CanisLucidus

This was one of two lucid dreams that came out of an experiment with caffeine during WBTB that I tried last night. (Thanks, Xanous!) My beverage of choice was green tea.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

Lucid #44: Pool Care in the Temple of Zeus

I'm standing outside of a pool where people are swimming around having a business meeting. They're fretting about the now-green condition of another pool that's one story down and perhaps 100 feet away from the one where the meeting is taking place. I jump into the clean pool, swim toward the meeting, and explain that all we'll need to do is get the Ph and stabilizer levels fixed up and then shock it with liquid chlorine or even household bleach. They're relieved and grateful, and I have one moment of contentment before I realize that I jumped into the pool wearing a backpack with a laptop in it and have probably ruined it. I'm pretty distressed by thus until I realize that I'm dreaming.

"Got to go, everybody! This is all a dream." The other swimmers seem mildly surprised by this but they quickly accept it and go back to their meeting.

In the distance I see that the pool ends at what appears to be a sheer drop-off. Past that, I see the skyline of a city in the early morning. Eager to explore, I try to rise out of the water but somehow have trouble getting into the air. I yell out that I am going to fly into the air and nothing will stop me. I employ some probably-unnecessary profanity in my speech. I shoot out of the water, knifing through some overhanging tree branches (where did these come from?) and land on the roof of a stone temple in the style of Ancient Greece.

I'm overlooking a large, open-air courtyard that's surrounded by Doric columns. Past the courtyard is miles of grassland and a sky that's dark with storm clouds. The clouds are lit up with occasional bursts of sheet lightning and I hear low rumbles of thunder.



There's a strange platform of gray stone suspended above me and it's hung low enough that I can't stand fully upright. I decide to phase and begin pushing my hand upward against the platform, which feels solid. I push harder, and my fingers start digging chunks of stone out of the platform. I'm somewhat pleased by this but I decided to refocus my efforts on phasing through the platform.

I push my hands and head into the stone and this time it feels cottony and insubstantial. My vision goes black as my head disappears into the stone and I feel my feet leaving the temple roof. I float upward through the "stone", gradually becoming disoriented. I feel like I'm in a bed now, but I don't believe it. Still blind, I reach out, grabbing onto a pillow. I suddenly become very aware of my sleeping body and wake up in my real bed.

A short lucid, but it featured some of the most arresting visual imagery I've encountered so far. I'd wanted to see the Great Pyramid, but this was well beyond what I'd had in mind.

I like to think of my conscious mind as the "coauthor" of my dreams, but sometimes I have to wonder if it's anything more than a proofreader.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

Lucid #33: The Poolside Pyramid

I'm swimming at a pool party. Rather than relaxing and enjoying the moment, I'm scrubbing furiously at algae blooms along the pool walls while trying to make sure that my two kids are keeping their heads above water. A tall, gray-haired man swims up and makes some unflattering remark about my scrubbing technique. First a flicker of annoyance ("this isn't even my job!"), then one of realization. He stops talking as soon as I'm lucid.

I want to go but I can't make myself leave until I'm sure my kids are safely out of the pool. Fortunately, when I check for them, I see that they've already disappeared. I tell the guy I've got lucid stuff to do and he responds, "Oh sure, man. Go for it."

I fly up out of the pool, thinking vaguely about my goal of reaching the top of the Great Pyramid. I'm shocked when on the horizon I see an entire pyramid complex, fully formed. In front of the Pyramid, in even more vivid detail is the sphinx and a towering statue of an Egyptian Pharaoh. Incredibly, the statue stands even taller than the Pyramid.

Rather than the dull sand-colored stone that I imagine when thinking of the Pyramid today, it's clad in brilliant white. The sphinx's face and body is either painted or perhaps decorated from top to bottom with colored stones, the eyes specifically ringed in deep blue, like lapis lazuli. The statue of the pharaoh is gold, similar in style to King Tut's burial mask.



Everything that I see ahead of me is far, far beyond what I'd incubated (or even imagined) for the Great Pyramid, and I'm thrilled with the idea of exploring it further. A little too thrilled, it seems, because not long after I start flying toward the pyramid complex, I'm awake. My heart rate is elevated (though not quite racing) and I can't seem to settle back in for a DEILD.

Ayiee! Let me back in!