Thread: The Journey

The Familiar Ruins at Sunset

22MAY07

15 mg Melatonin (synthetic) ingested.

Segment 1: First out of two dreams last night. I'm walking along a nicely shaded sidewalk of two-story brick buildings during the sunset. A beautiful shade of gold is cast upon the entire landscape by the sun. The buildings look old, circa early 1900's. So I'm walking along and I have this strange sense of being totally at ease with the world, completely stress-free. I would almost describe it as a weightless feeling, but it wasn't quite that. Anyway, I stop at a house and a family of four or five are standing outside. I walk up to them and ask if they had found a pack of cigarettes the night before (scary that my nicotine addiction has invaded my subconcious). They laugh and say yes, handing me a pack of Marlboro reds with only three cigarettes left in it. Strangely enough, I made a point of remembering that there were only three left in the dream world. The family then left, but I stayed and took a closer look at the house. Come to find out, it was my first love, Ashley A's house, though it looked like it had aged over 100 years or more. After I realized where I was, I began to look around my old neighborhood in San Antonio, and everything was right where I remembered it, though falling apart from age. During all of this I had a strange sensation of "I'm finally back." I felt true happiness, something I haven't felt in Waking Life in years. It is noteworthy that no characters from my past were in this dream; in fact, the only DC's in the dream were the family at Ashley's house. Finally, after having walked around the old neighborhood, I thought, "I want to go to the dock." In a flash, I was at a dock by the ocean. I watched the waves for a long time, as I do in waking life (i have an affinity for the ocean), until a small speed-boat pulled up to the dock. A bunch of camo-clad Navy SEALs came out and walked right past me. That's the end of the first dream of the night.

Analysis: I believe the first segment of this dream may be my subconcious yearning to return to the stress-free life of my pre-military days, thus the return to my old neighborhood and girlfriend's house. Why were the buildings aged though? Everything had been transformed into ruins. Also, am I getting closer to lucidity? I made the decision to "go to the dock", knowing I would end up there. I had no idea it was a dream at the time, so I know I couldn't classify this as being lucid, but it makes me wonder if I got one step closer to it.

Return to the Desert

Second dream of the night. Short and quick, I'm in Iraq, in the middle of a firefight. No sense of fear, excitement, anything. I reach down to where my rack (the vest full of ammunition) should be to load a fresh magazine, but nothing is there. My IBA (bullet-proof vest) is bare, no rack, nothing. I remember thinking "Oh s***, I'm screwed." Then I woke up.

Analysis: Don't really understand this one. Maybe related to my quiet opinion on the futility of the war? Not sure. Could the bare IBA have been a useful RC to gain lucidity?