Miss Babylon's Babblings

Wednesday, July 06, 2005

Sweet Dreams

My mom hates it when people go into great detail about the dreams they have. I think this is because dreams are often extremely convoluted and confusing--with the mixture of times, places, experiences, and people that are completely unrelated. Usually the dream hardly makes sense to the person who had it--let alone all the unsuspecting listeners who get roped into hearing the detailed explanation of it. As a result, in our family we grew up with the "rule" that if you were going to tell about your dream, you had to do it in 2 sentences or less. Although I can understand the logic of the rule (and I am the first to admit that it has saved me from some pretty boring conversations)--I can't help but feel differently about the rule when it applies to my dreams--but then again, I'm pretty sure everyone feels that way. I occasionally have dreams that are so strange, awful, or wonderful that I wake up almost believing them. It is especially strange when they include people who I interact with constantly--and then when I see those people I have altered feelings towards them all because of a dream. Maybe I should adopt the tactic a guy I know used the other night: just come straight out and tell them. (He told me that he dreamt that we got married.) Usually in the telling of the dream, it sounds so ridiculous that it quickly brings you back to reality--which is what happened when this guy told me about his marriage dream. We were able to laugh and there were no weird feelings between us. But by using this tactic, I fear that I'm back to the problem at hand--how can I possibly describe a convoluted, confusing dream in two sentences or less?

4 Comments:

  • At July 6, 2005 at 5:05 PM, Blogger DataSurfer said…

    How did your mom come to despise conversations of dreams?

    I personally find other peoples' dreams quite fascinating. I believe most people find dream descriptions to be interesting.

    I fear your family may have been deprived of potentially cathartic or imagination expanding experiences because of this rule. Dreams that are "strange, awful, or wonderful" to you are doubtfully boring to anyone else.

    Obviously it is up to you whether or not you share your dreams, but please never feel guilty about having the desire to share them with others.

    Our dreams are somehow a part of us. Whether they are some sort of window into our subconscious or just the mashed up left overs of unresolved thoughts and emotions from the previous day they are valuable in helping us understand ourselves better. If anything they are at least something to talk about.

    I guess this all depends on if you already have plenty of other things to talk about.

     
  • At July 6, 2005 at 5:36 PM, Blogger DataSurfer said…

    I find your family's predilection for sleep and the inherited disdain for the relating of dreams to be quite a paradox.

     
  • At July 6, 2005 at 8:26 PM, Blogger chrishley said…

    In reference to a book that contained descriptions of her dreams: "She sometimes thought, she said, that to read this book was to know everything about her, all of her fears and strange wishes, all of the places she could not go when she was awake.
    . . . offering me her life in small pieces."
    -Carolyn Parkhurst, DOGS OF BABEL

    And wasn't the rule only ONE sentence, anyway?

     
  • At January 1, 2007 at 11:27 AM, Blogger bec said…

    I think it's funny how everyone starts telling about a dream by saying "I just had the weirdest dream". Does anyone EVER have normal dreams?

    And I just discovered your blog, it's great. You really should post more often.

     

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