The Labrynth of the Mind

Before bed I took 800mg of valerian and 0.25mg of melatonin.

Fragments from early REM period

I am walking around the halls of my university. There are a lot of people in the halls with me. I believe that I am on my way to class...

... I am part of Uru again. There is a linking book somewhere, I think...

... I am looking at a computer screen. There is a picture of something entitled "dreamsign". It looks like the logo for one of the filmmaking companies. The kind of Celtic looking thing. As I look at it, it looks more like the Yeesha symbol from Uru...

Going to my Grandparents'

I am on my way to visit my Grandparents' house. There seems to be a time constraint on this, and my mother and I are trying to figure out the best way for me to get there. In the end, we decide that I will drive part way there, and when I am almost to their house to park the car and take a ferry across a small lake along the way. Somehow I think that this will be cost effective and possibly save time. I will call and schedule the ferry while I am driving.

Former Workplace

My mother and I are at my former workplace (a toy store) looking for a specific toy. We look in a few places for this thing (some kind of military hovercraft) but can't find quite what we are looking for. Then I remember that it is probably in the action figure section. I take her over to that area, but when we get there we see that all but one of the shelves are missing. I ask one of the current stockers what happened to the other shelves. He doesn't know (he is new). I ask another employee, but he doesn't know either.

Lucid at the Fair

I am walking down the road in the middle of our county fair. It is late in the season, and there are not many people visiting. Many of the stands are closing up for the year, and I look as I walk for familiar games and people. I am in my uniform (as though I were there to staff the public relations booth as I did when I was a park ranger). I am not there as a park ranger, but I have some other reason to go to the fairs. I think how nice it is that I get to go back to these old familiar places, and walk down the road feeling at ease.

I try to think of why I am at the fair. I can't exactly remember. Then I remember that being at the fair is a dreamsign. I stop walking, and turn to look behind me. Things look OK, but I am beginning to realize that I am dreaming.
I try to justify my being at the fair, but I can't. "So this is a dream," I say.

I look up at a concession stand to my right. As I do, I become aware that the dream is losing realism. I am in danger of losing the dream, and consider either preparing for a DEILD or hoping to WILD when I wake up. Then I decide to try my Dream Posession technique to stabilize it, and attempt to summon Monk. I am vaguely aware of somebody's presence at my side, and try to take posession of their body. This is partly sucessful, and I blink a few times to try to get the vision clear.

I decide to fly, hoping this will further put me in the dream. I float up into the air, and then come down through the top of the concession stand. There is a woman working in there. She is not overly beautiful, but she is pleasing to look at. I decide to kiss her, and do so. Around here I loose the dream.

Archaeology

I am with one of my colleagues at an archeological excavation. We are back at a rockshelter where we were two years ago, and are at first digging through snow. My colleague, Dr. B., points to a birdbath in the middle of a field and tells me how much he dislikes it. Then he describes a statue that used to sit in it, and how much he hated that. I think the birdbath is kind of attractive, and like the idea of the statue.

We continue digging through the snow. We try not to make too many footprints in it, but Dr. B. seems to be making a lot. Now the snow is moss, and we are removing layers of it. Now we are no longer excavating, but pulling weeds. And now we are digging through dirt looking for trash.

There is a lot of trash in the dirt, and we move down a line sorting through rubbish to throw away. I come across a pile of items, with some electronic equipment and stacks of old records. I am happy with this find, since I get to keep whatever I come across.

Took 0.5 mg of melatonin before bed. Did a visualization MILD, visualizing my University.

Lucid Fragment

I am walking down the street near my university when I discover that I'm dreaming. I am able to change aspects of the landscape as I have visualized myself doing while awake.

Beautiful Women (fragment)

I am once again walking to class at the university. As I cut across a parking lot, a bunch of beautiful women show up. They are either African or African American, and look like models. I walk along with them, or they walk along with me, or something. Maybe this is even part of the above dream, but I can't remember.

Kids in Danger

I am in my own home (which also seems to be another place, maybe my old church). There are a bunch of kids with me. There is some kind of adventure going on, like a Boxcar Children story, or Tom Sawyer. I am a kid in this dream, named Taylor, or Huck, or Oliver or something like that. The other kids are out in our main living room, and there are bad guys outside. There is an adult with us, who leaves to do something that is supposedly important. I don't trust this guy.

Upon leaving us kids alone, the man says "keep watching out this window. Don't go anywhere or do anything, just keep watching. If they come, this is the window they will come through."

I know that there is a window upstairs that the villains may come through. I also have a feeling that the man is in with the bad guys. I decide to go watch out the back window. On the way, I stop in the closet to get a gun to take with me. I look in the closet, and see my 20 gauge and my father's 12 gauge shotgun. We have a couple of .22 handguns in there, but the shotguns are more powerful. I pick up my father's shotgun, and look for some ammunition. There is a box of shells on a kind of wooden ledge above the guns, but they seem to be fishing lures. I root through and find some shells I think will work, and drop them into the shotgun.

I run back to the back door (also the front door of my RL home) with my gun. I look out the window, and apparently see something. I dash out the front door, snapping the shotgun shut. Then I run a little ways, in pursuit of the bad guys.

While I'm running, I notice the shotgun seems awkward to carry. I look down, and see that it has more than the one barrell it usually has. As I look, I first count 2, then 4, and finally 6 or 8 barrells. Not only that, there are two triggers.

"How strange," I say to myself. "I know that this gun only has one barrell. What could be going on?" Immediately the thought comes to my mind "I must be dreaming. There's no other logical explanation."

I look around. Everything seems so real, it doesn't seem possible that I am dreaming. But there is no other explanation for the gun, and I know that I often think my dreams seem real. I turn around and head back for the house. "I'm dreaming," I say again, trying to grasp the idea. It just seems so real.

On my way back to the house, the plot and the realism overcome my realization that this is a dream, and I loose lucidity again.

Private Eye

I am a private detective. I have an office in a large city, which is also my current university, which is also my former university. Inside this office, you can walk into a sort of screen which hides your image from the outside. While I am hidden like this, my partner goes out onto the front porch of our office with a beautiful woman. I know the woman is trouble, but it's his decision. I watch from the inside, hidden behind this screen, while the woman shoots my partner. Then she shoots a few witnesses.

"We'd better shoot all the witnesses," her accomplice says.
"I don't see anyboy else around," she says, "nobody is in the building. Come on, let's get out of here."

I pick up my gun, and dash out the front door after them. They travel down the road, and turn left. I follow. They go down an alley, and I pull out my gun to be ready in case I come across them suddenly. Looking down the alley, I can see a house at the end that they are headed towars. It is one of the houses that I lived in when I was little. Apparently, this is their hideout.

I inspect my weapon, and notice that it is not a gun at all, but my set of throwing knives. I guess that's better than nothing, so I pull one out in case I need it. I look again, and I see it is once again a handgun. Then I remember that I never put bullets in the gun. At first I think that I keep the gun loaded, but upon closer inspection I see that the chambers are empty. I grimace with disgust at my oversight. What kind of detective am I?

I turn back towards the office. As I walk, crowds of people fill the street. The street is also a hallway now, I am at one of my colleges and classes are just letting out. I turn towards my office, which is now the maintenance section where I used to work. I need to get back, but some girl I know comes up to me. She wants me to look at her pictures, by which she means she wants me to go to her adult website. I don't really want to do this, but she keeps insisting. She shows me some rather obscene pictures of herself, but I manage to push past her to my office. Around here the dream ends.

I took 800 mg of valerian before bed last night. As often happens after taking valerian, I had some very unsettling dreams. Perhaps not so much what others would call nightmares, but so vivid as to be hard to go through.

Nursing Home

I go to a nursing home to visit my great aunt. She is supposedly suffering from Alzheimer's, but seems to be bright and talkative. In fact, she is almost a little overbearing. She keeps talking real loud, laughing, and telling stories. I wonder if she really has Alzheimer's, or is somehow cured.

Death of my Father

My father goes to a doctor's appointment. On the way, he calls me, and tells me that he is dying. There is nothing I can do to save him, as he is having a heart attack right on the spot.

For a while after this, the dream is spent in tears. This dream really felt like RL, due in part to the valerian supplement. I go home, and my mother informs me that they found my father's body. I say that I know. We cry together. After a time, I think that perhaps I should try to go on with life as usual.

I look up. My father is sitting on the couch. "Enough of this crying," he says. "What are we going to do tonight?" We look at him, and my mother says something about how loved ones will appear after their death when you are in mourning. He disappears, and I go back to crying. He shows up again once or twice, and appears to act like nothing is unusual. I know it is not real, though.

A little later in the dream I am talking with someone. We are discussing grief, and how I shouldn't cry too much. I bring up a part I read in CS Lewis' "A Grief Observed" where he talks about giving in to tears as almost a self-indulgant pleasure. I say that an honorable person should not do that.

Baseball

I am at a basebell game, watching the Cleveland Indians win some kind of championship game. They hit the winning home run, and it comes my direction. I am unable to catch it, and it goes out of the stadium. I get really excited about the Indians winning.

Still happy and excited, I walk down the street, leaving the stadium. I look at the yard of a house on my right, which is just behind the stadium. I see a baseball sitting in the yard, and can see a path in the snow running from the direction of the ballpark, as though it had landed and then slid across the ground before coming to a stop. I know that this is the home run winning baseball. I pull it over to me with my foot since there is a wooden fence around the yard and I don't want to trespass. I am about to pick up the ball when I realize that perhaps if it is in their yard it rightfully belongs to them. I debate about this, knowing that the winning ball will be worth something. I think that the honest thing to do is to bury the ball under snow, and send a letter to the owner of the house telling them that the ball is in their yard.

Visiting my Old College

I am in the parking lot of the community college that I used to attend. I decide to go in and check the place out, not really having an excuse. I walk into the lobby, and say hello to the receptionist who I used to know. There are two ladies sitting behind the desk who barely notice me, so I say hello again. They look up, but don't seem to recognize me.

I walk down the hallway, which is full of people. Classes are letting out, I think. I don't even consider the possibilit that this is a dream, even though it is one of my most common dreamsigns. Down the hallway to my right is my old boss, whom I used to work for while I attended classes at this college. I don't feel like talking to him or anyone I used to know for some reason, so I walk the other way and try to blend in with the crowd.

Grandfather's Ph.D.

We are at my grandparents' house. My mother and I are discussing my Grandfather's attempt to get a Ph.D. "Why not?" we say, "he has already published 8 books." I look at a bookshelf of books, all written by my grandfather.

Yeah, that's it. What kind of dream recall was that?!

I have been very busy for the past week with exams to study for, and rather stressed. As a result, I have not been keeping up with my dream journal and my recall is getting a little out of shape. Last night I was a little on edge, so I took 800mg valerian. I slept briefly from 12:30am to about 3:00, and then had difficulty getting back to sleep. I took approximately 1/4mg of melatonin at this point. I then briefly attempted a MILD, but my mind was so restless it was difficult to keep any mantra or visualization. Nonetheless, I appear to have been successful in something

Beat Up

... I am part of a much larger adventure. We are in school or a library or something, possibly in Japan. It might even be a hotel. There is a large swimming pool in one room, and we are chasing after some villain. I apprehend this guy in the pool room, which is also some kind of laboratory. Cornered, he turns on me.

The guy is Japanese, and much larger than I am. I am no match for him, and we circle around a set of shelves containing chemical equipment and some glassware. I think to myself "this is a very odd situation. Not only that, I'm in a school, near a swimming pool, and there are lots of other things that are dreamsigns. I don't ordinarily fight Japanese guys in real life. I'll bet I'm dreaming."Sure enough, I soon realize, I am!

My Japanese opponent takes advantage of my temporary disorientation upon realizing that I am dreaming. As I stand there laughing to myself and patting myself on the back, he jumps around to my side of the shelves and closes in. "Ha ha!" I laugh, "You do realize this is a dream, don't you? You're no match for me!"

He continues to come towards me. I decide I had better stabilize the dream, so I try a dream posession technique like the one I had great success with in a lucid dream last week. I decide to try to posess my opponent, but he won't stand still. I can see that he won't cooperate for me, and I remember that part of the success last time came from the fact that I posessed my dream self, Monk. I summon Monk.

"Monk," I order, "Appear right here." I indicate to the spot next to me. I look, and there he is, waiting. I step sideways until I should be standing in the same spot as him, and blink a few times until I am seeing with his eyes. I am starting to get this posession technique down, but it was not easy to complete last night because the Japanese fellow was still attacking me.

"Wait a minute!" I say, not quite understanding why he is still playing his part. "Let me stabilize this dream." He doesn't wait, but takes a swing at me. I glance around quickly, trying to notice details and activate my senses. I am partially successfull in this, though it is not easy to do a proper job of it with a huge thug trying to pulverize my skull.

"OK," I say, visiously turning on my assailant, "If that's the way you want it, fine! You're no match for me, this is my dream. I'm lucid, you know."

The Japanese thug just sneers at me, and swings at me again. "Watch this," I say. I visualize a force of energy coming out of my finger, and into the stomach of my attacker. Not much happens, so I thrust at him, feeling the energy as I do so. He looks down at his stomach, as though I had just poked him. Then he laughs.

"You really thought that that would work?" he roars, "Well watch this!" He punches me in the stomach and I double over. Then he grabs me by the shoulders, and throws me into the wall. My breath is knocked out of me. This is not going at all well. Pinning me against the wall by the shoulders, he peers into my face (all this time smiling in a self-satisfied way as though he knows DC's aren't supposed to do this). "What about this?" he says, punching me in the face. "How is the dream going now?" Then he slaps my face a couple of times, pulls back his fist, and delivers a punch directly between the eyes that wakes me up.

At the Lake

My famliy and I are at a lake. It is on that I used to dream of more frequently, but have not for a while. We wade a little bit at a beach, and come across some large rocks in the water. My Dad starts climbing around on them, jumping from one to another. There is one jump he is hesitant to make, but when I get out onto the rocks I attempt the jump. It isn't like you fall very far if you miss, the rocks are only a few inches out of the water. I miss one jump, and splash into the water. My parents chuckle, and that's all that happens. Pretty anticlimactic for a dream after taking valerian.

There be Giants

We are in a place with many tunnels. I'm not entirely sure who we are, but I think is it something like the crew of the starship Enterprise. But I'm also at my grandparents' house. Anyway, it is more like a huge sewer system. Many adventures take place that are a little fuzzy when I try to recall them, but they invlolve some mythtical creatures and some robots. A robot crawls inside of the Moon, which somehow causes time to stand still. This does something with a giant.

We now have to defeat this giant. The location is like a shopping mall now. An element of romance has been added, as I am trying to win a girl I believe. There are other people around. I can't remember what they are supposed to be doing. Anway, we can hear the footsteps of the giant down one of the tunnels. They get closer and closer, and we realize we had better seek cover. I try to run up a narrow set of stairs, but the giant follows. There is a scene where two of us and the giant are running around and around the stairs, jumping down to a lower part of the stairwell and running back up again. Then I run into a department store and hide among the shelves.

The giant is captured, and some of our group sets to work on performing a labotomy or something. They open it's skull, and pour in some liquid. A few minutes later, the giant wakes up. I am afraid that he might turn on us again, so I stay in hiding (for some reason, I was a big coward in this dream). Soon the giant approaches the place where I am hiding. Some of my companions come running in to tell me that everything is OK, and the giant is harmless now.