Dream #10

I don't remember details on this one, just the feeling.

I have the feeling that I'm hanging out with some "cool" kids in high school, at least by my impression. At some point, though, I learn that they're using me for some reason. Or maybe I finally realize that they don't treat me with respect, but rather look for any opportunity to not hang out with me and when they do, they look for any opportunity to trash me and put me down. I try to maintain and become better friends with these people, but by some point, I realize the hopelessness of the situation and that these people are just using me, so I break down in tears in my car outside of one of their houses.

There was a lot more to the dream than what I've mentioned. I just don't remember the details.

Dream #9

No play-by-play of a dream today. I don't remember most of it, and what I do remember, I don't recall in detail.

I remember talking to my mother, I don't know where, why or when. While chatting, though, she brings up something that happened in one of the other dreams that night. It might have been one of the other dreams, for all I know, but when she mentioned whatever she mentioned, something clicked in my consciousness that she was talking about a dream I had.

Reaching that realization shocked me but nothing extraordinary happened after that. I think I may have dwelled on that realization so deeply that I entered a dream state without visuals or any sensation other than all encompassing yet indescribable feeling. It was a rush yet a feeling of relaxation. It felt like a fuzzy embrace. It felt out of control yet comforting. Maybe it even felt sedating, taking away motivation and just making me wanting to stay there.

I may have had something of a clue into lucid dreaming when I realized that my dream mom mentioned information from a previous dream that night. As always, though, I either fall into that overwhelming, enveloping comfortable sedative or shrug it off.

Actually, I remember once a dream rewound itself and the cop in that dream tried to force me into doing something in the dream, which felt like a distraction from my realization that I was dreaming. In the end, though, I don't think I entered a lucid state in that dream. I got so involved in fighting the cop and running away from him that I think I forgot about the realization that I was dreaming. My subconscious mind may have successfully distracted me there. . ..

I should head to bed now, though. Not only is it late, but I'm tired, too. Dreaming makes for a great opportunity for fun.

Dream #8

I am on an el train heading west from Chicago. A friend is applying to some Ph.D. or graduate program out in the suburbs. I'm hoping to meet up with him and maybe he'll give me a ride home. Strange, some of the scenery looks like the Greater Boston area. The ride feels like it takes a long time and becomes tedious. I consider getting off and taking a train back to Chicago.

I decide to get off and head back to Chicago. Getting on a train heading back, finding a place to stand and grabbing a hold of one of those straps hanging from the ceiling, I see my friend through the crowd here in the train car. I squeeze my way through the crowd until I reach him, noticing that he doesn't look too happy.

He tells me that after the rigorous interview and application process, they didn't hire him. I tell him that they don't know what they're talking about, and they've made a huge mistake all the way back to Chicago.

Reading List for Amateur & Prospective Writers, Editors and Other Publishing Professionals

Kids, reading the appropriate manual listed below is essential and a pre-requisite for getting a job in writing or publishing. Fail to read the right one and lose. I know that I have missed out so far and hopefully reading the first entry on the list will help me get into my desired field.



The Chicago Manual of Style by Chicago Editorial, University of Chicago, University of Chicago Press. From Google Books: ". . .the essential reference for authors, editors, proofreaders, indexers, copywriters, designers, and publishers in any field. . .."




The Associated Press Stylebook and Libel Manual by Norm Goldstein, Associated Press. "That bible of the newspaper industry" -- American Bookseller, June 1997."




MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Writing by Joseph Gibaldi, Modern Language Association of America. Also from Google Books: "Since its publication in 1985, the "MLA Style Manual" has been the standard guide for graduate students, teachers, and scholars in the humanities and for professional writers in many fields."



AMA Manual and Style: A Guide for Authors and Editors by Cheryl Iverson, Stacey Christiansen, American Medical Association, Annette Flanagin. From the indispensible Google Books: "For decades indispensable, the AMA Manual of Style continues to provide editorial support to the medical and scientific publishing community."



So, people in the know, did I miss any other essential guides?

Dream #7a

Driving into Chicago from a long trip with friend, Zach, in the back seat. We're driving into the city on a bridge over Lake Michigan [which doesn't exist in real life, as far I know], which takes us into a very industrial area of town. Zach expresses much excitement, and I feel very excited about getting home.

Dream #7

I'm staying at my parent's house when I decide to take a walk or a bike ride, not sure which, at something like 3 or 4 in the morning. I end up walking somewhere between 7 and 11 miles up to Nashua, NH, with a lot of emphasis on the nature, fields and trees, between Dunstable and Nashua.

Up in Nashua, I run into my friend, Jenn, who's heading back in my direction, so I catch a ride home with her, once again with emphasis on the nature, fields and trees. It's still pretty early, around 5 or 6. I have this feeling of oppression by the light and the sense of things.

And something about a oil change, either I need to drive my car up to Nashua to get an oil change or Jenn was picking up her car in Nashua because she had dropped it off for an oil change. Either way, there's sense of urgency that if I don't do something now, I'll forget to do it, so I had better do it now.

Dream #6

My friend, Tim. Road trip. Hotel. Tim's new car in the parking lot. Heading off to the event or to continue the trip.

COMMENTARY
The guides on dream journaling advise you to write whatever you remember from dreams, whether the memory has details or if it's just an impression. The last entry, I got to record just intimations and impressions but no details. This dream memory has no big details, just scattered images and impressions that either got spun into a narrative or, in my waking life, I have strung them together into a loose narrative because it's natural to do so.

Dream #5

I had this experience yesterday morning. I don't remember the dream very well, if at all. Mostly, I just remember the feeling of urgency and the need to get back to sleep, so I could finish what I had started. I felt a sense of duty to go back to sleep and address the needs of more people than I could possibly handle. Even if I couldn't provide for all of them, I had to help and do something.

Then I realized I had awoken from a dream. More accurately, I had drifted between dream and reality, the dream creating a stressful world with many obligations to people. I had to tell myself that I made up the people, I made up the situation, I made up the stress. I didn't have an obligation or duty to go back to sleep and address the responsibilities in my dreams.

The material world, after all, had real obligations, duties and responsibilities for me. I needed to address those for survival. The dream duties had no need for my attention because I had created them, or maybe I should say that I copied them from the real world, from work.

Ack. . .how lame is that? Not only do I unwillingly get to handle stuff from my job during the day, I have to face them at night, while I sleep and am supposed to be resting. Ugh.