Thesia

It was our monthly Writer's Circle meeting last night and we had a 'write beforehand' exercise that we then shared and critiqued.  The theme was waking from a dream, and everything has changed. We had an extremely disturbing sci fi story, a ghost tale, a wonderful story about 'shoulder people' (from a truly stunning writer) to name but a few. As ever we had a fun night with much laughter and some excellent writing.  Here's my contribution:

My mind tossed in dreams like clouds in a whirlwind. The day before was hurting, tomorrow was a chill wind, brown was a circle and the sound of traffic became a warm touch.  My skin went cold and the prickles rose and grew - I saw a forest sprout from them and flood into a valley that sang.  Although asleep I knew that my world was changing.  The sound of birdsong, struggling to invade the cocoon of consciousness that kept me in that strange world, translated as the worn surface of an ancient oak chest. 

Finally awake, I opened my eyes. Last night I had slept poorly – a broken heart makes a difficult bedfellow.  Strands of dream tugged at my memory briefly as I slapped my phone in an effort to silence the brittle alarm. 

I lay in my bed for a moment, feeling the cool sheets on my bare skin. It felt… like chocolate.  As the night fog cleared from my brain I swung my legs over the edge of the bed to place them on the cold parquet floor. The wood seemed to suck warmth from my soles and sent a jolt like lightning up my legs. It felt as if every hair on them had been commanded to stand to attention, and a snatch of the vision of a forest growing before me briefly distracted my arousal into consciousness.

I stood and headed for the bathroom, my head spinning slightly.  The bathroom window, unshielded by curtain or blind, spilled white light into the room that felt like diamonds scraped across slate. Squinting, I looked at myself in the mirror. I was still me, hollow eyed and wan with sorrow, yet something had changed.  There was a brightness in my eyes that looked back at me with a challenge. There was a new dimension to what I saw, what I heard, what I felt.

Bravely I squirted paste onto my toothbrush and had the strange sensation of a white hare running on heather. I looked at the brush, at my face in the mirror, and started to brush my teeth.  Everything was normal and yet it was completely different – as if as an adult this was the first time I had done any of these things … waking, walking, touching, seeing.  The brush in my mouth was Tuesday’s meeting, my spit in the bowl was block and tackle, rope twisted and shining.

With the whole world evolving weirdly around me, I continued to get dressed and experienced everything on a different level.  My mind was desperately trying to assimilate new sensations attached to old experiences. I wasn’t sure how I’d get through the day. Surely this disorientation would pass?

Dressed, ready for work, I went downstairs and prepared breakfast – where a landscape painting, soft silk and ball bearings all contributed to the experience of eating cereal. Everything looked normal, and tasted normal, yet everything had a new dimension too.

I left the house, thoughts of the unceremonious dumping by my boyfriend, and the tumult of three days before – had Tuesday only been three days ago? – disappearing as I tackled the walk to the tube and negotiated my short commute with a world of new senses invading every single experience.  Could I continue like this?

I exited at Tower Bridge, and joined the throng towards our office. Glass, like a lambs bleat. Concrete, smoke over water.  The roar of traffic, flames on an open log fire. My phone buzzed – and the strong sense of purple was almost shocking. I looked at the message – from Aunt Emilia. Aunt Emilia, who could not say certain words because they felt like bricks in her throat. Aunt Emilia who was sensitive and fey, and yet the most creative, loving and extraordinary person I knew. Aunt Emilia, who – suddenly – I realised I understood. I thought this was a gift, or a curse, from birth. But it seemed for me, that a broken heart (and the smell of old wet paper pervaded) had triggered the condition.

I swung through the doors into the office and thought about James, his corduroy callousness, and a river of leather swept past.  I thought of how I would like to feel – happy, free, loved, and the painted wooden door of an old stone cottage swung shut in the breeze.  I started to choose how I felt and different images, sensations, tastes and smells pervaded my every step as I climbed the single flight of stairs and into our open plan office.  “Good morning!” I looked around and saw colour, tasted new and familiar things, the air was tangy with orange and pebbles.  A new day had truly begun.

(C) Carolyn Sheppard 2018

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Royston Writer's Circle website

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Dreams and food

Well I did dream last night, but I have no clue what about, so you don't get a recounting here today. I have been told that there is nothing more uninteresting than telling someone else your dreams (in a way so negative as to put me off ever mentioning them to that person again) but I like hearing about dreams. I like the way they weave reality with fantasy, and also a little bit of prophecy.

My friend Chris posted this on Facebook, a link to an interesting little story about dreams: The Timekeeper at the Way Out of a Dream which I enjoyed and hope you do too. Now, on to food...

The picture on the right features my very first paella! Made from a low fat recipe, it includes all sorts of lovely ingredients such as squid, chicken, bacon, prawns, peppers, peas and of course rice. I used a risotto rice which worked really well.

I volunteer to cook sometimes for the family (musician friends) who are kindly hosting my presence during the week whilst I am working far from home. I had never tried a proper paella before, but with the help of John (who just happens to be a chef), I think I did ok this time. He did some chopping for me and prepared the mussels. Before last night I'd only ever eaten one mussel, so I was hoping I liked them.

The family ate the meal and no one has complained of feeling ill today, so I think it was a success. I will try something different next week.

The Jump

I dreamed about a post-apocalyptic world. This is not surprising as I watched 2012 the other day - but that was all the lead up to the latest take on a global disaster. Not asteroids, not climate change, not even alien invasion - 2012 was about sun spots heating up the earth's core. Oh, and that did cause a little bit of climate change.

So what was my vision of the aftermath? Well, the floor kept shifting, a bit like partly cooked pastry. There were rooms where we had sheltered, with old blankets and a strange colour to the atmosphere. And when the ground began to shake - we had to jump.

This jump in my dream struck me because it was so physical. Not the jump so much as the falling back down. We jumped straight up many feet - probably as high as a house. And I knew that the fall back down was straight down, onto the earth. But I also knew that the fall would be fine if I just relaxed.

The sensation of falling was very physical, I was extremely 'present' in this action in my dream. And after the feeling of falling, as I was relaxed, hitting the ground was fine. A gentle touch down.

I had not been drinking. I slept reasonably well, and the difficult dream world was challenging, but not frightening. I have no idea what it means, but I do now know that falling in dreams doesn't always have to end with waking up or hitting the ground dead.

This lovely picture was borrowed from: http://www.josephinewall.co.uk/ocean_dreams.html

Bad dreams

Mostly my dreams are just colourful - but last night they involved terrorists, murder (I can still clearly see the side of a child's head split on a bullet exit) and earthquakes.

I started out with another person to get a drink (I was thirsty in reality, later got up and had some water). I knew it would be alright for us to go out as we weren't in uniform.

We came to the shop which was by the border. The shop shook and trembled, foods falling off shelves - we could see this through the huge glass sides. The other person in my dream was no longer there, but I was surrounded by a border terrorist group. They would not let me go. The leader of the group said I could not go as I had seen their faces. They were young, not more than teenagers really.

They were camped out between the pillars of broken buildings. They were just heating up needles ready for torture when I woke from that part of the dream.

I had my water, went back to sleep. Then my dream included the child being shot - in a darkened room. Trying to escape from the terrorists and someone else, an older man, being shot in the chest, but this time a small wound as the gun was against his chest in a fight.

So, given that I like to analyse dreams sometimes, what might this mean? I don't know. I think it is not very nice. It's now nearly 2pm and I still can't shift the images from my mind.

I'm not a burglar

I do have strange dreams - picture this, I'm in my dressing gown in a house in New York. I've broken into the house as I need somewhere to stay with two other people (one of whom is a friend's daughter, and is about 10 years old instead of her actual 15). And my cat Toby (who has in fact been dead around 15 years).

I'm in the kitchen looking for something to eat when the owners of the house come in. "I'm not a burglar, this is a banana". I say, holding up the banana. The owners have children, four boys I can tell from their family photographs, but they are older and the children left home.

The family are understanding, and wait while I go and get things packed so we can leave. We need to find a vet though. The cat needs to be treated.

The whole story is very vivid and I can picture the people, the cat, the banana... I guess it's no wonder I wake up so tired!

Broken dreams

To 'break a dream' is when someone says something to you that makes you recall a forgotten dream. This happened to me this morning, but only regarding part of a dream.

Let me tell you a bit about the dream first of all. There was a man with no shirt on, half his body sun-tanned, laying on a wall by the river. He fell into the river where he was already swimming. The two versions of him became one, and then he turned into a mer-man. He swam down the river, obviously confused at the transformation. He was curled by the bank.

I was looking down into the water, from a height. The wall above the river was maybe 20 feet high. But then I was also in a small rented flat with two metal beds, one atop the other. Behind the bed were sweets and other rubbish on the wooden floor that the renter had not cleaned up properly. I know, because I pulled out the bed to look, then put it back again afterwards. Outside the window, a big wide double doors window, was a path and then immediately a lake. A nice view from the bedroom, but no privacy. Children walked by and we thought that it was a shame you couldn't cordon off your piece of path to the lake.

I went into the sweetshop to buy some sweets. It was old fashioned - wooden display units at child height.

But the bed was towering high - and I was swinging on the metal edge, knees folded over, encouraged by someone - a women (a pop star even) who watched me as the edge of the bed became a towering structure from which I could swing out over the river. I swung deeply forward over the river, and back again. And the most amazing thing about the dream is not the detail or the colour - but the sensation of swinging. That heart swooping rush you get when swinging on a rope, or a trapeze (though I've never done that) or dived off a high board. That adrenalin high that is part fear, part excitement.

The sensation was very physical, and I realised after the first copule of swoops that I could actually enjoy the rush.

Now to the breaking of my dream... what I had forgotten (with all above details still fresh and visual in my mind) was that I was also learning Polish in this dream. Sat in a cafe with a young man, who was - I think - going to teach me to speak the language.

And this morning, my friend sent me a text saying I was 'not Polish enough' (I won't explain) and so I remembered that part of the dream.

All this must have taken long, interminable seconds between the alarm going off and me waking. But the sensation, the physical sensation of swinging, was very powerful indeed. I enjoyed the dream - the colour, the variety, the incongrouous nature of all the different parts. And the sudden remembering of one part of it, that had slipped my mind until an innocent text arrived.

What did you dream? Can you remember? Have you had very physical (clean answers only please!) or emotional dreams? Do please post a comment, I'd be interested to know. You can post a comment anonymously, you don't have to belong to Blogger to join in.

Photograph courtesy of http://www.onebooktwovillages.org/whs/pages/image23009.html