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Morning of July 2, 1978. Sunday.



There were a few different versions of this dream (including a couple “resets” during the same sleeping period) which was likely influenced by the television series “Gunsmoke”. I make my way to an old, smaller (unknown) ghost town on my own. There is a skeleton hanging from an old noose that had never been taken down. I had understood the town to be “cursed”, yet it also has some sort of secret.

It turns out that the town is some sort of portal to the past. As I am walking along, I see an upright oval portal (higher up) in another area that is looking into the past. It is a man (about thirty) who still seems to be alive (but dying) and hanging from the noose. The “vision” soon fades. The town had been “cursed” because of his wrongful death - by the tavern entrance being turned into an active portal and the people being “pawns” of time itself.

Later on, when I walk through the batwing doors of an old tavern (wooden floor), I am transported into the past, into the time when the town was at its peak in population and prosperity. Someone is playing the song “There is a Tavern in the Town” on a newer (and properly tuned) piano.

I talk to a few people, including the man who had been hanged. Apparently, he had been hanged for murder. However, he seems very friendly and claims he did not do it. Eventually, a knife is thrown into someone’s neck from behind, just as they are leaving the tavern, and the friendly man I know is blamed. I go in and out of the batwing doors and back to the same time portal entry point. The song “There is a Tavern in the Town” keeps repeating (a thin man in a dark purplish vest and a white shirt and with a mustache and smoking a smaller cigar - is playing it), as I do this a few times, so the scenes repeat. Finally, I am able to see who actually throws the knife (an older, chubbier man of about forty with a black beard and dressed in ragged clothes). Eventually, as the cycle repeats, I am able to warn the other person. The villain gets away, though, but promises to do harm at some point in the future.

Soon, I am in my own time; there is an unserviced player piano (originally thought to be a ghost involved by some visitors) playing “There is a Tavern in the Town”, but it is very out of tune (or in an unfamiliar minor key) and playing very slowly (similar to a particular Johnny Bond recording I used to own in real life - not sure, but it may be from the “On the Wagon” narrative - have not heard it in many years). It seems that the town was eventually made into a tourist attraction for a short time, prior to it finally being abandoned.

I see a very eerie in-dream vision of an empty noose swinging in the wind (it was the same noose that had originally been used to hang the innocent man but is now empty). I had saved the young man from the hanging. He comes out from the portal and thanks me, but then tells me that time may eventually reset itself and he may have to face the idea of “being hanged again” and he then returns to his own time. Still, the skeleton and noose are gone when I make my way home. The “resetting” may not occur in my lifetime.

Morning of December 2, 1967. Saturday.



A green cat is seemingly “haunting” an unfamiliar area of an unknown neighborhood in my dream (though possibly implied to be near my sister Carol’s house in Wisconsin). It glows brightly, mostly while walking atop an older brick fence near a residence where there are a lot of shrubs and flowers in the front yard. The green cat does not seem to be a lost pet, but perhaps the ghost of a stray. It does not frighten me in any way. Although I see it walking towards me at times, I also seem mostly incorporeal and perhaps unseen by this “ghost”.

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A cat is linked to the idea of sleep yet being active at night, and therefore is a good representation of the dream state itself. Here, the cat mostly only appears in liminal space - the top of a wall. Although the color blue usually serves as induction, green sometimes does as well (in contrast to red, which mainly seems like a waking priority prompt).

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This was possibly influenced by a very small plastic figure of a green cat (which may have come from some vendor novelties my brother Earl had in his apartment near ours at North Monroe Street) that I had in a large box of various small items, which included a soft orange rubber cockroach, a black brontosaurus with its head turned around over its body, and a plastic flying lizard among many other items.

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Morning of April 9, 1966. Saturday.



This, I believe is the first version of this dream, a day before Easter.

I am in an unknown region. There is an isolated house in the forest but near a winding path. Oddly, the house seems “cut in half” in that some outer walls seem to be missing but a family still lives there. The imagery is intriguing and appeared in other dreams with different themes later on, including some featuring the “mystery girl”.

I am aware of a real, living wolf, but am also aware of the “ghost” of Little Red Riding Hood, who is wearing a white riding hood and is mostly glowing all over, a white light with a lighter bluish tint. She seems somewhat sad and lost. I talk with her but do not recall the conversation - there is an unusual awareness of peace at one point as if she is to be a long-term part of my life. The association may be related to a basket she is carrying being filled with Easter eggs, but I also get the impression they will hatch at a later date rather than being eaten. Even though my dream implies she is a spirit and that the wolf has possibly already eaten her, there is still a strong presence of her in my dream. She is dark-haired and green-eyed and very pretty. There is no direct threat from the wolf although I do see it looking down from a ridge in Chipmunk Coulee (recurring).

Interestingly, the only other time I saw this precise dream imagery was of an actual “incomplete” house in a photo my wife-to-be had sent to me many years later. This, like many other dreams, seemed to establish a connection to my beautiful wife (and “dream girl”) a couple years or so before she was even born.

Morning of February 10, 1974. Sunday. (Could have started to develop the night prior - before midnight, on February 9.)



My original dream journal title of this entry was “Ghosts”. I had somewhat carelessly drawn some of the imagery (the witch, the shirtless man, and the cloaked figure) and took it to school, but no one was interested.

In this very vivid and lucid dream, I had “stepped into my dream” simply by “getting off the couch I had been napping on” (although knowingly remaining asleep) and was heading south through our hallway. There was a very heightened awareness of energy and expectation - my target was the back door of our house that I often went through in lucid dreams, although in real life it was rarely used (much like the carport door from my bedroom). A short, rather small female (perhaps younger than I) walked out of my father’s old room from my right. She was wearing what looked like a cross between a full fancy wedding outfit and a classic Halloween witch costume, but it appeared all in white with a slightly bluish tint in the shadowy areas, including the glowing skin (similar to photographic negatives or tulpa templates where any light seems to come from inside the source if reflected onto it in the normal positive image). I am somewhat afraid, but not fully nervous; it is my dream after all, so I approach her. I notice that she has no eyes to speak of. Mostly, it is only wrinkles where her eyes should be, which go in rows down her cheeks, even though she seems fairly young. It actually looks a little like two vertical rows of gills down from where her eyes should be (much like the underside of a manta ray) - almost down to her mouth. I feel amazing tingling sensations as if sparks are hitting me from her presence alone. The power from her seems to make me fly backwards back down the hallway as sparks move about. She does not make any sound, but there is sort of an awareness of buzzing and a feeling of electricity everywhere. Some words come to mind like “her face was adumbrated” as if part of a story when I had first seen her more closely.

A little later, two other figures appear in the living room, Lyle Waggoner (the actor) and seemingly a man from the 13th century not wearing a shirt and carrying chains (although this is ambiguous, as Lyle seems to be that character at one point - seemingly the vampiric man from “Castle of Blood”). This part is more of a normal dream awareness not remotely as vivid as the hallway part. Lyle has an axe and it eventually ends up on the south end of the couch, but there is no blood or danger at that point, only the suggestion of such. I seemed to wake up (false awakening) into a vivid state of awareness and noticed that there was a pair of scissors at the end of the couch and thought it was interesting how my dream had changed scissors into an axe. However, I was still in the dream state. When I did wake up, there were not any scissors at all, even though I seemed to have some sort of false memory that there was throughout the night. For some reason, it seemed to be closely related to the Barbara Steele movie “Castle of Blood” (Danza Macabra) from 1964 (of which I was a big fan of since very young) but looks more like her character (in dress and presence, anyway) from “The Pit and the Pendulum”, but it did not really share much other than a loose idea about ghosts reliving their last day, which seemed to imply that I was supposedly a ghost in my dream as well, also odd that Lyle (known mostly only as a comedic actor at the time with Carol Burnett) appeared here as such.

There is also another part of my dream that seems to be possibly a different dream or “reset”. It involves another supposed ghost (but Grim-Reaper-like) that is like a green-cloaked figure (no face visible) sitting on the couch. It is non-threatening but I sense the word “abhorrence” in my mind.

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This dream has a very similar subtle “summoning” essence as my “Silver Manta” dream (in that I was aware on one vague level that I was deliberately bringing forth the being). The silvery glowing ghostly witch of course represents the moon as a circadian rhythm event, extraordinarily vivid here and with an odd intense level of lucidity. The main difference between the two dreams is that I do not “defeat” this being to instigate waking, which instead leads to a sense of healing, intense energy, and augmented “moon induction” in continuity. Eventually, this dream becomes offset into other patterns and is quite long because of its nature. The witch ghost and the silver manta are the same unconscious archetype which is evidenced by the fact that the witch ghost also has manta ray gills down each side of her face rather than normal eyes though she also represents the essence of my wife-to-be on one level.

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My wife Zsuzsanna was born on a Friday the 13th and as such, people have made sarcastic comments about her being a witch (especially because of all the unusual events associated with both of us growing up), and that she is smaller than average as with the figure in my dream, but it is probably not directly related, although interestingly, I did come to Australia on February 9th (1994). At the time of the dream, I think there may have been some sort of association with the name Wendy, which was the name of the first “girlfriend” I had when around age six, and not just because of the Wendy comic books I enjoyed (and she had curly dark hair).

Morning of June 10, 1972. Saturday.



I am following train tracks for some reason, but after I walk for several minutes into a more isolated area, the tracks come to an end. There are a lot of trees and bushes around. There are no other people in this dream. It seems to be an unknown location, as well.

I come to an abandoned mansion. Looking around inside, I notice a young deer’s head as a trophy on the wall. I see the ghost of that deer, when looking through the doorway near the fireplace I am standing by; the deer ghost leaps over a few loose scattered boards in another room and leaves the area. Apparently, the mansion is haunted by the ghost of a deer, but there seems to be no real threat at all. I do not really feel bad in any way, but actually feel a sense of peace.

I feel now that there may be some sort of play on the train tracks ending - linked to the idea of the animal tracks and animal “ending”.

Morning of February 19, 1972. Saturday.



Around this time period of my life were some of the last but more unusual dog attack dreams. This was also one of my more vividly “energized” dreams of the time.

I am walking out to the backyard and fairly close to the back of the shed my father had built. Some of the area seems as it was before he built the shed. I notice the somewhat bony remains of a dead dog halfway between the railroad tracks and the edge of the backyard prior to the more weedy area (which we later used for a garden). We also had bonfires in the area in real life during one time period. It is otherwise more featureless in my dream and seemingly slightly more elevated.

My dream takes on an unusual eerie mood, a sort of “antiquity” (or sense of “alternate time” - slightly reminiscent to the eerie feeling I got when watching “Jason and the Argonauts” the first time) that seems to begin to dominate my dream. I notice that a smaller dog seems to be guarding the remains for some reason - from the other side and facing me. The dog soon notices me and begins to growl menacingly. The ghost of the other dog rises up from the bones and seems to pose a threat as well. Soon, both dogs (the “dead one” possibly being a golden retriever and the other at least part Labrador but two-thirds the size of the first) run towards me. I turn and flee into the carport and dive into the front doorway (which apparently was already open) and wake just as I contemplate the idea of the dogs getting to my feet and legs, which are still just outside the doorway. I wake with somewhat of a jolt, but it is an interesting sensation as if I was actually leaping out of my dream’s residual energy. I anticipate the feeling of the dog’s teeth on my feet and legs but this never actually occurs this time, although I have felt severe pain in similar dreams.

As stated before, dogs are most often rust-colored or black in my childhood dreams, and almost always invasive to my in-dream freedom, both lucid and non-lucid (though more common in lucid ones). My wife also had very similar associations with such dogs.

On February 18th, the prior night and into this morning, I had watched “King Kong vs. Godzilla” (1963) on Channel 13’s “Shock Theatre” (though found it very amusing rather than scary in any way) as well as the first fifteen minutes or so of “The Mysterious Doctor” (1943) starting from 11:30 pm (apparently about a headless ghost) before falling asleep. However, it is more than likely this dream was influenced by having seen “The Hound of the Baskervilles” (late 1950s version, I think) at an earlier date.

Morning of October 16, 1971. Saturday.



This was another November 6th dream (the first recorded title being “I Married a Ghost”) though the longest, most focused version was on October 16 (very early morning), 1971. In this case, it was mostly based on associations with the movie “Danza Macabra” (also known as “Castle of Blood”, but first seen as “Castle of Terror” on the “Shock Theatre” television series). To this day, I still have not seen, or even made any effort to see, the remake (“Web of the Spider” from 1971). This was quite odd I suppose (especially for a young boy), some sort of catalyst, perhaps, and came years before the “showdown” dream (the castle-of-winds one) between the “other” and my as-yet-unknown-to-be-real wife (in their actual forms rather than being represented by others). Had I not been influenced (or rather deliberately focused on with a higher clarity than with most movies, to be honest) to some degree by a few (to me) archetypical movies, it is likely my path would have been the same, just with a little less movie-based synchronicity and long-term memory of such, perhaps - the patterns and personal themes would likely have come from elsewhere as it is. I would likely have formed similar symbolic aspects from other things I saw or did not yet see.

For many years after, I had this focus around November 2nd (related to the “Night of the Dead” event in the movie - which of course is not Halloween as some have claimed - guess they did not really watch the movie they wrote about so much - which often seems to be the case even with so-called movie critics). Thus, dreams relating to around that date sometimes centered around certain ideas even when I had not seen the movie for awhile. Interestingly, as a young boy, I even perceived November 2nd to be the “real” Halloween even though I never mentioned it to others much at all. I guess because it was sort of like “my” private Halloween.

The main point of my dream was that I was originally going to marry the Julia character (Margarete Robsahm). However, there were scene changes and parts with wandering about in a mist. Eventually I married the Barbara Steele character (Elisabeth Blackwood). I guess the reason was that at least she tried to save poor Alan (me?). I did not die, however - only everyone else was a ghost. The marriage took place in an unusual location. It was outside in a mist on the top of a fairly high isolated staircase (at least twenty steps) with nothing beyond the top landing. Everything had a sort of grayish and bluish transparent look. The preacher (unknown) stood reading for some time. In the background, below, there was a very vague association with a white horse and hippies on motorcycles in the fog - seems to be from the episode of “The Immortal” (“White Horse, Steel Horse”). There are also scenes of wandering around in a library after-hours (recurring). This time, also in a mist. Being in a mist was far more common when I was younger, becoming fairly rare after the age of sixteen unless I instigated the idea with lucidity. (Age sixteen is when I developed what I considered amazing full control over some dreams for nearly a year - usually the last ones of a series).

Curiously, the movie characters, depending on angle, lighting, and expression, were similar to the real-life associations (which of course I did not associate with my wife at the earlier times, as this was years before she first wrote to me), including the same hair colors. I did include an image, but I cannot find the photo where my wife looks so much like the first image I actually mistook it for her once, the third being the “other” symbol. Again, it all depends on angle, expression, and lighting; otherwise, there is not that much of a resemblance at all. It could have been the other way around (hair, looks, and character intent different), but was not.

Night of October 19, 1970. Monday.



I am at a cocktail party very late at night on our carport at Cubitis even though I am only a young child. It may be around two o'clock in the morning. I had been playing with a friend (Eddie from my class), with a large, rubbery and mostly hollow all-orange toy racing car with driver (the “midget” kind that looks a bit like a shoe and the person leans way back to drive them). I clearly hear the glasses and ice-cubes clinking and party chatter, and see that everyone is fancily dressed. Suddenly, there is a much enhanced silence as I suddenly feel lucid. My dream becomes extremely vivid, of the “like real life” perception, even after waking. The silence ends with a few whispers and talk of the ghost of a wolf that haunts the railroad tracks just beyond our back yard beyond the usually weedy area. Soon, there is an eerie howl, and the white, glowing wolf moves quickly down the railroad tracks, going south. For a moment, he seems frozen in time in mid-leap. This is not nightmarish at all, but very enjoyable in its intense eeriness and nonthreatening event.

This dream is type EC2. The orange (associated with October, the month of this dream) toy racing car seen at the adult cocktail party on my carport (while fully in-body throughout as a remarkably stable dream self) foreshadows the waking transition as a downsized conduit symbol. The train coming down the track is my emergent consciousness. The ghost wolf that could be perceived as either “leading” the train, or being “chased” by the train is the hybridization of my temporary waking self (a ghost almost always being a thread of the “incomplete” conscious self in the dream state) and sublimated dream self, offset from the adult cocktail party as reflecting the “pack” - yet as a singular ghost wolf. The imagery is beautiful and extremely vivid and seems to occur in infinite night. The transition echoes as an eerie, but beautiful and very “familiar” howling sound.