtfully takes a few steps onto a crossbeam, then notices the camera to his right. He stops, carefully turns, and addresses the audience. 

VIL:  Modern political fashion can be a bit of a balancing act. On the one hand, a dedicated revolutionary should make every effort to convince other workers that his cause is just. On the other...

Cut to: a scene depicting a bourgeois capitalist pigdog, finely dressed, getting rich off the honest labors of the working man by selling Che Guevara t-shirts to noble, hardworking proletariat for literal buckets of money.

VIL (voiceover): ... one does not wish to give aid and comfort to one's political enemies simply because they control the means of distribution.

Back to VIL, looking straight down the camera, face-only.

VIL: That is why, on this Glorious People's Day of Labor, I, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, am proud to announce...

Cut to wide shot. VIL's arms spread wide. To either side of him are large workmen, dressed in equally tight t-shirts.

VIL: ... the Second October Revolution! (SFX:  echo and reverb)

(Back to 3/4 shot of VIL)

VIL: Yes my friends! Today is a glorious day! Today, the workers take back style! From each, according to their sense of design! To each, according to their sense of fashion!

VIL begins stalking across the beam towards stage right, knocking over the workers in his way. Those further back, seeing the trend, dive off into oblivion.)

VIL: The workers control the means of production! Without the workers, you have no shirts! Do you truly wish to be seen as ideologically naked in this political struggle of class versus crass?

VIL stops again; head turns to the right to address camera once more.

VIL: (roaring) NO! Down with the industrial bourgeoisie! Up with the industrial  proletariat! Buy Second October Revolution apparel TODAY!

VIL stalks off-camera as the Second October Revolution logo appear: a dollar sign, a hammer and sickle, and a profile of Lenin, each indicative of the letters S, O, and R. 

Voiceover: Available at these fine outlets.

Fade-in logos of stores carrying the SOR brand, such as Aeropostale, Hot Topic, and Banana Republic. Linger for three seconds, then cut. 

Yes, even my dreams are full of satire.

Please tell me that all of you get this. I hate having to explain my humor...

Last Night's Dream Oddity

So occasionally I have odd dreams.

Last night, I dreamed I was living with Abby Sciuto of NCIS fame -- not sure if we were roomies or lovers, my dreams can be annoyingly vague on certain interesting details -- and since it was morning in my dream, she was making breakfast for the both of us.

Readers may find it of interest that in said dream, Abby's preferred morning-wear is a black silk kimono with a pink bat pattern.

Anyway, she was fixing waffles and insisted upon adding what looked like blackcurrant to the batter, even though she called them blackberries. She explained that this would stain the batter an almost black color and would result in what she called "goffles" -- goth waffles, of course.

I explained that I did not care to eat anything black for breakfast, and that's when she started growing scales, and fangs, and generally turning into either a dragon or a dinosaur, I'm not completely sure.

The next thing I know, I'm in a field, mounted astride an animal that is charging towards an opponent. It's not clear if this animal is Dino-Abby, but since that makes the dream more awesome, I'm going with that.

I don't recall what I'm wearing, but I am aware that my Mosin-Nagant, with its bayonet attached, is clutched under my arm like a lance. And I'm charging someone who is either Sonya from Mortal Kombat, or Sue Sylvester from Glee, and who is twirling what appeared to be two rifles (not sure if they were Mosins, but they had wooden furniture and were bolt-action) chained together at the buttplate like they were rifle-nunchucks.

I can't tell you how disappointed I was that I woke up.

An awesome dream I had

Last night I dreamed I was hanging out with Jamie Hyneman (like you do) when suddenly we were accosted by Jamie Hyneman cosplayers. Apparently we were at a convention and the Mythbusters were the Guests of Honor. However, for whatever reason, Adam Savage wasn't there.

Not wanting to disappoint our guests (and perhaps fearing their wrath), Jamie introduced ME as Adam and gave me a "Don't screw this up" look. I of course was terrified because I look nothing like Adam but the fans seemed to buy it...

For the rest of the dream I was acting larger than life, waxing enthusiastic about stuff I didn't know anything about and just improvising like mad. I also signed a crapton of autographs, which apparently people took as legit.

So if you attended ImaginaryMythbusterCon inside Erin's Head, then you got a bogus Adam Savage autograph. Sorry, no refunds.