Dream Dream Dream Dream Dream Dream

Dec 22

I dreamed I was at some sort of beach area (maybe with tide pools?). Just before that, I’d been having some weird bdsm dreams that I ain’t sharing online (basically I was borrowing some kinda book or dvd from the college library and it was full of wild stuff); this one was much more family-friendly.
It started off sunny and warm, and one of the first things that happened was that I found a baby sea turtle. I scooped it out of the water (not really feeling the water but seeing and feeling the turtle very vividly) and excitedly showed it to the rest of my family.
Soon enough it turned that there were loads of types of turtles around, including something called a “castle turtle” that was huge (maybe like three feet across) and had its head coming up through the middle of its shell, perched on a long neck. Its name was basically a reference to its defensive mannerisms and centrally situated head: it peered out over its shell as though looking out over its castle, and was constantly prepared to swim away from danger coming at any angle.
There was also some sort of kitten/turtle hybrid, which, in adult form, didn’t have many kitten characteristics, but which gave birth to straight-up kittens. The kittens couldn’t breathe underwater and had to learn to swim at least a little (they were bad at it no matter what). I was quite worried when I watched from underwater as a kitten, trying to swim, got close to the floor of the shallow water and seemed at risk of getting its flailing front paws tangled in a seaweed plant. Ultimately, I rationalized it as “a way for kitten genes to spread out into the ocean.”
After that, we moved a short distance down the shore, and everything grew much colder. It’s hard to remember, but I think the family was getting in a van when I noticed a huge turtle’s neck sticking out of the water, completely covered in a thick layer of ice.
I got excited and yelled for my family to see this and help me, while I started removing pieces of ice. Soon enough the turtle was free, and retracted its head underwater… only to come back up a moment later. It seemed that it was quite attached to hanging out in that position, even if it meant becoming frozen. Underneath the ice, its coloring had some brilliant oranges and greens (which clashed a bit, but was quite striking all the same).
There were a lot of details in the dream that I left out because they were confusing, vague, or nonsensical compared to the rest of the dream. I hope that by only remembering the clear parts, it’ll help my dreams become more clear and stable as well.

Dec 23
This was about reuniting with a girl from my old youth group (NG) and her developing an eating disorder. I wasn’t hugely on-board with that as a dream topic so I didn’t write it down.

Dec 24
I dreamed I was in the middle of nowhere, at night, in an area where peeps were all about adopting dogs. Not the first time I’ve dreamed about nighttime countryside things so it all felt a little bit familiar.
Somehow I arrived at the house of the Main Family that’d led everyone else in adopting dogs (specifically, the mother of the family was the Dog Adoption Guru of sorts). They had a big golden retriever on their porch (I think?). I wanted to talk to them so I literally just… walked in the front door and then called out to let them know I was in their living room. It felt like the wrong approach even in the dream, but somehow it didn't occur to me to knock on the door... or else it seemed like they weren't home and I decided to straight-up walk in to check.
Surprisingly they didn’t mind the intrusion. The lady and her husband showed up from a back room (the kitchen), like they'd just been hanging out back there, and I’m not sure what we talked about but eventually they tried to sell me some cereal. They had big boxes of cereal arranged along the walls of their dining room (the layout was living room, dining room, kitchen, from front to back). They tried to sell me a Fairly Large box of Lucky Charms for $130, which was ridiculous even in the dream.
I ended up settling for smaller boxes of cereal, running around $30 or so, and figured I was getting a good price.

Dec 27 (gore warning)
Dreamed I was trapped on a space station in a horror scenario. I was with a colleague, whose name and face I don't remember and probably wasn't aware of. Our other four colleagues were already dead by the time the dream started, their bodies drifting very gradually within the station. I was watching the vacant face of one of these bodies; her eyes were open and staring, and as I watched, they slid over to look directly at me.
This was reason enough for my colleague and I to barricade ourselves in one room. I can clearly remember there being a sort of shaft going down through the floor of this room, with one of those "staring corpses" floating inside. I shoved something down there to block its way in case it got any ideas, and then put the shaft's flimsy plastic covering on top.
After that, my colleague and I had some sort of terrible idea; we had three or so bodies (either human or some form of robotic doll) that we were going to mutilate and then arrange around the room as part of a ritual. Even in the dream, I had no idea what we were specifically accomplishing by doing this. Regardless, we set to work, cutting out the body's tongue and placing it in its lap, and then slicing open its cheeks so that its mouth fell open. At this point there was blood all over it, and more pouring from the gashes in its face, and we were just about to put some finishing touches on all this and move on to the next body when some rather-more-sane survivors burst through our barricaded door and saw what we were doing.
The second they broke in, my colleague and I panicked, realizing that they were about to get the wrong idea. We tried to call out to them that it was okay, hoping that we could placate them before they decided we were insane, but since I had no clue what we were even doing or why, there wasn't much I could say other than "NO! It's okay!" or something similar. Obviously they paid more attention to the bloody spectacle than to my unconvincing words, running into the room and then coming to a halt with expressions of shock and anger.
In retrospect, I'm pretty sure my colleague and I were the craziest peeps on the station.

Another dream was that I was a TA back at UVA, running a math class that my brother happened to be taking. He was, as usual, struggling in his classes, and I was tasked with putting together the exam he was about to take. The temptation to make it easier for his sake, or even to make it easier for him specifically, was almost overwhelming; however, I never actually reached the point of the dream where I chose how to structure the test.

Dec ?
I don't know when I dreamed this one, but I dreamed the family was visiting our grandparents (father's side) for the holidays. Somehow it was pretty unpleasant and I think I ended up making microwaved meals for myself to get by. There was something else about a game but for a long time now, the concepts I've encountered in dreams are terribly difficult to translate into real-life terms or even remember correctly... and this dream was no exception.
That said, I've been reading about kaizen, and I might be able to apply mind sculpturing to lucid dreaming in a way that makes my dreams clearer and less abstract (the book in question is One Small Step Can Change Your Life by Robert Maurer).