Visions in the Dark

The first of three dreams on May 10th, 2011:

I am with my parents in a distorted version of the city I was raised in. It is a very hot summer and we are going to a swimming center to cool off. When we get there the swimming center has three pools in different rooms. The first room has a pool that has been converted to an ice rink, even though are are many pillars throughout, and there are hockey players in black and grey jerseys practicing on it. The second pool is huge and looks like two olympic sized pools stuck together. The thid pool in the last room is an indoor wave pool but it is closed for repairs.

My parents go to the second pool, but I go into the first room to watch the hockey. The game is just ending and workers come out and do something to the ice which makes it melt right away. Some of the players take off their hockey gear and strip down to bathing suits and jump into the icy water. I stick my feet in but am not brave enough to get in the freezing water. Soon the workers return and begin draining the pool of the water. Tables are set up around the pillars in the pool and the tables are set for eating. A catering table is brought out and set up along one side of the pool and along the farthest end (in the shallow end) many tables are set up and hundreds of soapstone sculptures are put on display.

Many people come into the first room from the other pool and begin eating. I am fascinated by the range of sculptures and ignore everything else to look closely at and admire them. There are two young men also looking at the sculpures, one middle eastern man and a caucasian man who is very handsome. I catch the eye of the caucasian man and blush and turn my attention back to the sculptures, pretending not to have been looking at the handsome man. I recognize some of the soapstone sculptures as famous one or ones that I have made myself. Some also look farmiliar though I cannot remember where I have seen them before.

Time is warped somehow. I can feel myself moving slowing and everything around me is moving very fast. People come and go for their food in a blur and soon it is nighttime and the place is empty save for a few of the hockey players and the two young men I had seen before. They invite me over to the tables around the pillars to eat and I am excited to find that sushi is being served in abundance. Time seems to warp again and seen the hockey players are gone and only the two young men and I are left. We eat as much of the leftover sushi as we can because we don't want to see it thrown away and wasted.

After we have eaten our fill I go back to the soapstone sculptures and continue admiring them. There are two peices that I am really attracted to and the handome causasian man comes over to tell me that he created those. I am speechless with awe and embarassed to recieve his attention and say nothing, but he comes and stands very close to me and shows me with great detail and intimacy how he created his work. I just stand there with my head and heart spinning and blush.

There is an explosion outside. The middle eastern man comes running inside with some people I think are his family. There are more explosions and gunfire to be heard but none of us seem to know what is going on. Suddenly soldiers in black uniforms come barging in and seperate the middle wastern people from the causasian man and I. We try to tell the soldiers that they are our friends and innocent of anything, but they will not listen to us. The sounds of fighting continure outside and soon a commander dressed in American fatigues comes in and orders the middle eastern people arrested for terrorism. Again our pleas that they are innocent are ignored and they are carted away outside.

Most of the soldiers follow the commander out, except for two, who are left to keep guard over the handsome caucasian man and I as we are placed uder house arrest and cannot leave the pool area. We huddle and shiver in fear together.

I am outside of a building that looks like a college or something. It is winter and there are many young people about with backpacks and books. There is a circular fountain between two buildings that seems to be the center of the campus where many people meet and hang out. I am not there to attend classes and came to see a special store that is in one of the buildings. I can hear many of the people talking around me and they are all speaking french, so I think I am somewhere in Quebec. I talk with some people and find that I am able to speak fluent french, even though I cannot do so in waking life.

I go inside the largest building and find a vaulted lobby that leads down the hall to a store selling Montreal Canadiens merchandise. In my dream this store is the only place in Canada to get authetic Habs memorabilia. There is a large glass case displaying rare items and many hockey cards. On either side of the case are two semi-circle staircases which lead up to a sort of indoor amphitheater. There are store entrances on both levels and I go in the one on the ground floor after seeing that the current best selling hockey card is going to be replaced with an newer one. The card has a smiling Brian Gionta (current captain of the Habs) on it, leaning on his hockey stick, but the name on the card says "Caberlay" or "Camerlay" or something like that and the number on the guys shirt is "8." I think this is odd because I am a big Habs fan and there are no players on the current roster wearing the number 8.

They are selling old copies of the old card and I buy one. When I take it out of its sheath the vendor notices that it is damaged and offers to allow me to exchange it. I say no because I think it gives the card character. The vendor tells me that if I hang around for a little while, the new card is going to be revealed in the amphitheater in a few hours by the Canadiens team and they will be giving away free ones to anyone who shows up.

Later I find my way to the amphitheater and find it crowded with people vying for spots near the front. I find a spot in the back corner of the room and hunker down, just glad that I found a place to sit. There is no one around me and I assume that it is because it is the very back row and no one else wants to sit there. The room is very full by the time the unveiling ceremony starts and many people are still cramming near the front for a good view. When the Montreal Canadiens team comes in the room they have to sit at the back because there are no other spots.

Some hockey players from some other teams arrive to watch, and also have to sit or stand on the sidelines because of lack of space. In the end I have Scott Gomez sitting on my right and Jerome Iginla standing to my left. I am really exciting but I try not to show it and keep my facade stoic.
The dream ends when Gomez gives me one of the new cards and Iginla gives me an autographed card of his.

I drifted off to a very light sleep just after Coach's Corner with Don Cherry and Ron McClaine at the first intermission of a Toronto Maple Leafs at Vancouver Canucks game. Although there was much imagery and happening that made it obvious I was in a dream, the hockey commentary could be heard the whole time and was not garbled or altered by the dream state.


The dream starts off with me in a small hockey arena skating around the rink and batting hockey pucks thrown at me by my teammates like baseballs into the net. A couple of visiting hockey coaches asked me how I knew how to do that so accurately and I told them that my paternal grandfather taught me how. My coaches took me out to a secluded road out in the country side that was covered in ice. The coach tied a rope around my waist and pulled me behind a truck while I tried to throw pucks into hockey nets along the side of the road. This unusual practice lasted until early afternoon when the coaches returned to the arena and told the team that practice was over and we were invited to watch the Toronto at Vancouver game on another ice rink within the same arena.

I wandered though the halls of the arena and found myself in a changing room lined with portopotties and small cubicles where professional hockey players were changing. I did not see anyone I recognized until the last minute when I saw Canucks lead goalie Roberto Luongo sitting in his gear, looking at me with a wry and amused smile on his face but I was then escorted out by a security guard and directed to the rink where the hockey game had started. I was in the second of three seating levels and thought it has weird that the game was playing in such a small arena and that there were not very many spectators there for an offical NHL game. For some reason I had no jacket but a large and very warm brown blanket which I wrapped around me like a cloak.

The game was in the first intermission so I got up and explored the arena and by the hallways and the layout I believed I was in a high school of some sort. The hallways began changing and the layout became confusing and I believed that the arena was changing shape at random since I could not find my was back to the second level seating area, which was very frustrating but understandable because I know that my dreams frequently do stuff like that. When the game started again I could hear the hockey commentary as clear as day, so I was aware that the game was on but I could not find my way back to the ice rink. I found several rooms where people were watching the game on small television sets or just sitting listening to the commentaty and staring at the walls but I could not find the ice rink no matter where I looked. Even though I could hear the Toronto/Vancouver game the images on the television sets were of Toronto Maple Leafs vs. the Montreal Canadiens game. I went up a set of stairs and found the nosebleed section (third level seating) of an ice rink but I found that it overlooked a basketball court where small children were playing with random non hockey related toys.

I wandered around the arena some more before I found my way to a small area behind the arena that looked like a garden admist fall where some more small children were playing in the fallen leaves. I wrapped the blanket tightly around me and walked through the garden and into a narrow alleyway at the side of the arena. There was a large man standing in the dark in the lonely alley and when I got closer I realized that it was Roberto Luongo, still in his full hockey gear (minus his helmet), and who seemed to be waiting for me. I was all embarassed at first and did not know what to say but he broke the silence by asking my who my favourite hockey team was and I sheepishly responded that the Montreal Canadiens were my favourite and that my second favourite team was a toss up between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Vancouver Canucks. Luongo just laughed in response though it seemed to me that he was a bit disappointed that I had not mentioned his team as my favourite -- though I did make a point of mentioning afterwards that even though the Montreal Canadiens were my favourite team that he was my favourite goalie currently playing in the NHL and that Carrie Price (lead goalie of the Canadiens) was my second, which made Luongo very happy. Every time he smiled at me I felt my heart stir and started to believe that I was falling in love with him even though I was vaguly aware that I was in a dream and was not really talking to Roberto Luongo but an aspect of my subconscious that had taken his form.

We talked about hockey for a while but our conversation soon became more intellectual and we were talking about these deep universal things which were very personal and spiritual and I was surprised that we shared many beliefs and agreed on a lot of things. Unfortunately I cannot remember any of the details of that conversation because even though I was talking to him I was still hearing the Toronto/Vancouver game loud and clear as if I was right there at the game. I was just going to ask Mr. Luongo how he could be there talking with me while he was at the same time playing goalie in the game when suddenly the hockey commentators said that Toronto finally scored early in the third period after trailing by 2-0. I was very happy and excited and my light sleep faded and I woke up to see the game still playing and indeed Toronto had just scored early in the third period after trailing 2-0. This convinced me that my mind was still focused on listening to the game even though I was dreaming.


I later watched the replay of the game a few hours later and everything I had heard from the hockey commentators in my dream had indeed been said during the gameplay and I thought that was really cool because I have never simutaneously listened to something happening outside of my subconscious and dreamed at the same time.