March 19, 2005

• I wish!
  Updated, completed,
  with the dream interpreted
  
  
  That was my initial reaction when I read Cinnamongirl78‘s
  comment declaring me a “truly free spirit.”  I chafe at my fetters
  all the time, but I suppose that from many people’s points of view I
  might seem free.  It is helpful to me to get someone else’s
  perspective sometimes.  One thing this spirit of mine is truly not
  free of is perfectionism.  I see how not free I am, notice many
  little bonds and snags.  I can only imagine what would happen were
  I to totally liberate my soul.

  That imagination is informed by traditions that include the concept of
  “translation”, the conversion of the physical body into pure energy
  when the individual spirit reaches perfection of attunement and
  atonement with Spirit.  It is with a fearful fascination that I
  view that idea of translation.  My mind tends to equate it with
  spontaneous human combustion.  I truly don’t know how free I want
  to be.

  I had a dream last night.  I’m hoping that by writing it out I
  will get more perspective on it.  Although in the dream I was
  sorta in bed with two sexy and buff specimens of masculinity, it
  wouldn’t be accurate to call it an erotic dream.  If it were a
  play it would have been a farce.
  
  
  
  I had sex with both of the men (alternately, not both at once), and it
  was hot, sweet and satisfying even though all the orgasms were in my
  dream, not in my body.  Perhaps the best part of it was that
  neither of them seemed uncomfortable or hostile in the presence of the
  other.  That has been the opposite of my experience in all the
  real-life threesomes in my life.  “Triangle” in human relations
  terms is a word at best uncomfortable.
  
  
  
  But sex wasn’t the theme of the dream.  It was at most a
  subplot.  The “bed” was a converted sofa stretched out into the
  traffic pattern in a living room where people were continually coming
  and going, around the foot of our bed, in and out an exterior door
  nearby and up and down stairs to the next floor. 
  
  
  
  A party was going on, celebrating some criminal triumph.  My
  lovers were wiseguys, made men, and I use the term “lovers” in the full
  sense of the word.  They sweet-talked me, lavished on me flowers,
  candy and jewels as well as foreplay.  I cuddled and cooed with
  one for a while, then the other one crawled into the bed and I snuggled
  with him while the first one joined the rest of the party.  One or
  the other one was there pleasing, amusing and diverting me the whole
  time.
  
  
  
  I suppose I should mention that one of the “lover” roles was played by
  Sylvester Stallone and the other one was Nicolas Cage.  In real
  life, Nic Cage is perhaps my favorite actor and Sly Stallone is a
  posturing idiot who can’t act at all.  In the dream that didn’t
  seem to make any difference to me.
  
  
  
  Then the cops raided the party and the farcical nature of the dream
  kicked up a big notch.  Suffice it to say there was widespread
  general consternation.  I was ordered out of the bed and had a
  moment of discomfort at the thought that I was naked, then I looked
  down and discovered that I was fully clothed.  The old switcheroo.
  

  
  The interpretation:
  

  
  

  It’s seldom wise to try and
  interpret someone else’s dream.  The symbolic language of dreams is an
  individual matter.  A snake, for example may mean fear or evil to one
  person and represent wisdom or stealth to another.  I’ve written about
  many dreams here, but I have interpreted only a few of them.  The ones
  I interpret are those about which someone asks if I know what it means
  or those that someone tries to interpret for me.  I don’t routinely
  parse every dream I blog for the same reasons I don’t routinely walk
  around naked in public or carry around my FBI file and show it to all
  and sundry.  Here is what I get from this one:

  First, everyone in the dream is me.  The me in the folded-out
  improvised temporary bed with the two men is my primary awareness, my
  everyday consciousness.  Sly Stallone plays the role of my shadow
  side, the aggressive, blind, stupid, hot-tempered part of me I’m not
  comfortable with.  I wasn’t really comfortable with him in that
  bed either, not as comfortable as I was with the Nic Cage
  character.  But I couldn’t deny him and he did have a lot of
  seductive power over me, besides offering me a lot of tempting but not
  good for me goodies such as candy, and flowers to which I’m allergic.

  The other one is the part of my masculine side that serves me well and
  pleases me, as well as some masculine traits I wish I were better at
  expressing.  He’s my strength and assertiveness, rationality (such
  as it is) and also my quest for more self-sufficiency.  The way I
  was relating to him in the dream and the way he kept wandering away
  makes this apparent.  He’s the one who brought me the jewels, and
  he was less demonstrative, less verbally seductive than the other
  guy.  I was always pleased to see him come back around, more so
  than with the other guy.   And that’s how it is with
  me.  I more or less accept that I’m sometimes an aggessive asshole
  or oblivious to my surroundings, but I’m not proud of it.

  Sometimes they were both there with me, but usually it was one or the
  other of them with me and the other one off circulating with everyone
  else.  We had some interactions with others at the party, were
  generally aware of what was going on around us.  We seemed to be
  much more aware of the others than they were of us.  Mostly they
  just wandered by and barely noticed us, hardly cared that we were there
  or what we were doing.  The exceptions were when someone needed
  information or help.  Otherwise, we were ignored.  That, too,
  is life.  Most of the time around here it is just me, myself, and
  I, until I get drawn out for some reason.  Usually, I’m contented
  with that.

  Then the cops showed up.  Everyone in the dream is me.  The
  cops are my internal censor, my parental programming, cultural
  “shoulds” and “musts” and “have tos”.  The party disintegrated
  into chaos.  We’d been having a good time until conventional shit
  intruded.  Everyone was screaming and scurrying around.  My
  two guys just disappeared.  All that was left was “me”, the usual
  self I live with and know best, the persona in which I feel most
  comfortable.  But that’s not ME, not all there is to me. 
  It’s just the socially acceptable mask.

  And that’s what that switcheroo at the end was all about.  I’ve
  had many dreams throughout my life in which everything was going along
  normally until I looked down and realized I was naked.  In those
  dreams my reactions to my public nudity ranged over time from
  embarrassed attempts to cover up into eventual nonchalance and
  comfort.  Eventually there was one in which I was nude and at ease
  among a fully-dressed crowd, and
  I was the only one who realized I was naked.  This time, I thought
  I was naked, but when I checked I was all covered up.  This tells
  me I need to pay more attention to all that unconscious
  culturally-programmed bullshit and make a greater effort to express my
  whole self.
  

  ---

  Ooops, almost forgot the Iditarod
  update.  Fifty-one mushers have now finished, the latest of them
  being Dallas Seavey, the 18-year-old who ran both Jr. Iditarod and
  Iditarod this year, setting three records as first ever to run both in
  the same year and youngest person ever to enter and finish the Iditarod.

  Thirteen mushers remain on the trail, with Perry Solmonson in last place out of Koyuk.

  Today’s AK program on public radio focused on Iditarod trail food,
  focusing on Brown’s Cafe where the elite meet to eat in
  Unalakleet.  Libby Riddles mentioned it in her book about her win,
  because she took half of her steak dinner with her and ate it as she
  mushed through the blizzard that had pinned down all her competition.

  Several mushers spoke about what they eat, ranging from junk food like
  chips and chocolate bars, through gorp and dehydrated mountaineer
  meals, to Charlie Boulding who subsists and nourishes his dogs on dried
  Yukon River red salmon. 

  The reporter said that “cooking” on the trail consists of pouring
  alcohol into a bucket, igniting it, placing a smaller bucket filled
  with water into the flaming bucket of alcohol and boiling… whatever.

  

  • 7:33 pm
  • 7 Comments