One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy

Very unusual night so this will be an unusual entry. I slept 11h 17m. But I still don't feel rested.

I dreamed that my mother gave birth to a pair of twin girls. I either have a wife or I live with my sister. I also have a son and maybe another daughter. They might be adopted as well. None of my family members look or act as they should. I feel like I'm another person in another family. Anyway, we split the newborn twins so that my mother cares for one and I care for the other. This seems to be a point of contention in the family. I want the children to be raised a certain way while my mother wants another.

Then the dream skips around through the childhood of these children and I get to see the difference between the twin raised by my mother and the one raise by me. I recall one scene where we are outside a movie theater. Our kids get into a fight with a group of bullies. I break up the fight. Then my son starts drawing something on the sidewalk in paint and everyone watches like he's a virtuoso artist.

Throughout the night, this dream theme recurred in different ways. In one, I am sitting in a dark movie theater, watching a movie about the same storyline. My part was played by Dustin Hoffman. Which now reminds me of his portrayal in Death of a Salesman. Something about appearing on the cover of a magazine dressed as an astronaut. In another dream, I am married and either me or my wife is dying of cancer.

I mostly recall that all these dreams were emotionally charged. I have all this anxiety about family and being a father. Today I feel drained and tired.

I want to say this non-lucid dream was an hour long. It just kept going and going. And in cycle 2? Vividness was only average or below. It was memorable, but kinda boring at the same time. I'm just going to skim over it here yet it's still a wall of text.

B-Complex vitamin one hour before bed, drank natural apple juice

Longest Dream Ever
0637: B.
Paradoxical Architecture and Drug Party
I'm in a strange building with several floors and many staircases. It's hard to get to the room you want because each staircase takes you to a different place than you expect. I'm living here while going to college but I'm moving out soon, I'm trying to find someone to take my apartment. Then there's a family that moves in and I befriend their young 10-year-old son. Lots of deja vu feeling here.

Then I'm hosting a few friends in this strange apartment and we are doing drugs. Then it turns into a formal party for a community of strictly kosher Jews. Everyone is doing drugs and talking about being kosher. Then the landlord shows up and I'm supposed to give him the keys. But I remember the drugs in the bedroom so I sneak back in and put them in a briefcase. I run away from the building with my friends.

Mugged and Suspected
Now I'm alone, walking on the main street of a small town. Reminds me of Monterrey. Instead of a briefcase of drugs, I'm now holding a bottle of whiskey, open and half empty. I sense there are cops around and also a criminal. I let the criminal steal the bottle out of my hand as he runs by. The cops stop me. They think that I gave the criminal the bottle, like a planned exchange. They think it's hard drugs dissolved in water. But I'm so scared and clueless that they realize I'm no criminal and they let me go.

Bear-Lion Mating Season
Now I'm walking with the friends again and we still have the drugs. We're in the middle of nowhere on a dirt path through some grassy hills. We stop and one girl snorts it all. She turns into a bear-lion kind of thing. Looks like the head of those big Chinese lion parade costumes with the big floppy mouth. She has thick black fur like a bear. The rest of us stand back, not sure what to do. A male bear-lion appears nearby and stares at the female, as if to mate. I try to make eye contact with my friend to see what she's thinking. She can't speak. I think perhaps she is afraid of the male and wants my help. She gestures with her eyes, which I interpret to mean "you guys leave, I'll stay". So I leave and the male pounces on her.

Now I'm walking alone toward the nearest town. I see my bear-lion friend running down a hill toward the same town. I chase after her. She seems upset and I figure out that she didn't want me to leave. She wanted my help. Her eye gesture actually meant "let's all run that way." Now she won't forgive me. As we arrive in the town, she turns back into a woman. I plead with her but she'll never forgive me.

Dalai Lama in a Diner
Then, I'm sitting in a diner with Lance. He is reciting a quote from the Dalai Lama with a perfect voice impression. The quote (which seemed real, but I looked it up and couldn't find it IWL) is about idea of spiritual salvation contrasted with the distractions of modern culture. At the very end, Lance is just staring at me intently and I let the quote and the whole dream just sink in for a moment.

Switching Places
0649: D. Gotta work on my handwriting. I had half a page of notes but all I can gather is: Dreamed of switching places with a bum who looks like Cheech Marin. We're on some kind of country club? Somehow we have people fooled. I also remember having a strong deja vu during this dream. Like I knew it was a dream and I had dreamed this scenario before. When I woke up, I almost didn't write it down because I felt like I already knew it.

Jumbled Mess
0805: D. Dreamed of talking to Rachel about missing work. Something to do with taking Grandma to get her hair done. Then I'm eating cereal out of the bags at the grocery store?

Then I'm in the desert and I see Rachel walking along a path towards a baseball stadium. It's the Angels. I follow her. There are two friends with me but I can't recall who. As we get close, I see Joe Pesci. I say "Hi Joe!" as if I knew him. He replies "That's Mr. Pesci to you," but in a joking way like he knows me too.

Had to drive a friend to the airport. I was up for about 2 hours and returned to bed.

fragment
1211: Arguing about dream?

fragment
1239: Looking up "butterfly" in the index of a book. The book is about dreams. This leads me to that quotation in the book about dreaming of a butterfly or the butterfly dreaming of you.