Friday, December 05, 2008

Coming Back to Life

A couple of months ago I decided I'd had enough and went to a councilor to talk about my depression. I called it "boiled frog syndrome": I was treated for depression 20 years ago, was on Prozac for six months, got my life on track, and did all right for awhile. Then, slowly, I've been sliding back into the hole, one bad decision at a time. I'm back on Prozac, and after three weeks I could start to feel a difference. I no longer feel like I'm swimming through syrup every day. I'm not a whirlwind of activity, but I'm getting things done, and I don't feel like a Complete Failure at the end of the day if I didn't get to everything on my list.

The only side effects so far are a bit of dehydration, and I want to sleep 12 hours a day. At first I was a bit woozy, but I was woozy before the meds, so that's probably my low blood pressure. Still having lots of epic dreams, but have been negligent about writing them down. Hope to get better on that score. Just found my Herman Riffel book again, so I'm going to re-read that.

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Pushing myself too hard?

I have a tendency to push myself too hard at the end of the day. It seems to be guilt motivated: I haven't accomplished nearly what I set out to, so I can't just call it a day when it's time to go to bed. As I write this it's just past 0100, and I feel drugged. I'm sickly tired, but I've just spent over an hour hanging laundry, washing dishes, and generally tidying in the kitchen. This is after a day spent editing the Callender wedding video, which I should have done a couple of weeks ago.

There are several other projects that need my attention, too, and each day I wake filled with dread because I know I'm not going to get enough done. I just want to escape from my life right now, for so many reasons.

Friday, March 14, 2008

Traveling, shipwreck, kidnapping, homicide, exploring

Started out with a lot of traveling dreams. This section ended in a dream where I thought I was not dreaming: I was packing up my gear after a prolonged stay somewhere (a reenactment or other visit somewhere). I was actually managing to get most of it together, and I commented on how I hate “those dreams where I can’t get things packed”.

Then I was picking up mom and Marge at the airport. There seemed to be a lot of people in our group for a simple airport pickup! Too many to fit in Marge’s car. We hailed a huge, limo-sized taxi instead. I had some huge, coffin-sized trunks (I guess I was still coming back from my earlier trip), and Cheryl threw them up on the roof rack(!) of the cab. I told her to “quit helping!”. Even though the cab was huge and full of people so it resembled a clown car, there still wasn’t quite enough room. For some reason we were now in Poulsbo, by the way. It dawned on me that Marge had driven her car to the terminal. I volunteered to drive Marge’s car and take whomever wouldn’t fit. The cab driver insisted that we add another cab, instead, but I told him “No”! What was the point of leaving Marge’s car behind?

They drove off, I think. I was distracted by a boat shop or travel bureau of some kind. Suddenly I was out on the water near a chain of islands in a small sloop/captain’s gig thing. I had my friend LeOnna’s four-year-old daughter with me, and she kept wanting to stand up and otherwise get in the way as I was handling the boat. It was twilight and getting cold, so I wrapped her in my coat and told her to sit down on the floorboards. She jumped up on the thwart again so I shoved her backward into the bottom of the boat. I could see our ship, a medium-sized brig or somesuch, approaching from the south. I was trying to rig the sail because I knew I couldn’t row the gig fast enough by myself. Then I noticed that we were drifting in the current and trailing a long line. Madeline popped up again, just as the line went taught. It was attached to some kind of anchor! The boat swung around and the line swept the deck and popped Madeline into the water. I could see her bright-colored t-shirt under the surface, so I jumped in and fished around until I found her. I held her up and squeezed the water out of her. Now the current was sweeping us away from our boat, which was now anchored instead of drifting. The brig had passed and was sailing slowly to the north, but there was no was I was going to catch it now.

We made it to land somehow, and now I had Madeline’s baby brother, too. At about half his real age of just over a year. We were back to the problem of “getting home from Poulsbo”. It was night, and the light from a nearby convenience store lit the parking lot. Somehow I lost track of Madeline, then I heard a car starting up and I knew somebody had kidnapped her! I saw a white Cadillac-type car backing out of a spot, and I ran to intercept it. The guy wouldn’t stop, so I grabbed the roof rack and climbed up and over and jumped in the open passenger side window. I pummeled the guy and tried to jerk the steering wheel to nose the car into an obstacle and stop it. Somehow I ended up in the back seat. I pulled a gun, but he pulled one as well, so I launched at him. We struggled for a bit and I knocked his gun away somehow. I fell back and, as he turned, shot him square in the chest. He had also stolen $100 from me, so I fished that out of his shirt pocket.

At this point, I think, there’s an interlude where I’m in some police station being booked for the crime of stealing the $100 or something like that. I was very despondent; the money was mine, but now I was going to jail. For some reason the homicide thing wasn’t an issue. I asked if books were allowed in prison, because I’d go crazy without something to read. They assured me books were fine, and that I wouldn’t be alone. I told them I’d be happier alone. “Lock me up in a hole for all I care”, I said.

Back in the dark parking lot, I was holding the baby boy and bouncing him to get him to go back to sleep. My neighbor Paul drove up, and now it was his son, whom I’d been babysitting. Paul offered me a ride home, but let me drive. I was having a hard time seeing. It was night and I couldn’t get my eyes to focus and I had tunnel vision. I asked Paul to help me navigate. He didn’t seem alarmed by my handicap, and told me where to turn. Pretty soon I couldn’t recognize where we were. Was it Lincoln Hill? No, we’re in Silverdale! It was a part of “Silverdale” I’d certainly never seen. Now it was daytime.

We made a turn to the south west and came out on a “T” overlooking a spectacular valley, with steep wooded hills and rocky crags. It took my breath away! There were a few houses along the ridge road we were driving, and I guessed that they must be valued in the millions with a view like that. “Bet you’ve never been out here, have you?” Paul said, laughing. No, I’d never even heard of this area! Somehow it came to me that this was the area behind a cluster of craggy, rocky mountains that I’ve dreamed about in the past, usually placing it on the Olympic Peninsula. We drove down into the valley, the road narrowing and becoming cruder as we descended. Soon it was a rough track, and we came to a spot where two pine trees had fallen over the road. They were high enough to drive under, but there was a short-haired woman in a lab coat there who pushed them up for us anyway. We were now walking, and as we passed under the tree trunks I saw that they were crusted with snow.

To our left, downslope, was the remains of a gargantuan wooden bridge. There were ruined bits of huge logging machinery. Then we were in the midst of a group of people working on towering openwork steel structures, bridges, etc. It was like a science fiction scene, with folks welding and using elaborate robot arms to fasten things out of reach. The whole scene was awe-inspiring somehow. There was even orchestral background music. I was thrilled. The air was cool, here was a group of people working on some communal project in an isolated, spectacularly beautiful valley… for some reason it just made me happy.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Can't get to the stream

This dream is actually from the night before last. I was feeling sick last night and couldn't bear staring at a computer screen.

In Hawaii (the version that looks like a beach in Puget Sound) with Gordon. The sun was impossibly low at mid-day for the tropics, so I guess my subconscious was being lazy. It was cool. Things happened. We were packing it up to move to a beach with a southern exposure (more sun). I went for a walk in the pine forest with my cat, Beany. We were walking down a manicured trail, heading back to the beach (to the East), following a gurgling stream. Off across the gully I saw a waterfall with a nice pool. I wanted to get to it very badly, but there didn't seem to be a straight way to get there. We walked down to the bottom of the trail and crossed over a footbridge, then headed back upstream on the north side. There were steps, which evolved into wooden interior stairs. I stopped and realized we'd been climbing and climbing. We were climbing away from the stream! Beany and I stopped and looked down into the gully, and turned to backtrack and just follow the stream...

Interpretation: Not sure what it means, but streams and bodies of water like this represent peace, comfort, safety, relaxation, freedom, and many other happy things. Usually I can't get to them in my dreams.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Alis's House & Serenity Cabin

Lots of dreams, only remember, sort of, the last two.

Driving and see a nice nursery with cool plants. I stop to look. Seems I know the owner. We talk about plants, and I look at her nice ponds. I'm debating what to buy. Pretty quickly it evolves into an interior scene, and the person is my friend Alis (whom I lived with in San Jose back in '90). The house and nursery are on several acres, and she has a house that might interest me. She can rent it to me for cheap, because it needs some work on the yard and exterior. Some things need to be cleaned out, but it's a neat old farmhouse. We go to look at it, and the drive and front porch are all ripped out, leaving dusty gravel. There's kind of a bleachers type arrangement where the porch should be. She says this is where "the choir" would sit back when this was some kind of camp or retreat facility. We go in, and it's plain they've been doing remodeling. Wall-to-wall carpet everywhere, which isn't my favorite but at least it's new. New kitchen, and they've tried to restore the plasterwork and moldings on the coved ceilings. Lots of little parlors and smallish rooms that lead one into another. We get to the main parlor/sitting room, and there's a fireplace in the middle of the room, as if a wall had been removed from behind it. Directly adjacent, at right angles, is another fireplace! There are a couple of kids in the room sitting on a sofa watching TV or something, and an assortment of pianos and organs. Looks like the family has been using this space as a "family room". I turn around and the "extra" fireplace is now a free-standing, folding, Art Nouveau fire screen or somesuch. It's one of the things that needs to be moved out, and I volunteer to store it "in my barn".

Later I'm on Serenity (the Firefly class cargo ship of the TV series), and happy to be officially signed on as a member of the crew. I'm walking down a passageway, which looks disappointingly like a hallway in an office building, kind of beige and vinyl-floored, with ugly hollow-core doors. We all have name plates by our doors. Mine is sandwiched about halfway between two regularly spaced doors, and my "room number" is even odd. "(something) and 1/2". Inside it's a smallish room with a cot and closet and not much else, but I'm so happy to have my own cabin on my favorite space ship. An announcement comes over the com system, alerting all crew to ready for takeoff. Kaylee or Inara or somebody comes in, can't remember. We lie down on bunks for blastoff.

Interpretations: The "house hunting" dreams always make me uncomfortable, because I'm looking for a place to call home. The Firefly dream made me feel as though I had finally found a home. Every time I dream about Serenity and/or her crew, I feel as though I'm with family and that I belong there. I feel loved and welcomed, and that I'm an important part of a crew. I love that and wish I could feel that way in real life.

Impossible Gig

My friend Claudine, an Oriental Dance teacher, has lined up a gig for her teen troupe and me(!) to be part of a show in Seattle. At first it sounds like a great opportunity, but the more I think about it the less I want to do it. For one thing: no pay. For another, I was expecting a couple of rehearsals for only a couple of performances, but it turns out to be rehearsals six days a week and then four weekends of performances. Insanity! I tell her there's no way I, or her troupe, can possibly do this gig, and she agrees.

Later: Working horses in an arena. On a movie? Preparing for a joust show? Wrangler with moustache gives advice to dark haired woman and then me, but now I can't remember the dialogue even though I can see the action...

Friday, February 08, 2008

Colossus, tin suit & nasty bad guys

Whole lotta dreams last night. I’ve had a busy day, so now it’s just before bedtime as I write this. Can’t remember every detail, but here’s the gist of three or four sequences:

Driving somewhere with mom, sister, and maybe somebody else. It’s at the end of a sequence. We’re heading south on 405 or something like it and the sun is going down. It feels like I’m watching this on TV at first, and there’s background music, but then I’m in the car. Ahead, to the southeast, a huge shape of a toga-clad man rises up on a wooded ridge. He’s hundreds of feet tall. Impossibly huge. At first the giant is in sillouhette, but then the setting sun sidelights him as he looks West. He opens his mouth to call something, but the horn section of the soundtrack is all that comes out. He has something in his hand like a discus, which he hurls out. “Watch this!” I tell my fellow passengers. The object arcs away to the west like a boomerang and curves north toward us to the right of the highway. As it approaches, I see it’s a huge crown the size of the disk of the Space Needle. It touches down with a roar in an open field and plows toward us kicking up dirt and boulders, then comes to rest a few hundred feet shy of the road. There are letters inscribed around the band of the crown. It’s Latin, and in the dream I knew what it said, but now I can’t remember. Seems like it was a conventional quote of some kind, four or five words of wisdom

Camping in the Canadian Rockies with my family. By brother is a kid as usual (he’s 39 in real life). Cabins and camping spots. Dad has a trailer or RV of some kind. We’re towing a trailer or truck and it flips over as we round a curve going very slowly. I reach out and flip it upright as I would in Second Life (virtual world). Somebody has a weird armored cart or boat that looks like a fat little silver robot. My sister wants to walk into the woods in it and observe bears and other wildlife. I’m dubious.

At a friend’s house in Seattle. Lots of people gathered for a pot luck or production meeting or both. Joel Hodgson (MST3k) is there, and we talk about MST. The TV is on, and we sit down to watch a movie or series of some kind. Contemporary cop thriller. Bad guys catch somebody and make him slash his own face with a razor. Are they going to make him cut his own throat? It’s really creepy. It’s at a point in the story where things are really going badly for the “good guys”, whomever they may be. A whole group of people are rounded up, and all the women are stripped and tied to a railing or fence. They are all black and rather stout. I’m afraid they’re going to be raped and I want this story to stop. Now I’m involved, and the story has moved to an interior like a large auditorium. I’m in the group of captured people. Various individuals are being singled out for mutilation with knives or razors. I’m trying to work out how to stop it and/or get the innocent people out in one piece. We’re isolated, high up on a mountain or tall building. I know that if I can get us out on the balcony or near an open window, I can fly us all to safety, but can I do it fast enough that some won’t be apprehended on the way out? One of the bad guys makes a crack of a theological nature, but he has his Biblical facts wrong and I contradict him loudly to draw attention away from the person about to be mutilated. I start to argue with the bad guys and feel like I’m getting control of the situation…

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

New Weather Variation and Film Job

Last night's offerings were pretty lackluster. Lots of stuff but pretty mundane. Shopping malls, film productions in High School Auditoriums....wait there was a weather thing...

In a small town, up at some point of interest on a hill with various friends and family. Can't remember what was going on until I looked at the sky and noticed that the entire 360 degrees of horizon was nothing but anvil clouds. Straight up it's sunny and clear. I decided we were in the eye of a hurricane, and that it was only a matter of time before the wall of the cyclone hit us. This is interesting because usually it's just a tornado of some type in these dreams. Sure enough, I could see the whole thing moving West, the Eastern wall looking like a huge sandstorm about to roll over us and with the same freight-train noise. I hollered for everybody to get to shelter, but Eric and Sarah were dragging their feet. Eric decided he wanted to stay in his truck, and I was trying to convince Sarah to get him out of there and to better shelter. I was rounding up cats and heading for a basement somewhere with Gordon and a small crowd of folks. We ended up in Mom's Suburban. At some point the scene shifted to a small town exterior again, and various astronomical phenomena that somehow portended great things. There was another "moon" orbiting the Earth, which was very creepy, and it was going to really screw things up no matter how fascinating it was.

Last dream was the film production thing. Small crew and lots of stage moms for some reason, including my mom. We were filming and staging out of a High School building. I gave the "moms", who were in some kind of extras holding area in a gymnasium across the hall from the auditorium where we were filming, a speech about set etiquette. Then I went to the auditorium where things were going a bit roughly. The AD(?) came in and announced that somebody associated with the production (a police representative or local city representative) had left the production (died?). He was overjoyed, because apparently this guy had been a real pain to deal with. I was arranging some miscellaneous stuff on the stage right stairs, when Gordon came in and whispered in my ear that he needed a "squire" to help him with cavalry stuff, and was I interested? I was very unhappy with my current position, and felt like a 5th wheel anyway. I jumped at the chance to work with the horse unit!

Interpretation: For the storm thing, probable my usual concern about either unsaved friends or worry about the way the world is circling the drain before the Rapture. Also could be anxiety about getting ready for the new year and all its activities.

For the second thing, I honestly think it really is about me working with my husband and feeling like I'm being included in his projects.