lucid

I dozed off in a chair in the living room this morning and my grandma was talking to my daughter in another chair. I think her voice kept me aware as I drifted off, and I was able to slowly get up out of my body.
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I stand up and look at my grandma and daughter and think of the totm to ask where someone is from. I almost ask one of them but decide to move on. I walk very slowly towards the door. The air feels thick and filled with static electricity. I get sucked back into my physical body a few times before eventually making it to the glass door. My grandma squishes in front of me and opens it for me. I move awkwardly out into the sunlight.

The landscape is enormous and clear of trees, allowing me a breathtaking view of rolling hills. There is a short tower or two that remind me of fire-watch towers. I walk out a little more and look around. I see my grandpa walking towards the end of the house wearing a really big bright red cowboy hat, the rest of his outfit morphing rapidly. I use intent, expectation and belief to will myself to zoom towards him, but he disappears around the edge before I can get there. I turn the corner and look where he has gone, now flying.

It looks like the back of a stock yard. Bare dusty dirt flanks wooden plank walls and random sections of metal corral fence are standing around in various configurations. I see the entity, no longer my grandpa, disappear around a pile of equipment. I zoom down there. The person keeps morphing and running away as I follow them around trying to catch up. They change into a fantasy-style warrior woman with a long curved sword and she stops to practice her swordsmanship, doing a series of complicated moves. I am able to catch up to her and she lunges at me from the inside of a large corral.

She tries to stab me with a long spear and I grab hold of it. She then tries to slash at me with her sidearm which is a short sword and I grab her wrist. She gets a desperate, fearful look on her face. I tell her to calm down and that I only want to ask her a nice simple question. My voice has no sound, like the rest of the dream so far. I can still vaguely hear my grandma's and daughter's voices in the waking world. I trust that the woman can hear me anyway and that it's just me who has a disconnect from the sound of the dream.

The woman calms down enough to look me in the face and I ask her where she is from. She yells something silently and I try to watch her lips and discern what she is saying. It looks like maybe she is saying "España!!" But I can't be sure. It didn't feel like a solid enough answer to me.

I get distracted for a bit and end up back in my waking body. I WILD back out and exit to the front porch in much the same way as before. This time my grandpa is there with about four other men. Two of them are yelling at each other, which I can't hear, and grabbing each other, almost throwing punches. I approach one of them and try to ask where he's from but he's too distracted by his fight.

I follow the group about a hundred yards out onto the grass where we encounter some brown elephant-sized cow-like creatures which are standing around placidly. I approach a large beefy man with two heads. His eyes are bright orange-red and his heads slowly merge back into one. His faces, now his face, look very much like John Goodman, and he has shoulder length messy light-brown hair and an outfit of tattered olive green cloth. I ask where he's from and he yells an incoherent silent answer, so I ask him to write it down. I offer him a pen which has manifested immediately and a notepad that was harder to conjure and keeps trying to become my phone.

He runs screaming into the soft side of one of the animals and I follow him, still holding pen & pad and trying to regain his attention. He is now very different in appearance. He's still beefy, but his face no longer resembles John Goodman, he looks clean, has short, slick black hair and wears a full pin-striped suit with a matching fedora. He turns to me roughly and takes the pen & pad. He starts by making dots and scribbles, using exaggerated movements. He keeps going and I eventually just take the pad back. As I look at it the words change extremely quickly. I blink my eyes and focus until I can see that they say "tu errryyghrregh". I immediately return to my body and struggle to wake up fully, almost making a false journal on my phone before succeeding.
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This silent dream state is new to me. I've never had that happen where I'm fully in a dream except for my hearing, which is still attuned to the waking world. After waking, my grandma said something to me that confirmed that what I had heard her say while I was in the dream was actually said in the waking world. Crazy.. Also I'm really pumped at how well I was able to exit my body. It's been a long time, so I'm glad my previous years of experience still held up. Confidence is key.

I have WILDed into a small bookstore with my grandparents who are talking about something they are planning to do. As they walk away, I go into another room in the opposite direction, hoping to separate from them.

This new room is a small library that somewhat resembles the one from my old high school. It has white walls, a white floor and cheap bookshelves made of light-colored wood. There is a group of about eight people who are very different from each other. I join in their gossip and we laugh and joke with each other for a moment. One guy cheekily says to me that I can't kill him. I immediately demonstrate my lucid powers by pinching together my right thumb and forefinger while willing his neck to break. There is a loud snapping sound but his neck does not actually break. It was only a kind of "proof of ability". Everyone laughs, including him, because they know that I could have killed him but didn't. This isn't serious at all because we all know that this is dreamland.

I feel even more lucid and powerful now and I walk on, into another area. There are very many people here, unique families of all different kinds. Most people are wearing dark colors, robes and capes even, and are seated at the numerous tables eating lunch. Some of the children have eyes of unnatural colors like red or purple. One blonde boy with red eyes also has fangs that I can see as he laughs, following another child back to the table where his parents are waiting. It is a very big room and there are counters along one side with display cases of different food. Workers are cashing people out and making food.

I feel the random urge to remove my clothes, but the presence of children deters me. I start doing it anyway because the clothes feel extremely confining, but I leave on the underlying layers, including some kind of pinkish-nude leggings.

I walk further and find myself in a smaller fancier dining room with black leather booths lining the walls. The aisle between the booths is very narrow. Most of the tables are piled with dirty plates and leftover food. There is a group of Asian businessmen in very nice suits. They are having a very serious meeting. I stand there looking down at the food on their table and I see something on their plates that looks like a green bell pepper stuffed with green pesto. I reach down and grab one, intending to try it because it looks good. I look closer, noticing the bell pepper more, then say aloud to myself, "I don't like these anyway," before throwing it casually over my shoulder. I walk a few more steps into the room as the businessmen kind of look at me in surprise. I turn around and cockily demand that they say something to me about it, in English. One man who is standing gestures to the one sitting nearest me, encouraging him to say something. I can't remember if he does or not. I leave the room the same way I came.

To the left is the large cafeteria that I have already been in, and to the right is a lofty area with large glass doors leading outside. As I walk towards the doors I notice an Asian woman in business clothes standing next to them. She tells me to have a nice day and I thank her. I then remember the task of the month to ride a broom above the clouds.

I look over in the corner near the doors expecting to see a broom. I see one propped there. It has a stick made of gold with an ornamental pointy tip and little stirrups on it just like in the Harry Potter movies. The stick is not perfectly straight, but crooked like the good ones in HP, and the broom head is clean white. I think it is beautiful and that it is made just for me. It is quite short though, only about two and a half feet long.

I grab the broom and walk through the first set of doors. As I approach the second set, I will the broom to become longer and it visibly does so as I glance at it. It is still not as long as a standard HP broom, but close. I hop on before I reach the second set of doors and begin hovering immediately. I pull a door open with my left hand, holding the broom with my right, and fly out slowly and smoothly.

There is a paved path of grey stone there and a mass of children wearing robes and holding books flows towards the doors, obviously excited to go in. They look like first-year Hogwarts students and I begin to hear some HP-like music softly playing. There is a tall statue in the small round courtyard ahead, illuminated by the bright sunny day. There are buildings all around on the other streets, older and smaller than the one I've just exited. There are some large oak trees around the far edge of the courtyard.

I float up and out a little more and Ginny Weasley is suddenly there on her own broom, facing right at me. She has that fierce brave look on her face and I, startled, say loudly, "Hey Ginny!" She returns the greeting calmly before looking off to the left. I follow her gaze and see other students flying their brooms in a kind of loose swarm. One of them looks like Hermione Granger, but I only see her from behind. I head in the direction of the other flyers and Ginny follows me. I go higher, rising above the roofs of the nearby buildings.

We fly around a corner or two before seeing some very large military airships of some kind landing on a wide highway. I think to myself that it's because I offended those Asian businessmen earlier. There is a loud brass hit in the music when we see the ships, and the soundtrack becomes more intense in general.

Ron Weasley, Harry Potter and Hermione suddenly appear. Ron gives a quick casual greeting before they zoom under Ginny and I. We follow, all of us shooting across the cityscape, flying just above the tops of the buildings. There are freeways ahead, twisting and turning through each other.

We attempt to go higher several times, under my direction, but it just doesn't work. It is as if the air becomes a treadmill when we try going up. Just as I'm about to give up, a random person, also on a broom, shows up and tells us that "the hospital" is above the clouds for those who need it. I feel so relieved.

We are now able to zoom upwards, possibly because we have a more solid destination. I become fearful at the vastness of the sky, but keep going anyway. It gets darker until it is like night when we reach the cloud layer, which appears as a medium grey against the blackness. When we get close enough to touch the clouds, we begin to disintegrate and are sucked up through them as streams of particles. My vision goes black and then I'm in the hospital.

It is a waiting room but doesn't resemble any that I've seen in waking life. This place is apparently some kind of high tech airship, maybe also a spaceship. The walls and floor flow together and are made of a greenish brass metal with lots of grooves and bumps. There are many people sitting around on the benches, all in a good mood, all wearing body suits of mainly white with varying colorful designs and decorations. There are a few small curving hallways leading to other rooms, and windows showing the sky beyond. Somehow I can't remember if it's bright blue sky or dark black night.

I look over to my left and see the pilot of the vessel, a black woman. She lets her young son switch a lever for her and they smile lovingly at each other. Her hair is shorter than his, which is quite big and fluffy. I look around again and see another black mother with sleek hair up in a bun. She is leaning over and whispering something reassuring to her white son. He is about the same age as the other boy, eight or nine years old. This place feels so wonderful. Everyone is happy and working together for common goals.

I realize that I still haven't seen the top of the clouds, so I allow myself to phase through the floor. I drop down quickly, briefly seeing the flat, smooth underside of the hospital ship and the tops of the clouds which are fluffy and somehow illuminated from within with a bright neon pink light. I do not know the source of this light. The sky is pitch black.

I go blank for a moment before appearing in my step-grandparent's living room, standing and watching the hospital on the tv. It is day outside. Next to me is a tall thin man sitting in an egg-shaped chair, wearing a suit like the others, except its main color is navy blue and there are more decorations around the collar. He has reddish, very tanned skin, lots of brown freckles, fluffy greying hair and beautiful hazel green eyes. As I look at him he meets my gaze with an incredibly honest and knowing expression. We clasp hands and he smiles at me softly, so seemingly aware. I sustain eye contact, deepening the connection. It feels so good to connect. I realize then that he is me. He is a part of my mind, a part of my awareness. I begin to cry heavy tears of happiness and can't help but smile wide, almost grinning, almost sobbing uncontrollably.

After a few moments we turn back to the screen and I see Jodie Foster with her hair pulled back in a sleek pony. She looks like she's in her late forties, maybe even fifty, and is wearing a mostly white suit with little or no decoration. She is alone in a small control room in the hospital ship. There is neon pink light radiating up from the floor and she is concentrating on what she is doing at her standing desk, a solid, light-grey rectangular pillar with an angled touch screen top.

A bunch of first and second year highschool students and I are standing in a room with blue and white tiled walls, florescent lighting and a concrete floor. There are windows in front of us and we're looking through them into a basketball gym. We are gathered here to ready ourselves for an event. The students all around me are mostly girls and are dressed in cheerleading outfits. I am wearing jeans and a grey shirt with the school's name and logo small on the chest.

Two of the cheerleaders are talking to me and the energy in the room is nervous. I feel kind of like I'm a student too, but deep down I'm still aware of my actual waking life identity. The girls tell me that we aren't allowed to wear the school logo during this event and I get a little bit worried.

A big male coach comes in, looking like a caricature of every mean grade-school coach ever, and yells at everyone to get ready. He gripes at me about my shirt and I respond by telling him I'm not enrolled here and that I'm 25 years old. He huffs and pouts away.

I know that my friend J is in the bandstands and I go to sit with her. The basketball gym is cold and blue. The cheerleaders come out and begin their routine. After talking to J for a few seconds I leave through the main doors at the end of the room. It's like I'm going through backstage at a film set, with all sorts of staff and equipment sitting around anxiously focusing on the event. I push my way through, uncaring.

The gym has transformed into a large movie theater when I come back and sit with J again. K and S are there too and we're all squished together on our part of the bench. J sits on my lap and we laugh. She's holding a baby who is apparently her little sister. K is holding another younger baby who is also J's sister. I am amazed by this because J's parents are septuagenarians and she is the youngest in waking life. Her mom bumbles around in a nearby corner which is stocked with toys, seeming tense and stressed.

I look around and see that the movie screen and the the wall it was on are now gone, leaving a very large opening to the outside. The concrete floor gives way to rocks and and shallow fast-flowing water and stone walls come up at the sides forming a sort of grotto. Small groups of people are exploring the area. It is a beautiful and refreshing sight.

I happily go exploring by myself. I come to a large rock bulging out of the water and bend over, looking for life. My sister KB walks up from behind me and is also looking, though less intently. I see different kinds of algae and some tiny fish.

Suddenly I spot a baby frog. I try to catch it but it escapes. Another one appears and I successfully capture it in my hands. I feel it wiggle for a moment before I let it go. I look back into the water and see a magnificent salamander, about eight inches from tip to tip, almost completely translucent, and having two tails. It is swimming around very actively. I have a hard time catching it but I succeed. I show it excitedly to KB then decide I have to show it to J.

I return to the bleachers carrying my prize carefully yet firmly and see that J is gone. I ask S and K where she went and they say they think she went to her room. We get her mom's attention and she agrees to lead me to the room. My sister, K and S all follow along.

This place is now an event center combined with a hotel, kinda like a resort. We go up several floors and eventually arrive in a very small, old film-showing room with yellow fabric walls and old, dark wood furniture. The door to J's room is here, made of that same dark wood. Someone in our group complains about the location of the room and I think to myself that it's not that bad.

J is there and she likes the salamander but is not very interested. Her brother is there now as well and they start acting incestual, flirting with each other, and I get really upset. I yell at them and fly away.

I find myself standing in a small room made from the same materials as the film-showing room. I see a small ornament, maybe a brooch, on a small round table. It has numerous blue and green smooth stones in a tarnished gold setting.

I am suddenly fully lucid and I remember the task to condense a color into a liquid and drink it. I think about using the small ornament but decide it has too many colors close together and it would be hard to single one out. I look around and see a long wooden box filled with dark, wine-colored apples. There is a blanket draped partially over them and I remove it, revealing some unidentifiable, slightly different colored fruit. I put the blanket back and prepare to extract the color from the apples. I notice there are a few bunches of similarly colored grapes among them.

I reach out and pull the wine red color out into my right hand without touching the fruit. I had intended to materialize a cup for it to go into, but the liquid seems to have replaced the flesh of my hand, which is now wine colored up to the wrist where it stops at a hard line. When I withdraw my hand I can see it is slightly translucent and the liquid within it is sloshing back and forth a bit. I put my lips to my open palm and slurp the liquid out, watching as my hand becomes flesh again. The liquid is cool and tastes like fruit punch. I smack my lips, savoring it, and smile at its pleasantness.

I fly off into an increasingly dark area down several corridors and begin to hear someone coming after me. It feels sinister. I fly faster into a dark bathroom and into one of the stall where I hide. The danger passes, having overlooked me. More occurs, but recall is almost nonexistent.

I keep WILDing up out of the chair I'm napping in. The first few times are kinda like FAs: sort of unaware then becoming more lucid. I begin to WILD on purpose while holding the compliment task in mind.

I stand up, make eye contact with my grandmother, and ask her if I'm dreaming. I don't remember her answer. I do the nose-pinch RC several times before thinking about who to compliment. I consider telling my grandmother that I respect her, but decide to compliment my three year old daughter instead. I turn to her and say enthusiastically, "You're so cute!" I smile at her and she grins big and sits down on the floor, being all silly and wiggly.

Satisfied with completing the task, I decide to go out the front door. I unlock it and open up both the inner door and the glass door before emerging into the bright sunlight. I want to fly, so I attempt to. I get a bit scared and drift back down involuntarily. I try again, going higher, but fall again, faster this time. I hit the ground rather hard, expecting pain but fortunately receiving none.

The sun is setting and I am on a cruise ship in the middle of the ocean on one of the main decks in the midst of a milling crowd of people. We're not on top of the ship but there is still a beautiful view through long openings on both sides. I hang out with several different friends from different times of my life at different parts of the boat. We drink at a bar with good drinks and really chill vacation vibes, walk around on the top deck chatting and enjoying the view, and gather in an auditorium for some kind of show we never actually see. My first crush is there most of the time and we have fun flirting cheekily with each other. Sometime during all of this I become semi-lucid and remember the task to compliment someone but never do it.

Later that night when it's pitch black outside and almost everyone is back in their rooms sleeping something goes wrong with the ship. Nothing noticable happens and there are no announcements or warnings, I just somehow know that something has messed up. A feeling of unease comes over me and I enter my crisis state of mind and become focused on doing what I need to to escape.

I enter some sort of emergency hatch on the wall which leads to a small corridor that runs along the outside of the ship's hull. It's some kind of slide system that leads down to where everyone is gathering to deal with the problem. There are small windows that show the blackness outside and there is water rapidly flowing along the floor like a water slide. The walls are white with a horizontal blue stripe near the bottom and little vents and things all along them. I let myself be pushed down the bumpy slide by the current. It isn't very steep so it's not very fast either. The passageway becomes smaller and my uneasiness increases as I reach a corner. The current is stronger now and it pins me against the wall. My foot is resting on a grate in the floor and suddenly becomes burning hot so I move it up against the wall where it immediately gets freezing cold. I attempt to push myself out of the corner and further down the slide.

I'm suddenly lucid due to the building stress and I calm down significantly. I choose to let go of reality, knowing it isn't "real". I kind of "push" with my will and the scene dissipates into smaller and smaller spheres which float up and away from me into the black void.

A bright sunny scene quickly appears around me. I'm in a small yard between the backs of some old brick buildings in a town. The buildings are painted different colors. I'm standing on a low wood platform with partial railing and a narrow boardwalk leading away between the buildings. The grass is overgrown and pretty, having fluffy weeds and vines that cling to the railing. I feel warm.

A knight in full armor is galloping around the outside of the platform on a nondescript brown horse. There is barely room for them. The knight's armor covers their entire body and is bright orange with silver glitter throughout and a seemingly plastic texture.

I recall the compliment task and I say to the knight, "You're so pretty!" I do not recall getting a response. I remember thinking I'd finished the task and that I should wake up. I walk down the sidewalk along a main street and attempt to wake myself using my "sitting up motion while feeling my body with expectation and intent" method. This may or may not have worked; I can't recall because I went back to sleep several times.