Verre

Ritual: I thought it might be nice to get lucid again, so I read DV before bed, though my motivation was considerably reduced when I realized that the time change had caught me unawares, and I was going to bed an hour later than I had intended! Also drank some sage and mugwort tea before bed. Those are the only relevant factors I can think of. WTB at 3am, woke 9:15am with dream.

DEILD: I came out of an NLD and started going over it in my mind, when it dawned on me that I had not fully woken up. I was in a hallway carrying a large package; to confirm, I tossed it in the air and sure enough, it hovered for a moment before drifting back down. It occurred to me that maybe I should take up the habit of tossing things into the air in waking life as a kind of RC. But it would have to be something smaller than a large box, something more like a coin or small ball. I produced a small black ball and tried again. To my amusement, this one behaved as if gravity were operating normally. Maybe not such a good RC unless I actively intervene: I tossed it again and concentrated on holding the ball in the air. That worked well enough. I resolved to spend more time in WL trying to move small objects with my mind.

I exited the building and thought I might try a TOTM. Even though I had just reread the list before going to bed, I now realized that I couldn't remember any of them. Thinking hard, I finally recalled the one about the dream guide.

"I'm ready for my dream guide!" I shouted. I've never had a dream guide before, so I had no expectations. I shouted a few more times until a woman showed up. She was of hefty build, with straight shoulder-length dark hair, and looked to be in her late forties. On the right lapel of her uniform-like black jacket, resembling that of a hotel clerk (or more to the point, a tour guide) was a name tag reading "RUSH." There was something very blank and bureaucratic about her demeanor that immediately put me off.

"Take me on a tour," I instructed.

"A Grand Tour?" she asked. Lately I've been reading about the Grand Tours eighteenth-century travelers would take in Italy, so I assumed this was merely waking life residue.

"Take me on a tour of Hogwart's," I proposed instead.

The woman must not have understood, because she started saying things about temperature and time that sounded like the details of a technical process—brewing coffee, I guessed. I was getting impatient.

"This isn't working out," I told her. Perhaps I should have been more patient, but she reminded me of one of those blank, automaton-like DCs that never have anything interesting to say. I turned my back and walked away, determined to try again.

"I'm ready for my dream guide!" I resumed shouting, trying to muster a sense of optimism. Nothing changed at first, but I persisted, shouting about five times before another figure drew my attention. He was a short brown-haired man standing next to a bar, gazing at me with a slightly amused expression. As I walked over, I was startled to see that he was the spitting image of Michael J. Fox. This perplexed me, because I have no particular attachment to that actor, nor did I recall having encountered his image recently in waking life. I remembered that in WL he had developed a terrible disease and I couldn't remember if he was still alive. This DC looked like the younger version of him from the 1980s or '90s, and his cheerful confidence created much more favorable impression than the last DC.

"Are you my dream guide?" I asked uncertainly. He replied with something casual, along the lines of, "If you want me to be."

"Let's give it a try," I said. "First, take me somewhere beautiful. Then, take me somewhere that I will find interesting." Since I'd never had a dream guide before or thought much about their proper role, now I was acting on the assumption that their job was to give me tours. In retrospect that's kind of funny.

As we walk out of the building together, he expresses a sexual interest. I'm surprised at his bluntness, but tell him okay, it's natural that there might be sexual tension between us, I can accept that. He seems relieved, telling me that many of the applicants ruled it out from the start. In fact, a lot of the essays he received closed on that note. I commiserate, noting how even from a purely rhetorical standpoint, that does seem like a terrible way to end an application essay.

We continue through a park-like setting, and as we descend along a wooded path I see a tree with several conjoined trunks. Emblazoned across it like a light projection is the name of a website, "www.tabu.com." I look again to make sure and the text shifts. "www.tabut.com." I wonder what it means. Is this in reference to the Polynesian word "tabu," the basis of our English "taboo"? [I looked them up as I was writing this and...seriously, it's a big world out there, how could these websites not exist?]

We walk right to the edge of a wide shallow lake. I realize we'll probably need to travel somewhere by a means other than walking, and let him know I'm familiar with some basic methods: "How are we going to get there? I can spin and teleport, if you like. And I know how to fly."

He offers another possibility: "See that brown line?" He points to somewhere behind us. I look back, and without thinking about it we automatically start rising into the air and drifting toward a brown line that runs across the grass of the lawn. "That's where we'll transition," he explains. We start gliding toward it, and sure enough, a moment later we are flying across a completely different scene.

The previous landscape was park-like, but we emerge higher in the air over a vast landscape. Distant hills, distinctive coloring, shades of red in the earth and sky. Everything becomes a bit clearer. "Okay, this is beautiful," I acknowledge aloud. He's definitely succeeded in the first task I set him.

We drift closer to the ground and I notice an odd detail: an enormous fence of thick horizontal wires strung between vertical poles that must be at least 50 feet high, stretched across a valley between two steep hills. There are only a few of the wires, maybe eight, strung in pairs of two. It would be no barrier for a person at all, or any earthly creature—it's so big it doesn't even obstruct the view—but then I see what it is keeping in. They look like giant green mantis-like creatures, clearly insectoid, but enormous. Despite the monstrosity of the creatures, the enclosure reminds me of a nature reserve. Are the fences for our protection, or theirs? Perhaps both.

I think about how my second instruction to my guide had been to take me somewhere interesting, and it would certainly be interesting if one of those things got out! However, I decide not to vocalize my thoughts or deliberately influence the course of events, instead waiting to see how things will play out.

One of the creatures catches sight of us and scuttles over, moving with astonishing rapidity for its size. It crosses several hundred yards in a matter of seconds. It pushes against the fence, snapping at us with its mandibles. It has surprisingly long reach and the wires of the fence are being bowed out by the weight of its body—they hold, but we have to dart away very quickly to avoid the initial attack. I realize the safest course is to fly directly upward, well out of its reach, in case the fence breaks. I can feel my adrenaline pumping and have to admit, that was definitely an interesting experience.

Abruptly the environment changes and we are back in a room that I think I recognize from earlier in the dream—but way earlier, the NLD sequence before I even got lucid. I realize the dream is ending, but I'm very pleased with how well this dream guide was able to fulfill my requests. "Can I meet you again?" I ask. His acquiescence is as casual and noncommital as when I first asked him to be my guide.

Ritual: Woke up at dawn after a DILD in which I was joyously flying over a gorgeous verdant landscape and admiring an enormous white castle. The detailed report took two pages and I don't see the need to reproduce them here, however, I'm amused to see that my initial notes on it look like an odd little poem:

party, paul
crash in kitchen
bird
ceiling, sky
oh, this is a dream, isn't it
fly up, clarity, joy
look at that castle, it's huge!
hello everyone, hello!

While flying around I wondered if I should try a TOTM, and remembered that February was ending but that I hadn't looked at the March list yet. After recording that dream, I reviewed the new TOTMs and went back to bed. At first I tried my vibrating alarm, but after an hour of unproductive sleep, decided that my state of mind was not suitable for that method and took it off. It was 8am by this point and my hopes weren't high, so all I did was think about the TOTMs as I went back to bed. I was especially drawn to the one where you ask DCs about their dream, because I thought I remembered planning to try that myself at one point but had never gotten around to it.

I actually did end up having another DILD in which I performed this task, but it wasn't very satisfying because I failed to wake and write promptly. This was annoying because during the dream itself I had been taking pains to try to remember the specific responses given by the DCs, but by the time I woke up fully at almost 10am, my memories had become blurred and vague. Here's what I can piece back together.

DILD: I was in a room with three male friends when I realized I was dreaming, and that the presence of the DCs was a perfect set up for the task I wanted to try. I approached one of the guys and asked him to tell me about a dream he had recently. He said something to the effect that he didn't remember any dreams but was curious about them.

What would it be like not to dream, I wondered—to be aware only of the moments when one is actually awake? It sounds like a kind of half-existence, a disturbing prospect.

I went over to the second guy, who was sitting on a barstool nearby, and discovered that his appearance had changed. Now he resembled... a jawa? Except his robe was red... no, a dark pink. Weird. When he spoke, his voice sounded high and girlish. I don't remember the details of his reply, but it was also in the negative. No dreams to report.

I approached the third guy and asked if he remembered any dreams. My hopes weren't high, but I was pleasantly surprised when he said he had dreamed about a location where HEMA could be practiced. (HEMA stands for Historical European Martial Arts, something I've been practicing since last year.) He started telling me about a weapon that he called a "brouheea" or something like that. I couldn't make sense of the word and asked him to repeat it a few times, so he showed me an example of one that was in a display case on the wall. It was shaped like a tiny axe, about six inches long, and the label demonstrated that the word had a complex spelling with a silent last syllable, like "Brouheeages." I thought it sounded vaguely Dutch.

When I finally woke up some time later, it was frustrating not to be able to recall if the three guys, who I had thought of as "friends" within the context of the dream, had represented specific WL friends or had simply been random DCs who felt familiar at the time (I get this a lot).

Ritual: Set vibrating alarm for 40m at 6:20am. I don't remember it going off, but I began dreaming that I was trying to fall asleep, until it gradually dawned on me that I was already dreaming. It was 7:19 when I awoke, so given that the dream must have manifested at some point after the signal went off at 7am (since it was not interrupted by it), it could have lasted up to 19m. I'm classifying this as DILD and not EILD since lucidity was not initiated by recognition of the device signal.

DILD: Initially I am on a beach, lying on a sort of cot, trying to fall asleep. There are other people all around me, and their activity and noise is keeping me awake. I mention aloud to someone nearby that I seem to be entering REM state even while awake, as I notice crisp and colorful visuals superimposing themselves over my visual field. Even though the new scene is layered over the old one, it is distinct enough that I can make out details: I am at the edge of a river running through a futuristic city. Some sort of V-shaped flying craft is flying in tripartite geometrical formations up above, the crafts each giving off light colored red, white, or blue, each grouped into a separate section. Is this meant to be a patriotic display?

I do not change position, but the cot I'm lying on becomes a sort of couch as the environment around me resolves into a room full of kids. Someone plays a video on a TV monitor, which annoys me because I am trying to fall asleep and the music is distracting. But then they mention that the video features Jonathan Tweet, and the name sounds familiar. When I remember it is one of my favorite game developers, I take more interest in the video and sit up.

Something makes me think this is a kind of school where the kids are learning lucid dream abilities. One boy, bald, sits to the left of me on my couch and he's trying to test his powers against me. He takes my hand in his, which begins to glow blue, and I realize that he's trying to "crystal" me, that is, harm me with the pale blue light he is creating. I counter it easily, however. This frustrates him and he begins trying to bite me. He opens a disturbingly wide mouth and tries to chomp down on my hand, but I counter him by softening both his flesh and his resolve, so that mouth sags toothlessly and he never completes the bite. We go through this cycle three or four times before I tire of the game and get up.

By now I'm aware that I am already dreaming, and I walk into the next room, recalling my personal goals. [I accomplish a personal task, finding a certain fictional character, then suggest that we become dragons to fulfill one of the TOTYs.]

I lead the way to a window and lift it open. We're about four storeys up, but I jump out without hesitation and spread my arms, letting the air catch me. As I fly off to the left, I focus on trying to develop the "feel" of a dragon body: four legs, wings, tail, scaly skin. I haven't tried this before and the results are so-so, a fluctuating hybrid between the new bodymap and my usual one. I am flying over what strikes me as a mid-twentieth-century city. There are no skyscrapers, just a mixture of low commercial and residential buildings that cover a wide expanse. I recall that the task requires me to destroy a village, but the city below seems too urban to qualify. Would a neighborhood count as a "village"? But my moral qualms kick in, and I hesitate to bring wrath upon an innocent residential neighborhood.

I fly further on, toward the edge of the city, looking for a more remote target, preferably one with few occupants. After exploring the land for a while, I find a spot that, while a stretch to call it a "village," at least satisfies my ethical preoccupations: it is a cluster of buildings around a large industrial apparatus, evidently a manufacturing concern of some kind. I don't notice any people wandering around, so hopefully there are not many on site to be harmed. I can't imagine I'll find a better target (at least in relation to my own concerns, rather than the specifications of the task), so I begin circling over the site, breaking the buildings and bashing them down. Meanwhile I focus on maintaining my dragon form; this takes constant vigilence because it is so unfamiliar, and too easily slips into sensations more congruent with human limbs.

What color dragon am I? I recall that D&D dragons can take many different colors, with corresponding breath weapons. On the ruins of the factory, I test acid and frost breath in turn, trying to decide which feels more natural. I like the effects of frost—after freezing metal walls solid they shatter in a satisfying way—but then I remember that the task specifies leaving flaming ruins in my wake, so I switch to fire. There isn't much in the way of visuals; rather than great gouts of flame, my fire breath is more of an intense heat that makes metal glow red. But I dutifully knock down and burn the factory into rubble.

Afterwards, I hover anxiously over the destroyed site to see if anyone was harmed by my stunt. (I know, I know, I make a terrible dragon.) I do spot someone—something?—running around frantically, but as I peer closer, it does not look human at all. Curiously, it appears to be a small white gem that I take to be a cubic zirconia, attached to a tiny wire loop that looks like it must have once been the pendant of an earring. The sense of scale has been skewing dramatically as I have been peering closer, and now I feel back to my normal human size and form, kneeling over ruined buildings the size of an architectural model. I look carefully and spot two more little gems running around. Unless there are more I don't see, three victims isn't too bad, and at least they're still alive, even if they're looking understandably anxious. (How do gems even look anxious? It was something in the way they moved.)

[I've been concentrating on my task and realize I have lost track of my friend. I look for him and we are briefly re-united before I wake up.]

Ritual: Went to bed around 2am. Woke at 5:45 and fed the cat. Returned to bed and set vibrating alarm, attached to wrist. Interval was 30 minutes, set at 5:55am. Last time I used this device I completely slept through several vibration cycles (it was at the lowest setting), so I turned the intensity up slightly. The first time it went off I remembered to lay still, but could feel that I had already lost dreamstate. The second time it went off, my mind felt fully awake but I felt like I might still be integrated with my dream body. I tested movement cautiously and sure enough, I could swing my arms freely, unconstrained by the covers that I knew lay over them in WL. There were still a few moments when I couldn't quite be sure if I was engaging dream muscles or real ones, so in order to avoid sending the wrong signals, I started spinning and sliding my whole body until I felt like I was lying the wrong way in the bed. I didn't feel like I could safely engage my legs yet, so remaining on my back (though in WL I was sleeping on my left side), I slid across the bed and off the other side until I dropped gently to the floor. The cat was lying on me in WL (confirmed when I woke up afterward) and the sensation of warmth and weight bled through into the dreamstate, so it felt very odd and amusing to have this remain constant even while my self-perception of where I was in relation to the room and the bed was changing. I took care to note this WL sensation cautiously and with a certain mental distance, lest it startle me awake. The sensation faded naturally as I now "stood up" and walked through the house.

EILD: I walk straight into the living room, which was dark, and stop to figure out what I should do. Although I have been trying to remember a few personal tasks, somehow it is easier to recall the TOTYs, so I figure I'll attempt another of those to start with. Most of them seem better suited to the outdoors, so I exit the kitchen patio door.

My initial thought is to look for a circle of fairy mushrooms. My cement back patio is unusually life-like this time, so I cross it until I reach the fence that borders the property. In WL this is a low wall of beige-painted cinderblocks; in the dream it is a chain-link fence several feet taller than I am. With the lightness and agility of my dream body, I easily climb over it and drop down. In WL the ground slopes steeply downward here; for some reason in dreams, it is typically a steep hill going up.

I start looking for fairy mushrooms among the trees, but notice a large area where the soil looks loose and disturbed, as if recently planted with the flowers that cover the expanse at regular intervals. The blossoms are very simple in structure, a small disk encircled by six delicate purple petals. I realize that I am unlikely to find a fairy circle in ground so recently landscaped, so I decide to pursue the gnome task instead. There are trees all around, but most look young, their trunks only a few inches in diameter. I look around for the biggest tree I can find, and approach one that is over two feet in diameter, conjoined with two similarly-sized trunks to make a row of three. I can't tell if they are three trunks from the same tree, or multiple trees that grew up in close proximity.

The earth is still bare and loose here, recently tilled, so it is easy to dig my arms in and start casting it aside. I alternately cast the soil I'm displacing to the left and right and back between my legs. It is much easier to dig than it would be in WL, but it is still too slow and tedious to form a hole of the depth and dimensions I need, so I decide that I need a new strategy. If there are tunnels down there, there shouldn't be any need to displace the soil outside the hole—I should be able to drill straight through. I leave my hands in the earth and focus on pushing the soil inward. As a hole begins to form, I step in and will it to widen, so that I won't feel claustrophobic. When it is a few inches wider than my shoulders on either side, I take the plunge, willing the earth beneath my feet to drop into the tunnels and carry me along with it.

I find myself in a network of spacious square hallways, about seven feet tall and wide. They are dimly lit by what seems to be electric light, though I don't investigate the source. There is nothing natural or even rustic about these tunnels—they might easily be the basement corridors of some ordinary building. I look around for evidence that they are the gnome tunnels that I am seeking, and find that the most distinctive thing about the space is the graffiti scrawled here and there on the walls. It is not high-end arty spray-painted graffiti, just ordinary lettering written in what looks like thick black marker. I step closer to one example and find it at once legible and unexpectedly funny: "Hobbits are HUGE!" It does sound like the sort of thing a gnome might write, so it gives me confidence that I've landed in the right place after all.

I continue down the corridor, looking for more memorable examples of graffiti. The next piece that catches my attention says "SpiritLA." Something about the way it is written makes me think that this is a Los Angeles-based sports team that the gnomes apparently favor. A few steps further on, and I finally encounter the gnomes themselves, about six of them congregating in a junction where several corridors meet. There is also a sort of wire gate that appears to lead into a larger open space, though it is too dark to discern any details. Despite what the graffiti said about hobbits, these figures are pretty huge themselves, coming up almost to my shoulder, so I peer closely at their faces for evidence that they are in fact the gnomes that I seek. I am reassured by their features, which have distinctively rounded, gnomish features.

"Hello," I say, curious how they will respond to my intrusion. "Hello!" they reply cheerfully, completely at ease. I have been voicing my observations (like the examples of graffiti) aloud in order to assist my recall later, so as I take note of the appearance of the gnomes nearest me, I make a vocal shorthand description of their characteristics.

"Blonde, bangs, white dojo," I comment about the first gnome to approach me. She is a female wearing a gi (the garment used in karate practice), and though I know perfectly well what a gi is called in waking life, dream logic substitutes "dojo" instead. Her hair is long and straight, of a golden blonde color. Her gi is bound with a plain white belt. She smiles amiably.

Another female gnome is standing to my right, so I note her appearance in turn, remembering that the task specifies interacting with two of them. "Pink padded blouse and white skirt, knee-length" I say, but even at the time I realize "padded" might not be the right word. "Quilted" would probably be more accurate, since it looks like there is only a very thin layer of batting under the decorative overstitching, done with curving and intersecting lines spaced about half an inch apart. I note that the skirt has the same kind of decorative stitching over thicker cloth, with no apparent batting inside, as the stitches lay flat. "Light hair, long—no, shoulder-length," I continue, noting that her hair is exceptionally pale, almost white, and delicately textured. The way it falls reminds me of how hair was "feathered" in late '70s/early '80s hairstyles. The faces of both females look ageless, neither young nor old. Neither seems disconcerted by my weird mutterings, they both just look at me with calm curiosity.

Although I was able to make very detailed observations on the appearance of both, at this point I felt myself begin waking up and could not reverse the process. The EILD allowed me to time the dream precisely: it went off at 6:55 and I awoke at 7:04, so it only lasted nine minutes in all. Subjectively, it also felt very brief.

I got up because I couldn't sleep, and I went out to the balcony. I was several stories up, and the balcony looked out over a grassy lawn, on the far side of which lights twinkled from the windows of other apartment buildings. To my left, I could see more lights from the night skyline of the city.

I was surprised at how dark the sky still was, though full of brilliant stars. Wasn't it almost morning? I remembered that I had gotten up for a while and didn't go back to bed until the sky was starting to lighten. (That part was true.) Shouldn't the sun be rising by now? For some reason I felt strangely tempted to jump off the balcony to see if I could fly, which made me wonder if I might actually be dreaming. But I realized that would be a terrible test, because if I was wrong, well...

I didn't think it could be possible that I was dreaming, because I was sure that ever since I had gone back to bed, I had lain there unable to sleep. How could I be dreaming if I hadn't gone to sleep first? I'd better do a test anyway, just to be sure. I reached out my left hand and tried to invoke a ball of glowing white light in the air above it. Nothing happened. Oh well, I must be awake after all... was my last thought before I woke up. In retrospect, it was a terrible choice of RC, but the only one that occurred to me at the time.

Waking up was confusing at first—hadn't I just been suffering from insomnia? But if I had been dreaming all along (and only now did I notice the profound discrepancies with WL: that I have no such balcony, and moreover live in a completely different kind of building with a completely different kind of view), then I must have been asleep the whole time, only dreaming of insomnia.

Ritual: Yesterday was full of work and stress, conditions that I have previously correlated to vivid dreaming. I worked until going to bed at 2am. Woke at 5am to feed the cat, then again at 6am after a dream that culminated in an experience of intense frustration, vivid enough that I spent around 45 minutes writing it down—an unintended but useful WBTB. Since today will also be very busy I did not do any other lucid practices, however, I had primed myself a little by reading the list of TOTYs last night. Apart from those conditions, the following dream was spontaneous, and I woke from it at around 8:45am.

DILD: I am at my mother's house, but it is unlike any WL house. I am in a long room with high ceilings, very spacious and sparsely furnished, with no modern accoutrements. Maybe it is the medieval look of the interior that reminds me of the TOTYs, and I become lucid. Which would be a good one to do? Fairy would be easier to do outdoors. I could turn into a dragon but then I'd have to destroy everything and I don't want to wreck my mother's house. Phoenix? That would be a good one. I try to remember the details. I can't just summon it directly, I have to burn something, right? I look around the room for something suitable.

On the far end of the room is a table under a shuttered window. The table is covered with a white cloth, and spread across it is an assortment of jewels and precious stones. These look ideal. I select a faceted gem and place it in my left palm. It is small, only about six millimeters across, transparent with cobalt blue striations, like a combination of diamond and sapphire. It is faceted into what I think of as a classic gem shape. [According to online sources, this is simply called a "round" cut.] I walk slowly across the room back toward the couch where my mom is sitting, concentrating on the stone and willing it to catch fire. The stone feels inert in my hand, and I feel that I have chosen the wrong one. From the coloring, this stone is clearly attuned with ice, not fire. I should go back and pick a different one.

I return to the table and find a small stone of matte earthy red color. This is more a mineral than a gem, and it is shaped like a narrow lozenge, almost a centimeter long, pointed at the ends, and only a few millimeters wide in the middle. I begin to will it into flame, but immediately have second thoughts. The stone is so skinny and small, it would probably make a scrawny phoenix. I go back to the table to look for a better one.

I decide to find a gem that could pass for a phoenix egg, examine the options more carefully, and finally come across a good-sized stone around three centimeters across. It is also matte and reddish, but a generous oval in shape, and the top is composed of randomly assorted rounded protrusions, like bubbles. The bottom has been leveled off and already set into a metal frame. I decide that this one is ideal, put it in my left palm, and begin to invoke fire in earnest. Around this time my mom tries to talk to me about doing some household chore but I hush her: "Not now, I'm busy."

The stone resists at first, but I do not let myself doubt my ability to do this. I've summoned fire in my palm before. This time I'm just transmuting it from a substrate. I will a flame to emerge from the stone and soon it does—but I notice that in the process, the stone has transformed into a candle. The candle is larger than the stone, filling my hand. It is a 6cm tall cylinder and is conveniently fitted in a round container. Between the candle and the sides of the container is what looks like a filling of crumpled dry grass.

The flame is burning on the wick in the ordinary way, and I will it to expand and consume the whole candle, turning it into the phoenix I am trying to create. For a moment it burns quietly, but then the whole object transforms again. Briefly I seem to be holding a bundle of smoldering dried grass, around a foot in diameter, until the whole thing explodes and violently flies apart, patches landing in various places around the room. Failure? I'd better check the remains.

I wander around to a couple of the smoking remnants, but see nothing notable. I remember that I need to keep my expectations high, so as I walk toward a third, larger patch, I anticipate finding a baby phoenix. Sure enough, when I prod at the charred dried grass, underneath I discover a tiny, long-necked, bird-like creature! The phoenix has hatched! But it is it skinny and completely limp. What can I do to help? As a creature of fire, I reason, it must need heat. It is probably freezing to death.

I gently pick up the baby bird, which drapes across my hands with no sign of life, and take it to the fireplace. Luckily there is already a good fire burning. There is a kind of metal chain screen separating the fire from a metal grate on the hearth. Sprawled on the grate, soaking up the heat, is a long iguana-like lizard that I had previously noticed on the table when I was selecting jewels. I figure it must be a salamander, with the same need for warmth as my new phoenix. Should I place the phoenix in the fire directly, or on the grate? Since my hypothesis about the wisdom of putting the phoenix in the fire is as yet untested, I decide to lay it on the grate in case I need to remove it quickly.

The experiment goes well. As soon as I lay the baby phoenix next to the fire, its body begins to perk up and fill out. It grows until it resembles a toucan in shape and size, though red in color and with a sleeker bill. Success! But was there more to the task? I can't remember if we were also supposed to fight something, and figure I'd better do that as well as long as I can maintain dreamstate. "Let's go fight something!" I say to the newborn phoenix, and it hops up on my shoulder.

I head past the table with the jewels and open the window in the end wall. The window is a square aperture about three feet on a side, fastened with a single wooden shutter. The shutter is hinged on one side, flush with the wall when closed, and opens inward to the left. This truly resembles a medieval house in that there is no glass in the window, so it is easy to climb up and out. I pause on the sill and bid the phoenix to fly on ahead. Meanwhile, I hang up the long metal hook that I used to open the shutter so that I can grab it when I come in later, then use another device that resembles a hook attached to a wire loop to suspend myself from the sill and ease the drop to the ground, which is far enough below that it requires some precaution. I have the feeling that I have done this many times before.

Once on the ground, I look around for someone or something to fight. I am on a grassy lawn that extends between a number of different buildings. The buildings themselves don't leave a distinct architectural impression—I wish I had taken a closer look. Instead I was scanning the ground between them, but all I see are ordinary people walking about, none of whom seem like suitable opponents. I don't want to be an unprovoked aggressor.

The dream begins to fade. I worry that the abrupt transition to a different space might have unbalanced it, and I immediately take steps to stabilize, falling on my knees and examining the details of the grass while running my hands over it for texture. For a moment the grass turns grey and although I see all the usual plants among it, like clover, everything looks unusually small. But then a voice hails me from above and the dreamstate resumes its integrity: "Do you want to fight?" I promptly agree.

I am facing a man who is accompanied by a creature resembling a muscular, short-haired white dog. The man has a sword, and immediately begins to strike at me. Although I am unarmed, I find that I am able to parry his blows with my hands without too much discomfort. I suspect that I could turn the fight to my advantage if I want, but the whole point of this exercise was to fight in tandem with the phoenix. Where is that bird? "Phoenix? Phoenix!" I call anxiously.

The blade keeps falling, and I keep catching it and pushing it aside, but luckily the dog is hanging back for now. Suddenly to my relief the phoenix swoops in, aiming a stream of fire at the dog. More gouts of flame follow, consuming the man and dog, but they do not go down easily. I watch the phoenix, who has now taken human form, take a blade right through his stomach, angling up toward his chest. It is an unmistakably lethal blow, and I run over to him as he falls. I feel guilty for having put him in this predicament—but recall that for a phoenix, there should be a way to fix this.

Looking around frantically, I am pleased to discover a fireplace in my immediate vicinity. Nevermind the unlikelihood of finding a fireplace outdoors; it is just what I need so I don't question it. I drag the phoenix, currently in the form of a slim Asian boy, over to the hearth and dump him directly onto the flames. I expect the fire to heal him; instead he begins screaming as his skin burns and chars. It is horrifying, but I hold him down as he struggles—he was dying already, this is the only thing that might help. Maybe this is how it is supposed to work. A phoenix has to die to be reborn, right? The human body blackens and burns away. Sure enough, in its place I find a little baby bird, looking much like it did initially but yellow instead of red this time. I wonder if its pale color means it needs to eat. The bird pecks at some morsel of food near the fire and I try to tempt it with something better. "Here, eat a hot one." I pluck an olive-sized piece from a row of snacks baking in the fireplace (I don't feel the heat, just as I didn't feel pain from the sword earlier) and offer it directly. The little bird compliantly swallows the morsel, growing in size and turning red again.

I feel that I have completed the task to satisfaction, so even before I wake up I begin reviewing the details, making sure I commit them to memory. There is a moment when I am back in the same house as the beginning of the dream and ask someone to remind me the name of the guy I fought. "Ziggy Starduster and the Hoarfrost," comes the reply. I note that they definitely said "Starduster," not "Stardust." Since I only hear rather than see the names, I briefly wonder if the dog's name is spelled "Whorefrost" or "Hoarfrost," but decide that the latter is more appropriate on a number of levels.

Ritual: I had time to sleep in this morning so I was motivated to get lucid. Went to bed at midnight and woke at 6am to feed the cat. Didn't do a full WBTB, but took a few supplements (alpha-g, choline, l-theanine) plus a tiny amount (between 1-2mg) of very old galantamine. I lay down on my back to delay sleep onset and practiced progressive relaxation, a few SSILD cycles, and counting. Couldn't count very high (usually not past six, my focus is terrible these days) but clearly noticed onset of hypnogogic imagery and managed to put in a number of rotations before falling into dreamless sleep. When I awoke after a few minutes (guaranteed if I fall asleep on my back), I turned on my right side and let myself fall asleep normally, feeling adequately primed and hoping for the best. This "kitchen sink" approach has pretty much become my standard and despite being really haphazard has a decent success rate, often resulting in WILDs. This time I had an NLD or two that I don't remember well, then the following semi-lucid that turned into a DILD.

SLD: I am on a beach. All is not well: there are what look like tiny floating islands approaching from across the sea, and on each one stands a little stone tower and a menacing-looking figure in black armor with a horned helmet. The armored figures to be using the islands as transportation. Though not quite lucid, I remember that I have certain broad powers in this place, so I walk along the beach until I spot a couple empty islands, and try to summon one toward me. It turns into a little white sailboat and promptly sinks. I try to summon the second one, and the same thing happens. So much for island hopping. I turn right and continue to walk along the waterfront.

Something seems oddly familiar about this place—I've been here before, haven't I? I note the urban architecture up ahead, the sprawl of a city just past the beach and I'm distinctly reminded of a particular dream I had once, years ago now. It was here, I am sure of it, though this corresponds to no earthly place. I don't remember much about that earlier dream, except that it started in one of the apartment buildings a few blocks from the beach and then I went down to the parking lot, but saw the beach in the distance. [I think I actually found it, an entry from 12/29/13, but I misremembered the order of events: I was in the parking lot initially, then dropped by the beach before going up to the apartment.]

Various people are wandering around the beach, and a distinctive figure approaches. He is a thin old man with stringy, longish grey hair, carrying three lidded boxes in different colors, each about eighteen inches square. "What do they call this bay?" I ask him. "Sigismund?" he suggests, then modifies it. "Or Sigisroot?" He seems uncertain. I am about to ask the name of the city, but we are interrupted by the approach of a huge wave. We try to scramble up the beach but don't make it in time, and the wave crashes over us. I have to struggle against the pull of its wake, meanwhile trying to reach around to find the old man, to help him if possible. I grab someone's hand in the water, but it turns out to be a short, dark-haired woman. After helping her to shore, I come across the old man again on the beach. He has made it to safety, but lost two of his boxes. I feel partly responsible for the loss of his boxes, so I go back to the water to look for them. I locate the boxes but their contents have spilled. Apparently they contained cassette tapes, so I dredge as many as possible out of the water and wet sand, restoring them to one of the boxes. After I've grabbed as many as I can find, I return the boxes to the old man.

FA-DILD: The dream resets, perhaps a half-waking, and I am in my house again. I start reviewing what just happened, and write down the name of the bay, both variations—not sure I realized at the time I was writing in a dream notebook. As I think over the events of the dream, I realize I must have been semi-lucid at the point where I was trying to summon the islands and then recognized the setting from prior dream. I reason that if I was semi-lucid then, I must be actually lucid now. Dream logic is terrible, but this time it did the trick—thinking about lucidity made me recognize that I was still dreaming. Since I was back in my house, I decided to do the TOTM of walking through the wall. I had interpreted "my room" to mean the bedroom, so I head in there and immediately turn left to look at the wall. I'm pleased and surprised to find an ample stretch of wall between the door and bookcase (surprised because in WL there is no free wall space in the room at all, to the point where I thought I would have to do the task by going into the closet!) Instead, the dream has obligingly provided sufficient room for me to stand in front of the wall, so I press both hands flat against it and concentrate. The wall resists the pressure at first, so I increase it, then watch as my right hand starts to sink into the surface. The wall crumbles under my hand like weak plaster with an impressively realistic texture and sensation. As I continue to push, a whole section about two feet wide dislodges and falls inward under my right hand, and then I push my whole body forward and break through the rest.

I find myself in a cramped, closet like space, empty yet messy somehow, like it was poorly constructed—for instance, there are exposed 2x4s at odd diagonals. There is no visible way out, and I remember back to a time I was exploring the use of mirrors as portals and got stuck in a labyrinth of empty rooms that became ever smaller and more claustrophobic. [The dream I was thinking of occurred on 4/17/14, and the earliest experience of this kind I recorded on 12/18/10]. Simply recognizing the dream's tricks gives me the confidence not to be waylaid by them again, so I turn left and push through that wall too. Unsurprisingly, I am in an even smaller, darker, and more cramped space. I remind myself to remain optimistic and keep pushing forward with the expectation of getting out. I push through a couple more dark, tiny, empty spaces and then find myself in one that is different. It feels like an actual closet, with coats. What catches my eye is the style of those coats: they remind me of the cheap winter coats we wore in the 1970s, made of smooth synthetic cloth in drab colors and augmented with wide fake-fleece collars. I push through the coats and finally tumble free into an outdoor space.

It's one of those transitions that are so striking in dream. I had been struggling in narrow claustrophobic space with poor visibility, and suddenly everything has changed: I'm in open space, the air is clear and fresh, the light is bright, colors are vivid, my vision is sharp, and I feel a surge of ebullience. I remind myself that it is worth it, all the trouble I go to over dreaming, even if dream isn't always cooperative, because of experiences like this. I even notice that little flutter in my solar plexus that I associate with deep dream.

I move forward, on my hands and knees at first. I am at the base of a steep hill, and there are a number of animals sitting on the hillside, placidly watching me, including several ape-like creatures. As I crawl through the grass, I note the distinct texture of it: it might not be grass at all, actually, but some kind of ground cover with stiff, spiny stalks that flatten rather than bend under my hands. When I get to my feet, I see that a number of these stalks have actually adhered to my palms. They look like black tubes about three inches long and only a couple millimeters across, hollow, with a longer thin hair sticking another inch out the end. I try to pluck one out and it won't come off. I have the impression that even if I manage to pull off the outer tube, the hair will be left behind. It occurs to me to wonder if this explains the ape-like creatures, which seem unusually intelligent and anthropomorphic: did other people come here before me, and end up with so many of these hairs attached to their skin that they became furry?

I consider flying, but decide not to: I'm really interested in this place, and flying would destabilize me from this particular scenario, if not the dream itself. So I continue walking forward on foot, reminding myself both literally and figuratively to stay grounded. As I reach the end of the flat terrain at the bottom of the steep hill, I look up at the animals arrayed on the upper terraces, who are still quietly watching me. What should I ask them? I never seem to get anywhere asking the names of things, so I decide to be clever, and call up to them: "What would be a really interesting question for a newcomer to ask?" No answer. I repeat myself, but still no reply, so I start climbing up toward them.

When I reach the upper terrace, things get complex. I can't remember what passes between me and one of the creatures, who is more man-like now, before he pulls a knife on me—though it is unclear if he he is using the knife to threaten me or the grizzled, older-looking apeman creature who is sitting to his left. I wrest the knife from his grasp, which knocks him off balance. He nearly falls off the cliff (which suddenly seems a lot steeper now, almost vertical, than when I climbed up it a moment before) and grabs on to my waist to save himself. I check my moral compass and find that I feel no compulsion to save him—something about his attitude puts me off—so I peel his arms away and he falls to the base of the cliff, presumably to his death. The elder creature has retrieved the knife, which is now lying at his feet, and I go over to look at it.

When I pick up the knife, I find it to be a wide, cleaver-like implement made of thin cardboard with silver foil stuck to it. There is writing on the cardboard side, and I read through a whole confession, apparently by the creature I just sent to his death. The text describes an elaborate scheme that involved getting me pregnant and then killing me after the child was born, because it concludes, "I won't regret killing you when I see your features in the face of our infant." I find this repulsive and it resolves my lingering doubts about whether letting him fall was the right thing to do. I ask the elder creature if I can keep the knife, and he doesn't speak, but I take his silence as assent. I notice that there is a second knife on the ground, made of roughly-forged steel or iron and elegantly curved like a viking blade (the handle a loop of the same metal), that resembles like the one I wrested away initially, so I swap out the mock-up I'm holding for the real blade, and walk forward on the hilltop.

I encounter another man, this one entirely human in appearance except for a strange feature: his face is completely wrapped in grimy white bandages, leaving only a bit of forehead and his hair explosed. The bandages are thicker over his left eye, but seem to adhere closely to his right—I can see the shape of the eye bulging under them—so I conclude that must be the one he somehow sees out of. Despite his odd appearance I feel an immediate affinity for him, in contrast to the last guy. He leads me into a building, where a girl approaches us and asks me, "Who made that knife?" I look at the blade in my hand. It doesn't bear a long text like the mock-up, but there is a row of runes along the top edge that I can't read. "He's dead now," I reply laconically.

In the entryway of the building, we immediately go through a door to the right, into what looks like a machine shop. The machines are in the center of the room, and two people are operating them, but I can't tell what they're making. The machines have some kind of spinning disk that either cuts or polishes. The bandaged guy is telling me about a hardware store somewhere. "That's where the first ship came from." I have the impression he is talking about a spaceship, and gather that there is a whole complicated plot behind all of this, but I don't know the details. By the time we finish walking through the room, I am waking up.

Ritual: Last night's moment of lucidity made me crave good dreaming again, but I woke up after six hours with nothing but a few shreds of bland and wan memory. Determined to do better, I dug out the silent vibrating alarm I was using last year for my DEILD experiments and strapped it to my wrist. I set the timer for 33 minutes at first, so I would likely be asleep by the time it went off, but after lying awake for about half that time reset it for 17 minutes. I reminded myself that it would be fine if I was still awake when it went off, a good opportunity to re-familiarize myself with the sensation I was anticipating and to RC. I did feel the pulse once before I fell asleep; afterwards, given that another 45 minutes went by before I woke up, it must have gone off a couple times that I didn't notice. However, I did get lucid, even though the timing suggests that the onset was not triggered by the vibration, because when I finally woke up the alarm was 30 seconds from going off again, and I don't think the dream lasted that long (though I could be wrong about that). This would be consistent with my other experiments with this technique: it works, but not in the way one might expect. Rather than directly inducing an awareness of the dream state with its signal, it seems to be rather that the anticipation of the alarm serves as an anchor for the attention that makes it easier to transition directly into dream. Consequently, rather than a DILD I had a WILD.

I knew I must have transitioned when I realized I was holding a piece of paper in my hands. I used the paper to better integrate by running it between my fingers and being attentive to the lifelike sensations. They were vivid enough that I figured I should just get up out of bed, even though my vision hadn't kicked in fully yet and everything was dim and blurry. Since there are bookcases right next to my bed in WL and my intention was to do this month's Basic Task i, the moment I was on my feet I started examining the books. My vision was no better overall, but I could see well enough in the area of my primary focus. Reading was surprisingly easy as well, although the words themselves did not always remain stable, sometimes changing into new ones right before my eyes.

I read a half dozen book titles right away, some better than others, but none so striking that I felt like putting special effort into memorizing them. I hoped a few might stick with me naturally, but unfortunately I didn't remember any of them on waking. After browsing the books in the bedroom for a while, I moved out to the kitchen, where I have more bookshelves (there are books almost everywhere in my house). I continued reading titles, trying to find a really good one for the task. Finally after moving on to a second shelf in the kitchen I found what I was looking for. The book was a slim hardcover, about 9"x11" and 3/4 inch thick. The cover had a glossy sheen and was white in the upper half and a darker color, grey perhaps, in the lower half. In the very center, where the colors met, was the word: "REVOLIOTUN" in red and black stylized capital letters. I took note of how it appeared to be the word "revolution" with some of the letters transposed. I wasn't sure if this was part of the title or designated something else, like the series, publisher, or maybe just a cover design, since the actual title seemed to be printed below this in the lower half of the cover. The title was David Bowie's Dreams: Naked in Flight. This tickled me, especially given his recent passing, and I knew it was the one I wanted to bring back for the task.

I set my mind on remembering that book, but glanced at a few more for good measure. There was one small paperback titled Blue Skulls Book that struck me, but that's the only other title I can remember.

Now that I had completed the task, I wondered if I should wake and write immediately, but it seemed a waste of good dream state. Was it really that good, though? My vision was still terrible. "Then maybe I should work on that," I told myself reprovingly. So I looked out the kitchen window and tried to clean up my vision. "Just open your eyes," I instructed myself. "But be careful not to open your real eyes!" I actually did have a sensation like my eyes were opening, and suddenly my vision cleared up beautifully! I looked out the window and was startled by the amazing color and clarity of the landscape, a wide grassy expanse bordered by distant hills, so unlike my actual concrete pool patio. The vision from my left eye was perfect, but my right eye faded in and out: it kept feeling like something was covering it, which I tried to brush away with my fingers as though it were an errant lock of hair. I realized that it was probably the bleedthrough sensation from the way my face was pressed into my pillow (I was able to confirm this on waking) and decided I'd better do my best to ignore it.

The beauty of the outdoors lured me, so I stepped through the sliding screen door into this marvelous dreamscape, and immediately felt my heart fill with joy. I wondered if I should plan to do anything in particular, but decided no, it was enough just to look around and drink in the sights, now that I could see so clearly. As I moved over the ground, I was more dancing than walking for the sheer pleasure of it. Momentarily I wondered if I should be careful not to accidently blunder into any WL obstacles I couldn't see, but then had to remind myself, this isn't like google cardboard: I'm not just surrounded by an illusory overlay on the real world, this is a whole world in its own right.

"This is my favorite world!" I murmured in fervent appreciation, then caught myself. That seemed like a radical statement. Was it really true? I reflected for a moment and had to admit that it was. I felt a bit sorry for the real world—how could it compare to this? As I looked around, marveling at the beauty of my surroundings, my eye was caught by a brighter spot in the dream sky, a white disk surrounded by intensified illumination, like the sun filtering through a haze. For some reason this struck me as remarkable, and I thought back and couldn't remember ever seeing a sun in my dream sky before. Unlike the unpleasant brightness of the real sun, this one I could gaze at directly.

I wandered across the lawn until I discovered a large headstone. It had the traditional rounded shape but was very wide, maybe three or four feet tall and five or six in width. I was pleased to discover that I could read the chiseled inscription very clearly: "THE EARLY DEATHS OF BLAKE GRACE." The name meant nothing to me, but what particularly caught my attention was the plural, "deaths." How could he or she have died more than once? Oh well, in the dream world, I suppose anything is possible.

Encountering the tombstone hadn't diminished my joy in the slightest. I still felt radiantly happy, even when I glanced down and noticed that I was standing on a carved piece of stone that covered the grave itself, like the lid of a sarcophagus. "I hope I'm not disturbing the inhabitant!" I thought amiably, and stepped off the stone, watching closely to see if it would move, on the off-chance that the corpse might decide to rise from the grave in indignation. Even this possibility did not dampen my mood; I felt fully capable of dealing with such an eventuality, should it occur. But the dead slept. I felt compassion for the person buried here and thought I should make up for my accidental insult by doing something to honor the grave. In the hollow of one of the carvings toward the foot of the stone was an accumulation of gravel on which an uprooted mushroom was lying. I picked up the mushroom and tried to set it upright, pushing the stem into the gravel to help it stand up. The surface of the mushroom was starting to rot, but the sight filled me with a sense of tender compassion, much like the grave itself.

After this I decided that it was probably time to wake up, since I didn't want to risk wandering off and forgetting the book title and the engraving on the headstone. Since I was waking myself up deliberately, I was able to get ready and do it in a very controlled way. As the dream began to fade into void, I grabbed a pen and got ready to start writing in the notebook next to my bed the moment I transitioned, until I realized how ridiculous this was. There was no point in picking up a dream pen—it wouldn't save me any time—I would still have to move my physical arm and grab the physical pen once I actually woke up! What a hassle!

Train—open—more and more crowded—trying to stay secure.

Earlier, plane—everyone had kissed the screen, identical lip print.

Bangkok—know the route from having taken many times.

Scenery from the train amazing, began photographing—tall earthy brown cliffs on the right; later on the left forest, enormous trees, figures of other beings like bas-relief in bark, then we were zooming through a city on the water, buildings alternating from Renaissance to modern faux-vernacular shopping plaza style.

Reminded myself to actually look at the photos after I took them, because when I woke up, they would be unlikely to still be on the camera. Some were amazing, and I was sorry they wouldn't last. Others not so great—we were moving fast, and I couldn't always capture the best angle.

"This is the clearest dream I've had in a long time." Happy because for a while dreams have been distant and dim, frustrating. How did I accomplish this? All I could think was that I had finally wanted it enough. But how did I get lucid? Thought back and tried to remember the moment—this actually destabilized the dream and began waking process, but it was gradual enough that I could think back a bit first—realized there was no "aha!" moment, the lucidity had dawned gradually, probably because it was right before I'd been planning to get up anyway—only genuinely lucid for those last few moments when I started thinking critically about the pictures and the dream itself. At the time, though, I felt not an alteration of circumstance, but a sense of continuity with what had gone before. To be aware that you are dreaming is not unusual; to be aware that you are aware that you are dreaming is to be lucid.

Was the lucidity that which allowed me to appreciate and experience the clarity of the dream? But an appreciation must have preceded lucidity because that's what prompted me to start taking the pictures, before I realized they wouldn't last. And even after I knew they would not persist—I couldn't help hoping that this time would be different from all the others, this time they might cross over, through some miracle.

I'm in the kitchen with my husband and one of the cats. A TV or monitor (neither of which is in the kitchen in WL) is advertising a website called "soundandspeed.com." I make a note of it, because it looks like it will be a useful place to pick up Christmas gifts.

The cat is dashing around like a maniac: she runs up to me as if she wants to be cuddled, then runs away again as if afraid. I'm lying on the floor at this point so grab her and put her under my head, like a fluffy pillow, which calms her a bit.

The kitchen is full of spiders of all sizes. At one point I step in something that crackles like dry leaves, but I feel something wet on my foot (I'm just wearing socks) and notice that what I stepped in was the carcass of an enormous spider, at least two feet across. The legs have dried out into husks, the source of the crackling sound, but there is apparently some residual moisture in the body cavity, which is what got on my foot. I feel a surge of disgust.

There is another large dead spider by the door leading outside, this one about eight inches across. It is flattened, which makes me think I must have accidentally stepped on that one earlier.

The spiders seem to have come along with stuff that we brought in from the garage. There are also cobwebs and dead leaves clinging to the boxes. I'm not happy about this. I see a spider that I suspect to be a black widow, and as I go toward the sink to grab rubber gloves so that I can crush it, I see another spider on the edge of a crate that is clearly a brown widow. (Both black and brown widows are actually quite commonplace outdoors where I live in WL, so this is not an unusual experience.) Should I kill it? I remind myself that I've decide not to kill the brown ones since they are less dangerous than the black, but I can't have it living in the house, so I decide to trap it and put it outside.

"This is an infestation of spiders," I think, as I go to the cupboard to get a glass. I ponder the word "infest" as I choose a glass of a suitable size and shape for trapping the spider. Next I need a stiff but thin piece of paper to cover the opening once the spider is inside, and I notice a piece of mail on the counter that will do the trick. As I reach for it, I notice a dead branch propped up on the counter, occupied by another strange-looking spider. It is glossy black with the red markings of a black widow, but the red forms a splotch rather than an hourglass shape. The spider itself looks oddly inflated, almost perfectly round as though it might burst. I look more closely and see a ring of tiny spiders, its young, circling around it. I decide I had better get rid of this one before worrying about the brown widow, so I grab the branch and take it outside.

I throw the branch over the wall of my patio into the bushes, silently wishing that the spiders will have a good life—so long as they stay out of my house. Meanwhile, I notice that the surroundings look a bit different than usual; the neighbors appear to be living in an RV rather than their house, and the bushes are more sparse than they should be. As I start walking back to my house, the realization comes very naturally: I'm dreaming.

I remind myself that I should begin a task in order to help maintain dream awareness, so try to think of what to do. No personal goals come to mind, so I think about the TOTMs and remember the one with the phone. That seems a good one to pursue, under the circumstances.

I begin by imagining that my phone is right in front of me on top of the wall and ringing. It doesn't immediately manifest, so I decide I need to build expectation: the phone must be ringing in the house. I dash back as though I already hear it and don't want to miss the call. Bursting through the kitchen door, sure enough, I see my phone on the counter. Although it is not making an audible sound, the screen is lit up with an incoming call, so I quickly grab it and push the button.

I hear the voice of a polite-sounding young man with a Middle Eastern accent. He is already talking, and sounds like he was in the middle of leaving a message when I took the call.

"Hello?" I interrupt.

The man doesn't seem to hear me at first, and continues with his message. There was more to it, but this is the part I can remember: "—honey and sweetness. Despite Middle Eastern rituals and invocation of Far Eastern gods, we regret to inform you that—"

"I'm here! I'm here!" I insist. Finally I get his attention. He states my name. "Yes?" I ask.

"What is your opinion of our company's business practices?"

The question mystifies me, because I still have no idea who he is or what company he represents, so I inquire, "What is it that you do?"

Instead of answering directly, he asks, "What do you think about your reduced number of intimid—?"

He was interrupted by the sudden dispersal of the dream. My impression was that the last word was going to be "intimidating," but "intimate" is another possibility. Unfortunately, neither one adds much clarity to whatever it was he was about to say!

"So they sold me for no onions... man, I don't know."

Trying to keep working after midnight, nodding off at my desk, shake myself awake and realize I just half-dreamed someone complaining in these words... time for bed!

Ritual: Woke up around 5am after four hours of sleep and decided to make a proper LD attempt. To reinforce my intention I used supplements, my usual stack of Alpha-GPC, L-Theanine, and Bacopa. Did some SSILD cycles until I felt too wakeful, and then breathing/counting. After falling half-asleep and waking up again, I turned on my side.

DILD: My recall is poor from the fact that I haven't been journaling diligently, and I also didn't write more than a few notes promptly after the dream, so I don't clearly recall the onset of lucidity. I just remember that I was in a small, empty, square room with white walls and beige carpet, and I knew I was dreaming. I had the idea that I should better integrate with the dream through physical activity, so I did some high-knee running for a few circles around the room, and followed it up with jumping jacks. This felt absurdly easy compared to the physical strain of exercising in WL, and the sense of incongruity almost collapsed the dream.

I managed to hold the dream together, but now I was feeling dissatisfied, and I decided that I didn't like this room with its ugly beige carpet. I went through the door and found myself outside, which was a nice change. I found myself in a small yard bordered by beautiful vegetation, glossy green leaves and vividly colorful flowers.

FA-NLD: At this point I had an FA during which I lost lucidity by believing I was actually awake. I recall telling someone about how beautiful the outdoors was in the dream I just had, compared to the bland indoor environment. The dream proceeded to take the form of a meeting with colleagues at work, though the details have faded.

DILD: At some point after the meeting, I was driving in a car with two women and realized I was dreaming again. I had reviewed the TOTMs during my WBTB, and was very confident in my recollection that one of the basic tasks was to blow a car horn! That will be easy, I figured, since I'm already driving a car... in fact, I feel bad because it's almost too easy. Dream took care of that, so when I pressed the horn, no sound came out. I ended up putting a lot of concentration into trying to coax some sound out of the horn, and the best I could get was a kind of doorbell buzz.

After giving up on my efforts to make the car horn sound louder or more realistic, I pulled over to the side of the road, and got out of the car with the two women. We were on a small rural road with a nice view over some fields. Now I wanted to try one of the advanced tasks, to pass into a DC's body. As I approached one of the women with this intention, I noticed her appearance had changed: previously she had been a fully-clothed middle-aged woman of non-descript appearance. Now I was walking toward the body of a nude young woman with no head! It wasn't that the head had been chopped off, her body just ended at the neck, a smooth stump.

I didn't let this deter me and walked right into the body. I realized that the lack of a head was handy: since the only "headspace" I was occupying was my own, I didn't feel any confusion about my identity—although it made the task less interesting than it might have been. However, I began to suspect that since the body had been facing me as I merged with it, now my head might be attached backwards! This thought was so disconcerting that I woke up before I could look down and check.

I was a young man, standing on a verandah. Overhead the sky darkened with a migration of birds. Tiny hawks with red caps began to descend and line up on the verandah railing. As more birds appeared, I noticed that they were organizing themselves by color. The birds ahead of me were all white, those to the right were all green, those to the left were all red. Those behind me had dark, variegated plumage: mostly dark grey and brown, with streaks of yellow and white. Among the white birds on the front railing, the centermost began to sing. As she sang, her image fluctuated between bird and human. In the back of my mind, I—the dreamer and critical observer—noted that she was singing in the vernacular and was slightly disappointed. But I—the young man whose perspective I had taken—was fascinated and enthralled. "Goddess, goddess!" he exclaimed, rapt.

Afterwards he went inside to tell his mother about this extraordinary experience. Then he went back out to find the moonstone he had left on the verandah. He went back in and started boarding up the window that looked outside. (I can't remember why.) Meanwhile, his mother was regarding him with a patient but slightly exasperated expression. If the young man were more observant—as was I, the dreamer—he would have understood that his experience was not unique, as he seemed to believe. She was looking at him this way because she had experienced the same thing at some point in her life. I was even aware that she had a moonstone of her own, and was considering whether to show it to him. But the young man seemed oblivious, perhaps preferring to believe that the experience had been for him alone, and the mother seemed to hesitate about whether or not to reveal that she had seen the goddess once too.

Ritual: My LDs have all but vanished now that I am not actively working on it (not for lack of interest, but work is way too busy right now, and I'm not playing any computer games either!) However, when I got up before dawn to feed the cat and realized I was wakeful enough to call this a WBTB, it occurred to me that I didn't even know what the October TOTMs were, so I looked them over before returning to bed. I tried to do some counting but had no focus and fell asleep. I did end up complete one of the tasks, but essentially within the context of a non-lucid dream! The distinctions between LD and NLD used to seem a lot crisper when LDing was new to me, but I would call this an example of agency without dream awareness, which I'm not sure has happened to me before. I always thought dream awareness was the prerequisite for agency, but apparently not!

NLD: I was in a community that was preparing for a special festival. They had a great deal of maguro (lean tuna meat) and slices of it were lining a long stone staircase that cut through a wooded park-like space. I wanted to marinate the maguro like I had done at last year's festival: it had been a big hit. I tried to remember the marinade recipe, and knew that it was very basic: pretty much just soy sauce and cilantro. Soy sauce was easy to come by, but I was out of cilantro. I had a limited time before all the maguro went bad, so I had to find cilantro right away.

I went into town to see if I could get any. While walking down the sidewalk, I saw some women holding cameras. I assumed they were photographers for the festival. This reminded me of the TOTMs, so I tried to remember the one I had prioritized. Oh right: if I see a DC, I should follow him or her. I picked one of the photographers, a black woman with her hair bound in two pigtails, and started shadowing her as she walked down the street.

The DC only walked about fifteen feet before she turned around again, so I turned as well and continued following her. She walked back to the place where I had first spotted her and stopped again. What was she doing? I studied her closely, trying to understand her behavior. She wasn't taking any pictures; her camera hung ignored around her neck. However, she seemed to be posing to display her fur coat to best advantage. Suddenly I understood: she had put on a gorgeous costume for the festival, so now she was walking up and down the sidewalk in order to be seen!

I decided that continuing to follow her would be redundant if she was just going to hang out on that same stretch of sidewalk, so I went into a local bookstore to ask about the cilantro. There was a guy who had a piece of paper with pictures of the various types. Right now only the cilantro from China was available, he said, but it didn't have the best flavor: they had picked it too early. I told him I'd settle for that if I couldn't get anything else.

Notes: Since I stopped doing active dream practice, not only my recall but even the content of my dreams has degraded. The more epic and story-like elements have dwindled and my dreams currently seem to be pieced together primarily from waking life residue. This one is full of it: I ate similar slices of maguro on Sunday night; on Monday I attended a lecture where the speaker used a fur coat as a metaphor; and in the back of my mind I had been wondering if it was true, as someone recently told me, that cilantro can lower the raised mercury levels one can get from eating too much maguro. Even marinating the maguro has a precedent, a very delicious form of sushi called zuke.

Ritual: I went to bed at midnight and found myself quite awake at 5am, so I got up and worked for an hour. On going back to bed, I realized that although I had not intended a WBTB, the conditions were good for LDing. I had to get up at 8, so I didn't want to spend the time on a formal WILD attempt, but I thought about what task I should do if I got lucid. All I could remember of this month's TOTMs were "fart" and "draw," so picked the latter. I decided I would draw a dinosaur, since I never got around to riding one last month.

DILD: I think I was outside my workplace—something I rarely dream of—when I reached down to pick up something off the ground. As I straightened, I realized with clear certainty that I was dreaming. I wasn't sure what had triggered the awareness, so thought it over, but there didn't seem to be any specific anomalies that I had noticed, and I hadn't RC'd either. On this occasion I just felt very naturally aware of the dream state.

I had originally planned to draw a dinosaur and bring it to life for the TOTM, but now I decided to start with something easier. I had been at my HEMA class yesterday, so I decided to draw a sword, then manifest it and do some practice. My initial strategy was to simply draw the sword in my left palm, so that I could manifest it directly in my hand (I am right-handed, so I was using my right hand to draw with). However, the lines changed as soon as I had set them down, turning into a cartoon-like character. I figured fine, I can work with that, it doesn't matter what I manifest... but my intention to transform the drawing into a real being fizzled. Nothing happened except that the drawing changed into a different character, and then faded.

Changing strategy, as I found myself walking next to a building I drew a sword right on the wall. It was a poor drawing, chunky and ill-proportioned, but I figured I could fix it in post-production. I put my hand over where the hilt was drawn, intending to grab the sword as it manifested. Nothing happened. I wondered if it would help to reach into the wall, in case the sword was inside it. I pressed my right hand against the wall, which consisted of a reddish, textured stucco. It resisted at first, but I kept pressing, and eventually it yielded like a crumbly semi-moist clay, and my hand went right through. I closed my hand over an object and pulled it out. Unfortunately it was not the sword I was trying to create, but a comic book.

It occurred to me that I was always trying to make the dream state conform to my will, and I should pay more attention to the things that it offered me unexpectedly, so I took a moment to flip through the comic book as I walked on past the building. The hero of the comic was a young boy, but nothing caught my interest, so I tossed it on the ground. Lucidity got a little weak, and I found myself grilling a piece of chicken for my husband's dinner. The image of the piece of meat on the grill was, in retrospect, an obvious bit of day residue from a Facebook post I had seen last night.

While getting the dinner ready I found myself indoors, where I made a third try at drawing the sword, inscribing an outline on the wall again. Since there was a DC in the room with me, I thought I would be clever and asked him to grab the sword off the wall and give it to me. I figured it would still count for the TOTM as long as the drawing transformed into a three-dimensional object by any means. But he couldn't do it either!

Later I got fed up and just manifested a sword directly into my hand so that I could actually get some practice in. For some reason I found it easy to create a sword in my hand out of nothing, even though I had been unable to do it from the drawings! I went through a few rounds of the "flow" movements I had learned in my HEMA class, but found myself wondering why I was wasting precious dream time practicing something that I could work on just as well in waking life, so I flew off to further explore the dream.

Only then did I notice the beauty of my surroundings. Some dream environments are drab, but this was one of those landscapes that is gorgeous beyond anything you've seen in waking life. Pink-tinged clouds of beautiful hue and texture filled the sky. All around me was water, interspersed with strips of inhabited land, like a strange city straddling the sea. The water was full of beautiful sailing ships of many varieties.

I felt a bit lonely in all this splendor and wished I had a friend to hang out with. Something inspired me to seek "Ozymandias," though the name has little relevance for me (outside being vaguely aquainted with its literary source) and has never come up in a dream before, nor can I trace it to DR. I loudly called "Ozymandias!" but no one appeared. Then I had an intuition that one of the boats was his, a small craft with a complex array of small square black and red sails.

I flew over and landed on the boat, which was not much bigger than a rowboat despite its magnificent sails. There was a tall vertical form in the prow that I had assumed was Ozymandias, only to discover that it was made of wood and evidently served as the steering apparatus. The boat was empty, even though it was not anchored but sailing freely in the harbor. Something caught my eye and I knelt down to find some single earrings and a few tiny beads in the bottom of the boat, as though a woman had been here. Though I retained a degree of lucidity, I found myself being drawn into a dream narrative. I lingered in the boat until it drifted vertically down a tall waterfall, although the movement was gentle and not frightening.

I wanted to figure out why Ozymandias had apparently disappeared from his boat, so I transported myself to an office where I could speak to a harbor official. I told him about the empty boat and the evidence that a woman had been on board.

"The only other person allowed in his boat is Delphine," the clerk informed me. Something made me suspect Delphine was a courtesan, so I asked about the local brothels, and the clerk described two locations.

As I went in search of the brothel I became confused.... now I began to wonder if I was Delphine, that is, if that was the character I was playing in the dream. But if so, why hadn't the clerk recognized me, since he had appeared to be familiar with her? Could it be because I don't currently resemble her, and instead look like my waking self?

Without resolving these doubts, I went to the brothel and asked if they knew what had become of Ozymandias. "We don't give information about our clients," the madam informed me politely.

"He might be dead!" I insisted, explaining my discovery of the empty boat. That persuaded them to give me a piece of paper listing the dates that he had visited. That was as far as I was able to pursue the mystery before I woke up.