memorable

Morning of July 7, 1965. Wednesday.



This was a recurring very early childhood dream. There were a few variations. The main scene involved being in the back seat of a car, on the right-hand side, with my father driving and my mother in the front seat. Somehow, I eventually find myself along the right-hand side of the road with no car in sight and where there are a lot of tall grasses and possibly a trench or ditch. This seems related to my parents stopping for me to relieve myself while they go to a nearby store to come back in a short time. (I get the impression that we had been at a gas station though I could not go because the bathroom doors were locked - this in-dream back story being based on a real-life event.) I soon notice a small green dinosaur on two legs (probably a very small or baby “ostrich dinosaur” or Ornithomimus not quite as tall as I am) that comes out from the tall weeds. In afterthought, I seem taller in my dream, or at least seeing things from a higher perspective. There is sometimes a sense of sadness as if it may be the only one around or the last of its kind. It seems friendly though also somewhat out of place in its surroundings. I am not sure what its fate will be as I usually return to the car when my parents return, though they do not see it and I do not mention it. I may continue to be the only human who ever knows of its existence.

Some of this is based on one of my most vivid real memories. My parents did stop at a gas station and when the attendant said that the doors were locked, I said “That’s okay, I don’t have to use the bathroom anyway” (so as to not be seen as demanding or annoying - I was quite passive and focused when growing up for the most part). My impression of this seemingly very annoyed-looking man towering over me stayed with me. We did stop at a wayside as such a few times (when I had to go to the bathroom), but my parents certainly never drove off for any length of time as in some of my dreams.

Morning of July 5, 1975. Saturday.



This entry relates to a small part of real-life but “dreamlike” events (also experienced by my wife when she was younger long before we met) of water bugs completely vanishing from a sealed glass mason jar I usually had on the left area of the northwestern jalousie window sill over a longer time period as well as touching a kind of seemingly aquatic (either hexagonal or octagonal) orange “accordion-like worm” and watching them “explode” into tiny grain-like and plate-like parts and dissolve within a short time. I was also the only one at the time (and for years after) to fully know about the non-native snakes, including Burmese pythons (one of which went into our large shed, likely with the intent to eat a chicken) “invading” the area - which no one else seemed to believe at all, and yet which is now a recognized problem in that region (even with a related television series) years later (this has remained a common “trend” for me - to be the first or only one to see or experience something years before someone else becomes known for first seeing or knowing of it - something I have grown very used to, in fact).

Based on a dream about a “new” kind of penguin (as in actually “newly evolved” or created from nothing), I had written a story called “Penguin in a Jar”.

I was in my Cubitis home in the living room and there was a large, tall, cylindrical aquarium that held a small penguin that was very aquatic, more adapted to water and the ability of perfect, fast swimming than being suited on land at all. It would swim in spiral-like patterns from top to bottom and then back up near the water’s surface to perform a lot of fancy swimming while eating very small fish when swimming downwards again. This special new species of penguin somehow just appeared on Earth with no explanation other than being a “new creation”. One person who wants to make a lot of money on the discovery does not get anywhere when the penguin somehow becomes invisible or dissolves completely when out of the water for very long.

Years ago, even before my older dream journal entry on this, there were no other online matches for “penguin in a jar” - now there are many (Google) matches of this phrase - which I originally personally used to connect to the real-life vanishing water bug enigma. Also, to give a little more detail to all the odd coincidental connections to the much later movie “The Gate” (1987) as partly mentioned in another entry, I forgot to point out how the jar in the movie (that the moths vanish into thin air from at one point) was the same orientation (relative to where it was kept by the window and the orientation of the room) as my real-life experiences from years prior (mid 1970s).

Also see: “The New Life”.

Morning of May 29, 1965. Saturday. (Memorial Day weekend - age four.)



In an odd “twist” on comical partial precognition (which has been very common for me throughout my life), I dreamt (semi-lucid) at age four, in Chipmunk Coulee in Wisconsin, that my father drove us to the “edge of the world” just beyond the end of a road that just stopped. There, a thin red devil (with a narrow beard) danced with a pitchfork in an almost comical way (as in the “Hot Stuff” comic book with “Grandpa Blaze”, who often looked different, though), but there was concern that nothing else existed beyond that area beyond the fence and gate (assumed in my dream), where he lived in a grass hut or haystack? or some such, that was always catching on fire and needed to be put out by a team of chipmunks somehow (water-filled nut-shells?). The world would have just a smooth cliff-like drop and nothing beyond.

In real life, the same afternoon as the morning of this dream, my father got directions from someone mixed up, and ended up driving down a road that actually did come to a sudden end and he talked about the “end of the road” - which, in my young mind, caused me to contemplate that it was as far as one could travel in that direction (south). A thin farmer with a pitchfork approached our car, giving me a somewhat uneasy feeling (thinking of my dream) of being near the “edge of the world”. The seemingly annoyed farmer looked at us suspiciously at first but gave my father instructions on what roads to take from there.

Note to self: I see that I still have the bad habit of writing “chimpmunk” instead of chipmunk, even after all these years.

Morning of February 14, 1965. Sunday.



This was a very long early childhood dream with “resets” - and it also recurred later, though the main longer-lasting and more vivid and emotional one was on that cold Sunday in Chipmunk Coulee. I had been able to determine the exact model of the car as I grew older. It was a red 1922 Phaeton in the dream. Although I had at times associated it with a Ford, the actual proper term is apparently “1922 Lincoln Phaeton”. In this early childhood dream, one of the most vivid of this time period, my father somehow “was” the car. The car becomes involved in an accident somehow (or goes off the road) which I do not actually see occur (but does not really show more obvious damage in-dream) and is apparently red because that is the color of the blood that was from my father which supposedly “painted” the car - being a melancholy perspective rather than more macabre. Interestingly, there were no other cars in the dreams, so one assumption, in having a clear understanding in-dream that the car “was” my father, I thought maybe the car had just stopped working rather than being in an implied accident - and there was also something regarding the thickness (or “wearing down” by the environment) of the car body’s coat of paint. I see it parked in the middle of an old back road in the coulee region at different points near mostly dense forests. My father did not have any health problems at this time. Actual health problems were not more apparent until 1969 and into the 1970s when we once again lived in Florida. Because we had moved between Wisconsin and Florida a couple of times, there was also a problem at one point with my father’s blood circulation and blood thickness relative to climate adjustment later on.

My father actually died on February fourteenth of 1979 (from blood clots) - Valentine’s Day (and I have had dreams on other Valentine’s Days involving parental loss and such), but that is not the main unusual aspect of this. After his death, when I lived on King Street (on my own for the first time) I was given a couple special edition car magazines discarded from a local book store on the south-side of La Crosse. Interestingly, there was a larger fold-out in the middle of one - of the “same” red 1922 Phaeton. I had it on my wall for several years, which sort of created an unusual “retroactive” mood and “continuity” at the same time, regarding the dream. It really made an impact on the nature of my life and personal path, almost like giving me more “grounding”.

That is not all of course. I also consider this a type of “artifact” event, which happened with a couple other patterns (including a light green pendulum-shaped wall clock), and with another one (relative to the mole cricket/lobster “hybrid symbolism” seemingly coming out more or on the horizon so to speak). The 1922 red Phaeton appeared in other dreams in my youth (even before I had the poster). It became the in-dream “car of choice” in some dreams involving the “other” (a female classmate that seemed “in competition” on the spiritual plane with my wife-to-be, before I knew the mystery girl was actually a real person).

Although the majority of my dreams were precognitive in highly precise ways, often in ridiculous, impersonal, and trivial ways (such as dreaming detailed Harvey comic book plots just prior to seeing and reading them in real life, as well as new television commercials), I consider this dream element more of a personal and paranormal nature because of the lifelong time period involved and because of the several layers. Another layer was that a slightly similar reddish antique car appeared in the movie “Fear No Evil” from 1969 and it went off the road, crashing - which actually strangely tied into my dream themes regarding the “mystery girl” and the “other”.

Most mainstream people or westerners would likely find it amusing how I believe certain movies (certainly not all - it depends on the person regarding their associations) have such a strong influence on dreams and even the nature of precognition and self-fulfilling prophecy, almost like a cycle of liminal associations “feeding off each other” - after all, imagery is an extraordinarily powerful force regardless of the source (and of course I remain perplexed at why so many people dream about zombies when this aspect is completely lacking from my dream life and always has been other than one or two comedic ones in my lifetime regarding the old-school aspect of so-called zombies). I have seen amazing examples of self-fulfilling prophecy in movie associations, often absentminded reenactments by other people, sometimes somewhat startling. People sometimes dismiss the paranormal nature of certain types of dreams because they claim people seek and find patterns where there is no actual connection, which is ridiculous because of the very nature of fractals in all things, something humanity seems to only be learning about now (but which I knew of as a young child). I do not look for patterns; patterns find me.

Although other types of cars have featured in my dreams later on, including the red 1958 Plymouth Fury (“Christine”), none have held such a dominating place and seeming importance as the red 1922 Phaeton. This was solely a “dream car”. I never had close contact with one in real life.

Morning of January 1, 1975. Wednesday. (New Year’s Day.)



Summary: Two cats quickly going in opposite directions meet on our Cubitis carport and their movement ceases as they stare at each other until my dream ends. This dream was possibly at least partially influenced by the limerick “There once were two cats of Kilkenny“, as the term “Kilkenny cats” did seem to be in the back of my mind at one point in-dream but was not spoken aloud (though the cats do not fight or even move as in the limerick). A younger neighbor and friend I waited with at the school bus stop on weekday mornings had the first name of Kenny, which may have added to the associations.

It is early morning in Cubitis just prior to the time I would be going out to wait for the school bus on a normal school day and the sun has not fully risen. I become aware that I am going onto our carport at the start of my dream for this reason.

Seemingly out of nowhere, two (unfamiliar to me) cats suddenly approach each other and both assume a stand-off position in our carport near the front entrance of our house, facing north and south. Immediately before I actually see them, I get an uneasy sense of a loud two-layered human-male-like “Ugh!” as if both of the cats had somehow “said” or “exclaimed” it simultaneously, each with a sense of implied disgust at the other, immediately prior to their near-collision.

Time seems “frozen” for seemingly several minutes as the cats stand completely motionless, facing each other from only about an inch apart (nose to nose). I get an eerie feeling that they may somehow have additional human-like attributes (though there is no real evidence for that other than the unvalidated assumption that they spoke).

Soon, at least a dozen (unknown) reporters, both male and female, having donned primarily early 1960s dress styles, appear on our carport as if out of nowhere. They are evenly gathered around, both standing and crouched in a semicircle (open to the driveway), with cameras (a male near the main door seemingly using a Polaroid 185 Land Camera) and yellow notepads with pens (though I briefly notice one female making continuous cursive loops rather than words or sentences). The reporters are gathering around the cats (though not that closely - about a yard or more away) and appear to be ready to plan or begin some sort of television or radio broadcast on the event. The cats do not make any other sounds and continue to remain motionless throughout the rest of my dream. I still feel a growing and somewhat unpleasant eeriness that they are “more than cats” and I almost expect something else to happen but nothing else does. There is a strange mythical awareness that neither cat will ever move again.

Analysis from my primary standpoint: This seems to be a play on the “old year” meeting the “new year” face to face or “blocking” potential progress into the new year with any issues of the previous year, almost in a mythical sense; thus, the in-dream uneasiness and “waiting for something to happen” even though a new year is basically just a continuation of the prior day. My family did not have a Polaroid 185 Land Camera but the camera has a feature that resembles the bellows of an accordion, which my father was well-known for playing and writing popular polkas and waltzes for. The reporters had a very vague association with cartoon characters on “The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Hour” though they did not really appear cartoon-like in any way in my dream. The “reporters” are there perhaps to “record” my progress in my path into the new year and my otherwise blocked passage into the new day, one cat being “of me”, the other a potential rival with opposite opinions, perhaps; likely a classmate I have conflict with.

Analysis from my secondary standpoint: What people have seemingly failed to see throughout the entire history of so-called dream “interpretation” (as I have never seen much evidence of it in commercial publications) is that certain types of dream events often reflect the dreaming process itself. In this case, it would be my dream self being “blocked” from the knowledge of the holiday, part of me wanting to wake up in thinking I have to get up for school (though I do not) and another area of my (dream-self’s) mind saying “Hey, you can sleep longer today, what’s your hurry?”. Of course, dreams are typically multilayered, sometimes with so many layers, it sometimes takes years for certain facets to reveal themselves.

Morning of November 30, 1974. Sunday.



I am wandering around in an unfamiliar area yet somehow am also aware it is part of my school. I find a large utility room, seemingly underground, which has a portal into another dimension in a west wall. This portal starts out as a very large, long square tunnel or metallic hall, somewhat like part of a huge ventilation system - yet large enough for a person to stand fully upright within. All of the sides; floor, ceiling, and walls; are like thin aluminum but not as pliant as would be the case in reality. Still, I make a sort of hollow clomping sound (with nuances somewhat like flexing roofing tin) as I walk through the silvery hall towards an unknown destination. At one point I notice a very large pipe with green sludge flowing out.

After seemingly a fair amount of time turning down various identical passageways, I end up in another world, apparently an alien planet. The race of human-like beings are about seven feet tall on average and have striped purple and white skin in a zebra-like pattern. Their features remind me vaguely of a more detailed and “realistic” Doctor Seuss character (such as a hairless Grinch) as previous in-dream aliens have sometimes appeared, but still with that sense of cartoon-like unlikelihood in conscious afterthought.

The dominant focus is of a giant beige-brown cobra (about six feet high when in striking position) that is known as “Terra Cotta”. It is originally kept in a cage of sorts by the “Zebra Men” but gets out shortly after I enter their world. It follows me back into my world (yet does not pose any direct threat at any time). Several friends and I plan to trap it back in its own world again, the main one being Charles D on his bicycle in one scene. There is some discussion of using it as a money-making endeavor with a carnival or some such, and also something about writing a book, but this does not clarify or continue.

For some reason, “Terra Cotta” seems a very familiar titular form in-dream at one point, apparently via a false memory, of being the name of a well-known war movie; I think about Pearl Harbor. In real life, after my dream, I mentioned it to my best friend Toby T on the school bus and he apparently had a similar association.

A partial influence of this dream may very loosely be based on the terra cotta warriors (also written as terracotta and terra-cotta) which I had not really known much about at this time. There is a terra cotta “monk with cobra” in Mianyang, China.

Morning of November 9, 1974. Saturday.



This is perhaps one of my funniest early teenage dreams (firstly at 13) that there were a few versions of (eventually “practiced” lucidly into a fully comedic dream ending the same way as the original) and which I also wrote a detailed story of years ago including additional elements which different dream versions manifested randomly.

The main characters are me, my best friend Toby T, and a version of Brenda W who looks and sounds quite different and seems to be a symbol of my unknown wife-to-be as with most dreams she featured in (but not all). It starts out in my bedroom in Cubitis, sometime in the morning around nine o'clock, and on a Saturday. Toby and Brenda had both walked from their houses, which are not all that far from mine but did not see anything unusual, apparently.

There is a smaller orange spacecraft that is mottled with a darker brownish orange in a sort of fancy “rounded flame” design. It is to the southernmost edge of my house, on my side (east) of the highway. The spacecraft looks much like a larger Volkswagen Beetle without wheels and is facing north. The two “aliens” that walk about, seemingly looking for certain kinds of flowers or weeds, seem very mysterious in a way, but actually look mostly like thinner “lighter” versions of the Apollo astronauts and their faces are not visible through the helmet. Looking at the “face” of their helmets, I am reminded much of the screen of an Etch-a-Sketch but with a more mysterious “glow” somehow.

The “V” of the Volkswagen symbol may be relevant here due to my life-long layered associations with this special letter (relating to higher levels or a play on “higher planes” as well as the formation birds fly in). Also, at the time in real life, I had a large orange model Volkswagen Beetle (remote-control, and which ran on real fuel - it made a lot of noise, somewhat like a miniature lawn mower) that my father had gotten me for a Christmas and birthday combo, but I had not played with it for awhile at that point.

The three of us talk for awhile about the possible intent of these aliens. They otherwise move and walk about just like normal men. We consider how one of us should hide on the spacecraft to see where they go from here or maybe even see where they came from. I decide to volunteer for the mission. Eventually, something interesting happens in which this dream references a past dream as if it really happened (recurring). Brenda is able to help me become invisible with some sort of witchcraft (Wendy reference likely linked to the “Casper Spaceship” series) so that I will be able to hide on the spacecraft prior to their leaving. (This comes from a much older dream where I became invisible through the power of a smaller candy-cane-shaped walking cane and was able to help her marionette play be the most successful at the school.) She is also able to somehow hypnotize the aliens from a distance as an additional precaution that they will not be able to see me at any point. She plays around by creating a simple “happy face” (eyes and mouth only) on the front of the helmet/visor of the supposed aliens in an Etch-a-Sketch-like fashion.

I eventually go outside and into the backseat of the spacecraft, on the right side. There is no fear or concern, but there is a very strange emotion of leaving my home and not seeing it again as well as an odd feeling of being ready to leave the planet itself but still with a strange sadness. (The mood and sensations of this entire dream event in the last section was somewhat precognitive in the exact way I felt in real life upon riding an airplane the first time, something I physically had not experienced but which was correctly represented in my dream somehow; emotionally, mentally, and physically; yet also precognitive to the closer upcoming time of our actual move from that location in Cubitis by car.) The two aliens come into the craft from both sides at the same time, the inside being mostly just like an actual Volkswagen Beetle with a few additional airplane-like indicators. They do not notice me. We start to ride along (somewhat like a hovercraft at first) and eventually rise into the air, going faster and faster. It is a strange sensation. However, Brenda’s hypnosis seems to have worked too well and they seem unsure of what to do. In fact, they just sort of sit for awhile as if forgetting what some of the controls are for, mostly seeming stupefied at their predicament. Although I cannot see their faces, I see them turn to look at each other a couple times (though seeing only the sides of their helmets).

Soon, the telephone lines become a potential hazard and the craft rocks and dodges them somewhat randomly with a few near-misses. Eventually the craft goes really fast but slows again, seemingly over southern Mexico or the northern area of South America (although I get the impression of Cleveland, Ohio for some reason, but that seems illogical in light of the residents and general look - although we were supposedly going north, not south or west). I notice that the two aliens/Apollo astronauts have vanished completely (apparently from Brenda’s magic being too powerful), both becoming a small pile of silvery dust in their seats (my Etch-a-Sketch had leaked silver dust in real life - I even ended up cracking it open to look inside but of course I immediately threw it out worrying about being poisoned). The spacecraft plunges downward, landing “perfectly” on the top of a merry-go-round in a playground or park (I am aware it is a Saturday) with a large number of Mexican or Brazilian children running about, some playing in sprinklers and laughing loudly at the spacecraft. I am aware that none of them speak English, yet I still feel a compulsion to ask in English (more to the implied unseen “hidden cameras”) “Hey, anyone know how to fly this thing?” A Latino boy of about nine jumps into the front looking around curiously and laughing in a cheerful way (Interestingly, I sense his name is Lorenzo, which I realize at this point is now the name of my next-youngest son but named after a grandfather). I get a slight impression of the song “Saturday in the Park” (1972 album Chicago V - another “V”). Thus it ends as a comedy farce which seems to color my day in a humorous, useful way regardless of the “failed” outcome.

There are a few precognitive layers in this as is often the case. One, the appearance of Brenda with a different personality representing my not-yet-known wife. Two, the feelings of leaving our home in Cubitis to move to Wisconsin when at the time of this dream, I did not know we would be moving and I had not even considered it (as well as the later airplane ride nuances). Three, the orange colors of the “spaceship” remind me of the U-Haul trailer my father got during that same move later in real life. Four, the recurring idea of “getting past Mexico” to continue on across the ocean to be with my soulmate in Australia. Five, the young boy named Lorenzo - my future son at the time?

Morning of November 3, 1974. Sunday.

Dream #: 2,876-07. Reading time: 52 sec.



In my dream, Susan R is sitting outside on a brick fence in Arcadia late at night, and I am standing, facing her. She tells me that something will eventually be happening to take me on a different path, away from her (implying destiny, with a sense of finality and certainty).

On cue, a Catherine wheel detaches, or someone throws it from somewhere unknown in the distance (perhaps three or four blocks away), and it moves high up into the sky. I think of shooting stars (even though the feature is first going upward before arcing downward). I am unsure what could have propelled it like this. Susan tells me that I will hear my name in a song relative to this event. My “dream girl” (Zsuzsanna before we met) connects to my destiny.

Though there is the essence of eeriness, it is not ominous. I watch the small and distant object on an arced curve, soon resembling a glowing pinwheel. (The scenario seems partly influenced by reel three of a “Casper the Friendly Ghost” View-Master pack, titled “The Falling Star,” where an anthropomorphic five-pointed star befriends Casper.)

---

The song “Catherine Wheels” (by Crowded House, 1993) uses my first name (Claude). Zsuzsanna and Paul Hester shared a brief correspondence, and he hugged her once in waking life.

---

Night of October 15, 1974. Tuesday.



The companion to this entry can be found here: “The Gate” connection

This was another dream about being underground and near a “gate” to an “underworld” - a very long sparsely recurring dream that I had also written as a longer story, called “Diamond Cave” - which had a large number of different ideas and imagery, a few having been similar to the later movie “The Gate” (but with far more additional mixed elements) - including the “eye on the palm of the hand” symbol. The diamond-like patterns through much of it was a type of in-dream hypnagogic-like imagery that was also common at that time. I had also illustrated some of the easier-to-illustrate parts, such as the “flatworm demons” seen at the end of my dream.

There is a scene near the beginning of several of my friends (including Toby T and Johnny C). They are sleeping (or in suspended animation?) in five mostly transparent coffins made of diamonds and turning about in an implied pentagon shape, floating in the air in the semidarkness in an undefined area.

There are later - geodes with diamond-like light patterns that glow and “dance” with various holographic light patterns (mostly bluish), like a swaying curtain that also crosses over itself. This was possibly inspired by a Donald Duck comic book story that implies meteorites are filled with precious jewels like diamonds, opals, and rubies - which was a recurring theme for a few weeks when much younger - something I even believed for a short time. Also, it seems as if the “diamond coffins” are some form of large casket-shaped transparent geodes kept afloat by magnetism.

There is a long-lasting scene of running through a very long hall or underground tunnel (or a fancy marble hall built into the underground tunnel, yet with imposing tree roots near divided larger doorway-like sections). I am moving past endless statues on each side of me that represent Greek gods and goddesses, mostly “good”, a few “demonic” or less human-like in anatomy. There is a sort of teal hue in parts of the imagery.

My dream’s last scene is of a larger “conference room” in an underground cave. It is filled to capacity with arrow-headed flatworm-like “demons” of perfectly alternating black and white figures, “standing”/upright, and turning (slightly twisting around) to look at me, each, either white with black eyes, or black with white eyes, similar to an M.C. Escher picture expressing perfect or near-perfect contrast of these “demonic flatworm” figures. There is one figure that seems to be addressing the rest on some sort of podium or lectern. There is no sound or speaking by them (and no perceived threat).

Looking over notes and doing more research, I have decided to consider this as lightly (impersonally) precognitive, because of the elements matching the later movie’s elements only for these connections (and not as precise in imagery or more multiple-layered details as other precognitive events have typically been):

1. The glowing geodes relating to opening an underground “gate” and being part of the overall theme.

2. Groups of “small demons” seeming to be in “conference” underground (though not of similar appearance).

3. Underground scenes with tree roots very much like my dream in distance, size, and depth orientation.

4. The eerie apocalyptic tree house scene (creating a very pure sense of time displacement), which also goes farther back in other dreams.

5. The fact that in the actual movie, it shows the imp’s arm (after being severed by the door) fall and turn into scattering worm-like creatures.

6. The movie also included a levitation scene.

There are also elements from other recurring childhood dreams that are vaguely similar, such as the idea of “saving the world” by firing a rocket (from “The Day There Was No Sun”).

Another loosely related link is of insects vanishing from a jar - such as the moths in the jar in the movie (but relating to a recurring real-life experience). Both my wife and I when fairly young used to collect smaller water bugs (in my case, smaller water-boatman beetles - the larvae which coincidentally resemble the “worms” in the movie) in glass jars with lids. We both experienced how the beetles (usually around seven or eight or more) seemed to have completely vanished from the sealed jar after only one night. In my case, I simply attributed it to microbes or some such eating them - or maybe weird properties of the ditch water (such as too much acidity), but was never certain of what really happened. There was hardly ever any sediment left in the water or residue at the bottom, either.

There were also a couple times in real life when I went to touch an (aquatic?) orange worm-like thing (that looked and moved somewhat like an accordion) in a puddle (left after a long rain) that mostly vanished after touching, leaving only a few particles and broken pieces within only a few seconds. This also puzzled me and even triggered several dreams about “ongoing creation of life”, such as “Niemeyer’s Penguin” (or “Penguin in a Jar”) and The New Life.

Very early morning of September 21, 1974. Saturday.



This dream was likely inspired in part by the often low-rated 1972 movie called “Frogs”, with Ray Milland. In my dream, I am spending the night with classmates at some sort of estate in the middle of a cypress swamp; probably in Florida near an area where we went on field trips in real life (as a toddler, I lived in a cypress swamp). My bus driver, Mr. F, is there instead of any of our teachers and he appears to be very scared and walks around with a rifle. (In real life, Mr. F was a kind but very unusual character. He would have some sort of severe panic attack whenever he heard the sound of someone whistling, even at a very low volume, and start shaking and yelling, almost driving off the road. He always acted a bit distracted and nervous as it was, and I was amazed he was allowed to be a school bus driver at all. He even bumped into me with the actual bus, although I did not get hurt, when I was crossing in front as we were always told to do, as he must have been distracted and just started to drive off again right after he had stopped.)

The “killer frogs” come out precisely at midnight. We all hide in a building (which is - or is like - a tourist station in a park). Not much happens, though. There is some concern about them breaking through a window, but they do not. I see them all in a row, lined up like soldiers, even possibly with a seeming unseen group leader. I view some scenes like this at ground level somehow (even from an angle that would imply being slightly under the ground’s surface and a few other odd “camera angles”), but am not in any danger at any time. Even though it is supposed to be “horror”, it is somehow more like “Halloween fun” for me in my dream.

There is a rather odd scene where I seem to be dramatically preaching about why the frogs are seeking revenge against humanity. One line is about them being run over by bicycles. (From a real-life event where I had actually run over a toad with my bicycle in the walkway from the carport to the shed).

Later on, everything is quiet (in the morning) and everything is normal again.

There were later a couple similar dreams as this. I also wrote a story in real life called “I’m Afraid of Toads” based somewhat on my dream (even though in my dream, they were frogs). Of course, I had no fear of either toads or frogs, and in fact, used to carry toads around as a boy even when they peed on me. I once set up a “toad city” in the Cubitis carport (before my father added the extra bedroom) in an old washtub (with dirt and cardboard buildings and the “Toad City” sign) I borrowed from my parents - and watched them for a couple weeks then let them go.

In real life, my female friend and classmate, Brenda W, copied my story mostly word for word (including the title) but solely replacing the word “toads” with “spiders” in each and every case - and several people liked it. I found that so odd an act, I was not remotely angry or annoyed, only amused, especially when she became very embarrassed when someone was reading “her” story out loud on the bus and I listened in.

Morning of September 11, 1974. Wednesday.



I am physically involved with a Latina classmate who is lying on her back. There are two older female classmates on each side seemingly giving her instructions as well as holding her legs so that she does not roll over or kick on a large platform holding the hanging Liberty Bell. Her blue jeans tear off like tissue paper. This takes place in the southern area of my backyard in Cubitis, very close to the southeast corner of the house. The cubic platform seems about three feet high and probably has room for about five people in side-by-side lying-down position. I am facing north.

---

• This was partly influenced by the television movie “Born Innocent”, seen the night of September 10th.
• This dream is an excellent example of a metaphorical rendering to halt the waking transition even though my lucidity is minimal. A bell symbolizes the waking prompt but because it is cracked, it is associated with the symbolic pause of the waking prompt to make the dream last longer as a result. (This is not by active dream self will but by native dream state metaphor).
• This was precognitive in being based on the exact location of my first real intimate experience in Cubitis.
• In real life, this classmate often wore blue jeans with a large stop sign patch on the bottom. Her last name ended in “bell”.

---

Morning of September 8, 1974. Sunday.



This is my original dream journal entry name from the 1970s. I am not exactly sure why I chose that name other than “heart” being associated with blood circulation and lava representing blood in an in-dream symbolic sense. “Volcano Maze” probably would have made a little more sense, I suppose, but my “automatic” title clarified the alternate associations and overall meaning much better.

It is early morning. It is on the weekend and Steve W and Tina L and I have discovered a cave in a mountain in the middle of Highway Seventeen about four houses south of my Cubitis home. This seems a bit strange, I suppose, but the idea it is a dream never occurs. Cars will just have to drive around it somehow, I suppose, or perhaps drive through it thus far.

Over time, we wander around and discover many maze-like passageways. It turns out to be a volcano which isslowly becoming active, but volcanoes are not really full of caves and explorable tunnels in this manner - and there are even stalactites and stalagmites of glowing volcanic rock. The fire and lava exists at various locations in the “maze”. There are various pools of lava of different sizes in different “rooms” almost as if it was man-made. We decide to leave, as the mazes seem to be getting bigger and the volcano seems to be growing. I find my way out first, but Steve and Tina are still somewhere in the “volcano”. They do manage to escape (from the southern area) and run down the highway to where I am. When I look in their direction, I see waves of reddish and yellowish “flame” behind them, but it is more like a blur of swaying columns of color (like an effect in a movie). There is also an idea that we should go back in with cameras and make some sort of documentary, but that does not sound like a good idea.

This dream mainly represents my curiosity about the human heart and the various ways blood circulates in the body. It occurred around the same time I had drawn a complex picture of the heart and its functions. Steve W was impressed by my drawing skills (I even did poster art for his student political campaign) but Tina was not impressed and always reflected more of a dominant sarcasm towards everyone.

Morning of July 27, 1974. Saturday.

Dream #: 2,777-01. 38 second read.





In the late morning, I am in the southwest bedroom of my home in Cubitis, looking out our jalousie windows (south wall) toward the southwest.

I sense my mother sitting in the room (to my left), possibly sewing.

There is a radio broadcast about a tornado watch. I anticipate its approach from the southwest, but I remain unconcerned.

When the "tornado" arrives, it is invisible. There is no evidence of wind. I vividly feel our house gently lifting about three feet from the ground and slowly floating north for several feet, with no discernible damage. I remain by the windows, feeling amused. I think of it as the remaining part of the storm. The neighbor's house to the south remains on the ground.

---

As I have explained numerous times in my reports, a tornado often results from my metacognitive anticipation of the vestibular-motor sensations caused by REM sleep. With the outcome of this narrative, there should be no doubt whatsoever.

---

Morning of July 20, 1974. Saturday.

Dream #: 2,770-01. Optimized 1 min 15 sec read.




In the late morning, I develop a growing concern about a brown recluse spider being in my room in the Cubitis house.

I go to the carport, intending to go into the backyard, considering it might be safer outside. As I walk, I look down and see the brown recluse "spider" embedded in the back of my right hand with minimal blood (eight small red spots in two clusters of four).

My dream self sees it as a "spider" even though it is a capacitor with eight wire "legs" (four jutting from each end). I can vaguely make out random letters and numbers on the side of the "spider's" cylindrical body (but I do not recall the sequence). My sense of awe feels artificial: as if I am creating a scene for a movie. I sense its milky "venom" is not yet in my bloodstream. My dream fades before I go beyond the east end of the carport (that would otherwise lead to our backyard).

---

Causation and Influences:

Second-hand "dream interpretation" is impracticable. There are many reasons why. As a metacognitive dreamer, my dreams predominantly respond to my navigation of the dream state while in it. Here, there is a specific amalgam of two literal influences. They are both tied to somatosensory phasing from sleeping on my hand and the "buzzing" effect from lack of blood flow in this position. The first was my concern about a brown recluse spider being in my room in waking life. The second was minimally injuring my hand while tampering with the inside of a radio. The screwdriver also slipped, and capacitor gel squirted into my eye, creating my dream's illusory implication of a capacitor as a "spider" with "venom." There are additional influences, one relating to the "buzzing" (or tingling) from lack of blood flow as correlating with electricity and associations with neural energy (in navigating the dream state).

---

Morning of July 13, 1974. Saturday



Most of my dream takes place in the southwest bedroom of our Cubitis house. I am not aware of my parents being present at any time. On my father’s large dresser that faces out from the east wall (just to the left of the door) sits a large greenish stuffed bunny, which, despite the fact that it is a fictional and unlikely feature, I am not at all surprised by. It sits on the leftmost side of the dresser.

Over time, I seem to understand that the stuffed bunny somehow works as a “traffic light” or more correctly, some sort of warning beacon, as it has the potential to turn different colors regarding the level of safety in the environment. I am somehow aware that it is akin to a barometer in some ways and is green because everything is okay.

Eventually, an earthquake begins. Parts of the ceiling start falling. Unrealistically, the falling debris includes broken rafters, small stones, and thin flat pieces of concrete. Through the falling debris, I see that the stuffed bunny is now red and I feel a sense of awe and wonder. Even though I sense it might be the end of the world, I am not terrified. This is the last thing I see and on one level, it almost seems like a mood I had deliberately manifested.

---

After my dream, my father told my mother and I that he was thinking of closing down our rabbit farm. In fact, he did take down two sections of our rabbit shed and a few pieces of concrete, along with boards that had been used as rafters and such, sat around for a time. This is why I have decided my dream had a precognitive layer as well as being a typical real-time dreaming metaphor.

---

• The bedroom setting was created because a person is often sleeping in a bedroom when having a dream. If a person is not sleeping in a bedroom in reality, it still, perhaps even more so, signifies the potential of being asleep. This is what I refer to as a “dream sign”.
• Although my father had a rabbit farm on our property at the time, a rabbit is also a real-time indicator of being asleep. Rabbits (except cottontail rabbits) live underground in burrows or warrens, which is associated with being unconscious (or exploring the depths of the unconscious mind within sleep). Therefore, a rabbit could be considered a third-order dream sign. (Think “Alice in Wonderland”.)
• Because a stuffed animal may have associations with a pillow, a stuffed rabbit becomes a dream sign on two different levels. The bedroom setting makes it a three-way dreaming indicator, yet I did not become lucid.
• Red is one of the three waking prompt colors (yellow, orange, red), red having the strongest priority, sometimes suggesting having slept for too long.
• The ceiling falling merely means cessation of the dream state and the dream self incarnation. Secondly, it is a subliminal projection of the biological falling sensation, that same level of subliminal projection that creates airplanes and birds in dreams (which represent real-time consciousness displacement, that is, being unconscious yet still aware at one level).
• We never had a stuffed rabbit in our home in reality.