Journal #86

1/13: The dream I had was one of the more colorful ones I've had in a while, continuing the trend of dreams trying to show me ideas for my writing YA/teen lit since winter 2011-spring 2012. This has been the trend since a dream I had on September 6, 2019 where some recurring dream characters over the years started to become younger and colorful, like a few dreams I had between 2012 and 2016.

This time, I found myself in what appeared to be a cross between a middle or high school's library and a Barnes & Noble surrounded by children and teenagers between the ages of 12 to at least 17, and it seemed as if they were leaving when I hear music in the key of F minor, and being sung in a pitch-perfectly haunting style, by a teenage girl that appeared to be a fan of American singer-songwriter and Paramore frontwoman Hayley Williams, even down, eerily, to the dyed red-orange hair; except, unlike Hayley, this character's eyes were brown. If the setting were a library, I would say that it was kind of a mix between the ones at Oberlin (formerly Daniels, thanks to an unfortunate event in the news in May 2020) Middle and Southeast Raleigh Magnet High in Raleigh, NC. If the setting were in a mall, I would probably say that it eerily resembled the Barnes & Noble at the Triangle Town Center, also in Raleigh, as it's on the top floor of the mall. I even noticed some lost characters from dreams from most of the spring of 2020 to at least October 18th and 25th walking out of the place after the beautiful singing from the redheaded girl.

I couldn't tell if the girl was trying to sing like Williams or even Canadian singer-songwriters Avril Lavigne or Felicia "Fefe" Dobson, either, as they have distinct, completely different singing voices. I believe her voice was a little smaller than those three. Come to think of it, I think it sounded like a cross between voice actresses Veronica Taylor, Tara Strong and Nancy Cartwright; I have a memory of a dream from either 1990 or 1991 that had a screaming voice that sounded like a mix between the character Cartwright voices on The Simpsons for 32 years, Bart, and Nick from the 1989 Disney film Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, portrayed by Robert Olivieri, but my four or five-year-old self was too young to process what was going on at the time.

I am also no stranger to dreams of girl characters that think they're Hayley Williams of Paramore. The earliest I can remember my first dream of a character like that was either in 2008-09 or 2009-10, where it was set in a school with creepy 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System/Game Boy-like music playing in the background as I saw a bad day at school in the eyes of a teenage character that had the unfortunate honor of being sent to detention, and in the room where it was held was a girl with that trademark dyed red-orange hair. The last time I saw a character like that was in 2016, the year my grandmother on my mom's side unfortunately passed. That girl had turquoise hair in at least two dreams. She never showed up again after that. The dream character with the turquoise/hot magenta-colored hair from another entry from December 2019 may have been also been inspired by her, but she didn't sing or apparently have any spoken lines, either.

Like I've said before, I don't have a problem with dreams that provide ideas for writing teen lit/young-adult fiction. I couldn't get anything done most of 2020 due to stress and anxiety over COVID-19, the news, etc., and I'll try to change that for 2021. -WM86/DFW

3/31/16: Two days ago when I took an unexpected Garfield-like nap (I honestly don't know what I was doing before then that resulted in this), I ended up with a snippet of a dream similar to one I had around 2012-13 after a reboot of Need for Speed: Most Wanted released on seventh-generation consoles (there were cars, but it had absolutely nothing to do with the gameplay and had a car not in the game); except here, it was shortened after a character was introduced, named Alex.

When he was revealed, I saw something that looked like a mix between Nintendo's short-lived Virtual Boy red screen and modern-day pinball DMD (dot matrix display). I suddenly woke up when a DC--more than likely Alex--threw a hard sucker-punch similar to Nathan Scott on One Tree Hill and Luke Ward on The O.C. to an unknown subject in the face. Also, when he was revealed, there were Japanese hiragana/katakana symbols below his name. So this leads me to believe he's half-Japanese. I don't get why he would randomly get into a fistfight with another individual.

However, one night later--after an almost brutal day, I find myself in a high school classroom (I think it was either a Southeast Raleigh or Sanderson High classroom) where teenage DCs are trying to get the autograph of the main DC who I think was starring as the lead on a show airing on either MTV or Freeform (formerly ABC Family)--also a teenager, but female and she's trying to get to know all of the students, including myself, as I think I was going undercover as a student. She also has some colorful streaks in her hair as well. I then see some stuff related to The Price Is Right that made absolutely no sense whatsoever and is not how the show works before my alarm clock beeps at 6:45 in the morning.

12-18-15: Everything's been up and down like somewhat of a crazy game of Magic # (a Pricing Game on The Price Is Right with an impressive design that scared the crap out of me when I was younger when it appeared from a fade-in) months after I updated my Dream Journal. Also, I've been busy with other things, including a personal blog during that time.

Last night, however, left me with some inspiration to write after a heck of a bad day, as most of the stuff (the plot, some characters) in Secret Agent 25, or SA-025, for short (my attempt at a YA novel), are inspired by dreams I have had since the 1992-93 year living in Maryland (when my parents separated in 1991-92 and I was 6 going on 7 at the time) to now.

Ever since I started on SA-025, I have had a series of strange dreams involving possible characters, and most of those DCs had no spoken lines--even Wednesday (which was uneventful) and last week when it marked the return of the 'office buildings outside my room window' dream, something recurring since 2006-07.

This time, it was a possible scene from later on in the series of SA-025, where possibly another Agent 25 was talking to someone, and this transpired:
"Does this mean we'll move to South Florida?" Agent 25 asked.
"No." A female chaperone said, sternly.

Later on, Agent 25 and the woman went inside the building, looking like a library, where there was another woman sounding like a strict teacher I had at Southeast Raleigh Magnet High in the 2001-02 year, trying to give words of motivation, and just before the dream ends, there's a teenage girl with what appears to be a Surface tablet and it appears she is logged on to Twitter at a table, similar to a dream I had in the 2014-15 year, having brown eyes and brown hair, but she has no spoken lines as Agent 25 looks over her shoulder like a teacher. She also had a pink case to carry her Surface.

I have a feeling this may have taken place in Hemet, California, as the villainous Sterling clan's mansion in SA-025 is there, and the dream suggested it gets turned into an underground library. It could also have taken place somewhere in North Carolina, too, where a building for villains may have also been turned into an underground library.

I also have a tendency to throw DCs into my book as well, so I'll see what happens. Turning the Sterlings' mansion in my attempt at a YA novel into an underground library may not be such a bad idea. I don't mind getting dreams like this, personally.

(For those who don't understand, YA stands for young-adult fiction. It is a popular genre of books amongst teenagers.)