Thread: Valwen's Dream Journal

7/17/08 2:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. 10 hours
I’ve noticed that as the day progresses, I forget more of the details of the dreams I’ve had. I’ve only noticed this recently (because I’ve had to write my dreams down either in the afternoon or just before going to bed). If I take the time to run through every detail, I might be able to retain it all for a longer period of time. I’m going to try that.

At Jasmine’s House Again

5. 2:30 a.m.—I can’t remember the exact order of these scenes, but I’ll put them as close as possible.

Scene 1—I am outside Jasmine’s house, around what should be where her dad keeps the helicopter sometimes. It looks more like a huge construction site. There’s a mound with grass, about 30 feet wide, surrounded by down-sloping dirt hillsides. One side goes almost straight down about 30 feet, and there is a large wall at the bottom of the slope, reaching as high as the mound. There is a number of adults, maybe including Jasmine’s parents, talking about something or the other with regards to working on the house or surrounding area. I go down the steep slope and reach the bottom. There are many dresses, which I suspect belong to her mom, hanging all over the place. I walk through this area for a minute and then decide to go back up to the mound. I hike up the side for a couple seconds and then am forced to climb. I grab the rocks and barely think I’ll be able to hang on; it’s a really small crimp. I manage to pull myself up though, and I go a few holds until the rock turns into climbing wall and I’m climbing artificial holds instead of formations in the rock. I get one hold from the top, and I’m incredibly tired. The final hold is a jug (really big and easy to hold on to) and I reach for it. I hold on for a second, long enough to see that above the wall decreases to a forty-five degree slope before I fall to the holds below. I never make it up the wall.

Scene 2—I am at my house, which is different as usual. There is a small hole about the size of a piece of bread between the second and first floors. I’m reclining in a chair, playing video games and eating pasta that my mom has made (done too much of that recently). Chad Outlaw, from work, comes in with what looks like one of those huge janitor machines on wheels to fix the hole. I ask why he’s doing this and apparently he has two jobs or something. The fills the ceiling part of the hole, and I suspect that he’ll fill the hole in the floor by pouring something in there, but he never does.

Scene 3—I am now inside Jasmine’s house, and there are probably 10-20 kids from school there too. They all have even less business being there than I do. Among them are Brian Paul and Last Place Ace. Ace is playing laser tag with some people, and I shine a flashlight into their eyes to mess them up. I decide I like it here so much that I’ll live here instead of my home.

It's appropriate that Jasmine has been away in my recent dreams because she's on a trip to Paris right now. I find it interesting that this is manifested in my dreams whereas I still see my brother in my dreams often, and my sister sometimes.

Originally Posted by Naiya

Wow! You know, I had a dream about going to NY and getting in traffic myself. I just told my cab driver to drive on top of the other cars. And he did. LOL.

Were you lucid? That would be a pretty funny reaction if you weren't.

7/18/08 4:00 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. 9 ½ hours

The Lamest Rock Show Ever

6. 2:33 p.m.—I’m being taken to a Brother on Skates (the rock band I play saxophone in) show in someone’s jeep, along with the rest of the band. We’re in the middle of nowhere; there are no buildings around at all and we may be driving on a dirt road. The concert is held in a kind of natural auditorium; there’s a big open circle surrounded by trees. There are about 20 people at the concert, most of them dressed in overalls and shirts that are way too big. Some other band is playing first, and we’re second. The band finishes their show and we get up on the stage (at least there’s actually a stage). We play two of our songs and then I’m back on the ground as Alex, Caleb, and Nate drive slowly through the crowd in the jeep. As they come my way, I raise my hands in the air and point at them. They are about to pass me so I jump on the back of the jeep.

They drive out of the circle and down a small dirt road. We eventually reach the end of the path, and turn right to go down to the lake. I get off the jeep at that point and the others just sit down by the lake. Mark is still back at the concert, probably wondering why we left after playing two songs. I decide to go back to the concert; I really just want to leave and go home. In the dirt path there is now a cart. I stand on it, and when I lean forward, it moves forward. I realize I could easily speed back to the concert, but I decide to leave it there so that the others can get back easily (forgetting that they have a car).

MM—Someone called me and woke me out of this dream. I told him about it, and I wonder whether I would remember it as well if he hadn’t woken me up.
NI—I called Alex last night and he told me he was just coming back from a show.

In New York

5. 3:08 p.m.—I’m with my parents in a strange shop in New York. It’s night time. We go down to the basement floor to see some of the merchandise. I can’t remember what any of it was. We come back up to the first floor and the owner shows us something, maybe a lightsaber. I leave the store to do something with the car while my parents stay inside. I need to park it or something. I put the car in reverse and go towards the parking spot, but I’m on the sidewalk. I look at the road, and there are no open spots on the road, but there are some parking meters on the sidewalk so I assume I can park here. I put the car in drive and the person in front of me who was following me drives forward for me. I drive up to the meter to park, and now I’m on a bike. I place it by the meter, look around, and see two more bikes sitting by a tree. I realize that I don’t have to park a bike, so I just set it by the others. I walk towards the store.

MM—awakening

Finally Cut

3. I’m working at Ruby Tuesday, and I ask James if I can be cut. He says yes and right as I’m walking out the side door, I see Paul walk in the front door. I wake up. Paul is the regional manager or something like that, and though I’ve never seen him, the impression I get of him is that he’s kind of like an agent and everyone working is like the people from the matrix. He instills that kind of fear in people. I hoped to reenter the dream to find out what happens next, but I couldn’t fall back asleep.

7/19/08 3:00 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. 10 ½ hours

Movies after Work?

4. 3:04 p.m.—I get off of work around midnight, the same time as Kat. I ask if she wants to go see the new Batman movie with me. She says yes and we drive to the pinnacle. We go inside, and it’s very dark. The tickets are sold on the right side of the lobby. She goes to the bathroom or something while I look at the show times. It plays at 12, 3, and 6, and it’s 12:15 or so right now. We’ll just miss previews if we go to the 12, so I decide we should go to that one.

She shows up, and she’s already got tickets (I think they said 3, but I thought they were for 12). We go to the right section of the building. The walls are all cinder block and they have weird symbols painted on them. I think the theater is really crappy compared to what it used to look like. We get in the movie and something that isn’t the movie or a preview is playing. The movie ends, and we might decide to go to another one at 3 or something. I can’t stop thinking about how easy it was to get her to go on a date with me.
MM—Remembered after about 10 minutes of sitting in bed.
NI—I read some stupid article on yahoo about how the new Batman movie was going to be playing at 12, 3, and 6 in some theaters to accommodate the huge number of people that were expected to show. I haven’t seen the movie.

Marathon Dream

7. 4:29 p.m.—This one changes to much to receive a real name—I’m hanging out with Michael, Kyle, and possibly Chris. Michael has been at some camp which focuses on the origin of life or something from a scientific perspective, and he shows us some of the stuff they did. I ask doesn’t he think that it’s kind of ridiculous that probably trillions of conditions that had to be just perfect somehow happened, and he responds, “Unless you consider that something may have influenced it.” I’m so shocked by his statement, which almost certainly shows a belief in god or something supernatural, that I don’t even respond.

He shows us one of the experiments, which I can’t remember. He shows us a second one, in which we place heated sugar on the floor by ant colonies, which is supposed to show that living beings seek energy. The first experiment was supposed to show the exact same thing, and I begin to think that this stupid camp was probably a huge waste of time (who the hell doesn’t know that living beings try to obtain energy?). I accidentally step on my sugar cube when I place it on the floor, and it shatters into individual crystals. A bunch of the ants go back into their colony. Michael explains that the young ants are going back in and the workers will collect the sugar. They do so my stuffing it into their cheeks, like hamsters. The ants’ heads grow to about 5X the normal size as they fill up on sugar and then go back into the colony. All the ants on the ground disappear. I pick up the colony, which is somehow grown into the cement/plastic ground. On the underside are small colored pieces of plastic, like the light brite stuff but smaller. I hit some of them out with a tiny hammer or something, trying to cut off a ring around the colony—break—

I don’t feel like finishing this so I’ll make it quick. I see two bases in a desert setting, one undead and one orc. I see a big dragon or something like that but more human like fly down. I see a mountain that looks very SNES-like and then I’m inhabiting someone else’s body in an airport trying to get to Toronto, Georgia from Miami, FL where I currently am. My parent and brother come up dressed in winter clothes and I think they’ll give me away.

7/21/08 12:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. 11 hours

My Average Day

7. 1:00 p.m.—I open the refrigerator to get my breakfast, and my parents are inside. I ask my mom whether she got any milk. I can’t remember what she said now (like 5 days after I had this dream)—break—I’m driving with Dana Partington to some water park (even though I should be going to diving practice now). It starts raining really hard and I pull off the interstate. The water park has like 3 people at it, and the only rides I go on before I teleport to diving practice are the standard water slide things except they’re flat on the ground, about 20 feet long, and have different little sections where water drips on your or you’re in a river or a whirlpool—scene—I’m at diving practice, stretching quickly because I’m late. One of those crappy slides is there. We’re standing around where the lap pool should be, and no one dives before I leave (Weird side note—When I woke up from this dream, I started nodding my head, one of our warm up stretches, like I was late to practice)—scene—I’m driving home so I can get changed to work. It’s 5:50 or so right now, so I’m already 50 minutes late. Instead of home, I arrive at a big building. I still can’t figure out exactly what it was, kind of like a hotel and restaurant and courthouse. I drive around once, looking for a parking spot. I drift around the corners of the parking lot because it’s raining again. I park the car and get out, looking back to realize I was driving the van. I get inside the building, not sure what exactly I’m looking for.

7/26/08 4:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. 8 hours

Ice Pool

3. 1:52 p.m.—I wish I could remember this dream better, because it’s my longest lucid by about 20 times. As it is, I can’t remember what helped me realize it was a dream—I’m at an extravagant pool. The walls are golden and there are chandeliers hanging from the 20 foot ceiling. The pool has some unmelted ice in it. There are probably 15-20 people there with me, including George Stephens. At some point I threw a towel in because I wanted it to get cold or something. I knew I was dreaming for the majority of the time, but I can’t remember any dream control I exercised, though I do know that I did some minor things. At the end of the dream, I saw my sister. I walked over to her and told her that this is a dream because I had some plan for us to fly away or something. She doubted me and said that I don’t get lucid often, how am I sure. I was about to summon something into my hand but I decided that she would just rationalize that so I ask her how I could prove that it’s a dream. I can start to feel my body and everything turns black. The dream lasted about 10 minutes, which completely shatters my previous record of about 30 seconds.

7/27/08 3:30 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. 6 ½ hours

Warning! For Mature Audiences Only

4. 3:46 p.m.—My dad yells at me for something, and I go downstairs. The house reminds me of legos; it’s red and light gray and has lots of random stuff that probably doesn’t do anything. Anyways, I decide to masturbate now that I’m in my room alone but a few seconds in I look at myself and realize that I’m a bit bigger than I used to be. As I notice this, it grows further, about 20 inches further. I think to myself that I’m probably dreaming, and as I turn around, the air feels so fake that I realize I’m dreaming. I finish up and try to think of something cool to do now. I try to fly by looking up and raising myself onto my toes, expecting that I will fly. It doesn’t work, and I try raising my arms like superman, but that doesn’t work either. I give up and leave the bathroom, and I forgot the rest.

Lucid two nights in a row!! The difficulty I had remembering this one makes me wonder whether I’ve had lucids that I forgot completely.

On a weird side note, my junk doing weird stuff like growing or duplicating happens quite often in my dreams, so I guess I found a dreamsign.

7/30/08 3:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. 8 ½ hours

Princeton Bickering and the Secret Police

I was reading a newspaper Princeton sent me last night and I read a bunch of articles about the Eating Clubs, basically Princeton’s fraternities and sororities, and bickering, basically pledging and the selection process.

9. 4:37 p.m.—I am in a nearly bare room, about 15 feet tall/wide/high and made of cement. The only thing in the room is a strange type of manually-powered machine which I have no idea what it’s for. About 5 people, whom I recognize are prominent Eating Club members, enter to take me as the freshman entertainment for the night. I agree to come with them and try to be confident and personable so they’ll like me.

They take me to a stage, behind a closed curtain. The curtain rises, and I almost walk out into the open, but they tell me to stop; I’m coming on later. The auditorium seats about 1000, but I can’t see how full it is because there’s a bright blue-gray light shining onto stage. After a minute, it’s my turn to go out. They begin asking me questions and such, and I’m compliant and focusing on being confident and personable, when the walls begin to explode.

A wave of shattering glass moves around the theater, completing one circle and then going back around the other way. Everyone seated panics and runs for the exit. After everyone has left, I calmly move to the exit, holding my arms over my head as chunks of rock fall from the ceiling and I pass a few stragglers. I run down the hallways toward the exit of the building, but soon after I pass a wounded man being carried by others, my conscience forces me back to help.

We make it to where the hallway opens into a common area just about 50 feet from the exit when the big explosion moves down the hallway after us. We carry the man as quickly as possible but the explosion overtakes us, and everything is calm.

Instantly I’m back in the room I began in, knowing that somehow I went back in time. A blue glow creeps into the room and I know they’re almost here. I dash behind the only thing in the room, the strange machine, but as soon as they walk into the room I sense one looking over the machine at me, puzzled by my strange position. I stand up and act natural, pretending that I wasn’t hiding from them. I assert that I will not come with them, though I don’t think to tell them of the awaiting disaster.

Not the type of people to be denied, they pull out small silver weapons and throw them in my direction. I feel one brush by my arm as I duck behind the machine again, knowing that they intentionally missed. Unfortunately, one of them isn’t so nice and pierces the crotch of my pants, the very tip of the dart sticking into my balls. I feel the pain from the hit and pull the small piece of metal out, conceding. I will play their game.

The Boring Flood

4. 3:09 a.m.—I am standing at the garage door when I notice a huge brown flood just a few feet down the driveway. A kid is swimming/being carried in it, and I want to get my goggles so I can swim around and have fun too. There’s a man whom I do not recognize with me, and he might tell me I shouldn’t go in the water. By the time I get back to the flood, it’s gone, and I drive down the driveway, now about 4 times the actual length. Most of the ground surrounding it is dirt, I suppose because the flood killed the grass. I drive back up the driveway, deciding that I will park in the far right garage, wondering why I’ve never parked there before (nonexistent in real life). The house looks more like a castle.

I Hate Ruby Tuesday

4. 3:15 a.m.—I am in a building which does not resemble a restaurant in any way, doing my typical job duty of sorting silverware and waiting for it to be washed so that I can roll it in napkins. I put it on a conveyor belt which takes it through a huge loop around a closed-off room. Terry is in there, handwashing the dishes that come through. I do something with a computer.

8/2/08 5:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. 8 hours

Where’d You Go?

3. Meredith Manning is at my house; more specifically, in my bedroom. She says we’re going to make out for three hours. The room actually resembles my real room, and it’s bright inside like it’s late in the day. She leaves—I can’t remember why—but she’ll be back in a minute. She closes the door. I wait for a minute, and then I wake up, wondering when she’ll come back.

I hate it when I get taken by dreams like that.

Sweet! you had a couple of lucids while I was away. Nice job!

Originally Posted by valwen

Were you lucid? That would be a pretty funny reaction if you weren't.

Yep I was.

Ice Pool

Damn, it's too bad you can't remember what got you lucid! That would help tons. But do you think what you've been doing has been helping, or do you want to try doing more to induce more? Let me know and we can come up with some stuff.

Also, LOL that your dream sister knew you don't get lucid often. I love that logic.

Warning! For Mature Audiences Only

Lol, yeah for some reason it's hard to control the libido when you're dreaming. Lucid sex is great but eventually you're probably going to have to try hard to resist it so you can do other fun stuff. Anyway, other than the obvious sign, it sounds like awareness also helped you get lucid.

What do you think about trying to have a "constant awareness" for a while, before school starts? Because the fact that you were able to "feel" a difference in the air means that awareness might be something you have a knack for already, which means a faster way to more LDs.

Originally Posted by Naiya

Damn, it's too bad you can't remember what got you lucid! That would help tons. But do you think what you've been doing has been helping, or do you want to try doing more to induce more? Let me know and we can come up with some stuff.

Also, LOL that your dream sister knew you don't get lucid often. I love that logic.

I've talked to her about LDing a few times before, mostly because I really want to try shared dreams with her. She's a natural, lucky jerk, but she doesn't have control or anything.

Have you ever remembered the beginning of a dream? I think you'd have to be lucid before you started dreaming to do that (like sleep yoga). Just a side note.

Originally Posted by Naiya

Lol, yeah for some reason it's hard to control the libido when you're dreaming. Lucid sex is great but eventually you're probably going to have to try hard to resist it so you can do other fun stuff. Anyway, other than the obvious sign, it sounds like awareness also helped you get lucid.

I actually haven't ever had sex because I've rejected all the girls who've tried in dreams. I don't think craving lucid sex will be a problem, because I already realize there's tons better stuff to do when you can control anything. With enough control, I could create something 20 times as pleasurable.

8/9/08 2:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. 10 hours

So Many Failed Opportunities

8. I am at a friend’s house, along with another friend. We’re either eating dinner or playing video games. I get up and leave with the other visitor, going to the garage and driving one of the cars there away. I take the car on the left, a black car, and the other kid takes the white van on the right. We drive a ways, and then I’m back in the house, as if I passed back in time (this has started happening in my dreams; about 3 times in the past week). The exact same sequence occurs, and then we go back in time again. This time, I choose the van, and pull out of the driveway.

I can feel the pickup in the van and tell that it’s an automatic. I drive out of the neighborhood, taking a left on the street. The street becomes more like a roller coaster, steeply rising and falling. In fact, there is a rail about 10 feet above the road, and two cars ahead of me is a wide suspended cart. The road flattens, and the ground on the left side drops off into a cliff. The roller coaster leaves me, turning right and going up the mountain. The road curves around the mountain, and then there is a 20 foot gap that I have to cross.

I think that this will be really hard to fly across because I have trouble controlling a flying object when I’m not in first-person view (the dream becomes video-game style here). Whipping winds oppose me as I pull the control stick down and press hard on A to stay up and control the flight. The small black object that I’m controlling makes it to the other side but I don’t really care about that anymore. Now I’m looking at Mario (Mario 64) with the wing cap on. I make him jump three times to start flying.

There are about five feature areas on this level: a windmill area, the roller coaster area, a wind tunnel area, and I forgot the rest. At some point, I find the wind tunnel area and am very pleased because it’s the hardest one to get to in this level. There are tons of vertical cylinders placed in this area, all of which are like grates, blowing air upwards. They also shock you if you hit them, but if you don’t get too close you can use the current to fly. I end up near a star, which is encased in something I can’t destroy. I accidentally hit one of the tunnels, and then use it to fly. My wing cap runs out and the wind blows Mario up into the air. I expect him to spread his arms and slowly fall to the ground, but he twists on a random axis and falls like normal. I find two stars, which turn into weird shapes and decay. I figure out that I will have to fly into the case I found earlier from the side, and try to fly into it. I end up hitting a cylinder, get shocked, and fall off the cliff to Mario’s death (end video game segment).

There’s a tour of the area, and the kids can see how the separate areas were built by some ancient Indian tribe or something like that. View zooms to the base of one of the cylinders, and now I’m at a dance in a building with a big cylinder in the middle of it.

I’m dressed up in a suit, and a bunch of people from my senior class are there. There’s no rap playing, but instead songs from the 60s and stuff. A Beatles song comes on and I sing it, some of the people around me singing support lines (it’s so easy to sound good when John Lennon is singing). I mess up at one point, singing a few wrong words because I was thinking of a different verse. I don’t really care how I look so I dance, probably making a fool of myself, but I see another guy looking really weird so I just keep on. Mark Rudy passes me and does his usual thing. I’m around Katy Llewelen, Gabby Lloyd, and some guy (I just realized both of those girls’ last names start with two l’s. Coincidence?). Gabby is facing me really awkwardly about 2 feet in front of me, and slowly backs up. Katy pushes her forward and puts her hand out in front of her. I assume that she wants to dance with me and is nervous, so I take her hand and we slow dance. She leans back away from me. We stop dancing after just a minute; I can’t remember why.

Now I’m in my house, which is different, and it’s 12:30. I look out the window. The sky is enveloped by black clouds, with a small orange sun about 10 degrees over the horizon. A kid from diving camp is sitting on my bed, and I tell him how crazy it is that the sun is up at 12:30 a.m. (when I remembered this part I slapped myself on the forehead) but I rationalize it with the coming winter. I look back at the sun. After a few moments, it trails down to the horizon and disappears. I tell the kid how ridiculously fast the sun just moved, taking about a minute to explain that it moved about as far as it does in half an hour in 2 seconds (see above commentary).

My dad comes into the room and sees that something outside isn’t working right. He goes out some door and walks on the small ledge along the side of the house. I’m amazed that he’s doing this on the second floor, but later find out that I’m on the first floor (see above commentary). He jumps off the ledge onto the ground (I think this is when I realize I’m on the first floor) He starts messing around with the Christmas lights all over the ground. There’s some kind of break in the circuit somewhere, and he’s so pissed off the he connects it, burning all the batteries hooked up to it (in the form of large cylinders on the grass). They catch on fire. As he mercilessly holds the ends together, fuses blow and some lights go out. By the time he’s done, only a few purple lights are still on, and only one of the lights lighting our walkway works.

I come outside and he says I have to help him clean it all up. I start picking up a hose but he says forget it. We go inside, and he asks how the dance went. He gets pissed off that I didn’t dance with some girl named Amanda, whom I realize is one of the girls in a group of entirely black people. He asks why I’m not trying to impress him, and I say because I don’t care about impressing him. I see a piece of paper, a test that I just took on how much I want to impress my dad. He yells at me some more and I wake up.
God that took a long time to write.

NI—The van-I started driving an automatic again, Beatles song-I sang “It Won’t Be Long” in the car yesterday, Mario-I’ve been playing Mario 64, I have no fucking clue why those cylinders are in there.

LD #9

1. I’m dreaming, and I remember that I was in bed just a minute ago, and I realize I’m dreaming. I look around, and then think about waking up, and I’ll bet you can’t guess what happened.

8/10/08 2:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. 8 hours

A Premium Buffet

5. I’m in a room, well decorated, with food on tables. The floor is a black marble and everything looks very nice, but only a very small portion of the room is used. I see a couple of girls in dresses, but I don’t remember how I’m dressed. I think about telling my parents why I’m here and why I won't be home for a while, and then I realize I don’t really know why I’m here. I assume I just came here because I’m really hungry.

I ask one of the servers standing around if there’s a buffet deal or anything like that. He assumes I have no idea what’s going on and starts helping me around and putting the food I want on the plate he was holding. I only want rice and some butter glazed carrots but I get some of the stuff he suggests too so he won’t feel bad. After he leaves me I get more rice, and I see him looking at me like I’m a freak. I walk to the guys standing near the front door, which I assume is where you pay for your food.

Suddenly I’m in the kitchen along with Chris and Terry from work. My brother is there too, wearing an American Eagle t-shirt. I have the same one on. His biceps, much bigger than in real life, are stretching out the arms and I’m upset that he’s messing up one of my shirts, but I don’t say anything. There’s some strange ramp/trough thing that the cooks put a bunch of orange stuff in (cheese?).

NI—My brother had the same American Eagle shirt that I had, but he gave all his shirts to me when he left for the marines. He always takes shirts off by pulling the collar up, and it really stresses me out because it stretches the neck.

Gymnastics!

1. I see some gymnastics routines. At some point either an apparatus is set up wrong or someone messes up.

I’ve only dreamed about gymnastics once before, even though it’s a big part of my life right now. I can’t figure out why my gymnastics workouts haven’t made it into my dreams even though I spend almost an hour a day on them. I've rarely dreamed about diving, too, though I went to camp 2-3 hours a day every day for weeks. Now that I think about it, I've rarely dreamed about work, too. Obviously spending a lot of time doing something doesn't guarantee that it will be prevalent in your dreams. I'll consider what could cause the disparity between school's frequent appearances and the aboves' infrequent.

8/11/08 2:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. 9 hours

Dream Journaling

2. I am sitting at a computer in the middle of the night, thinking about the dream I just had and going over the details. Unfortunately, I forgot the previous dreams, but I do know that I had them; it wasn’t a fake dream memory.

Red Light, Green Light

4. I’m at school (again! Today was the first day of school for high-schoolers) and in class. It’s somewhere around the theater building. A door opens up to reveal an underground lava cave. On the sides are safe, unbroken paths, and in the center, a ring about 50 yards wide with many small pieces of ground underneath the 50 foot ceiling. The teacher, Sarah from work, stands at the doorway.

We play red light, green light, and the first kid who gets to the end of the cave wins. I see Sarah come to the doorway of the cave and look at us, thinking that she’s cheating (though they’re supposed to be able to see, aren’t they?). She calls red light and I’m still moving, so I have to come back to the start. There’s some kind of timer going, and I remember it being at 375 or something like that. I don’t remember whether I start back at the beginning, but she calls red light another time and I fall down forward and catch myself in between two platforms. It is generally accepted that I wasn’t moving so I don’t have to go to the beginning.

There are only 10 seconds left now and everyone makes a mad dash across the stones to the end. There are others ahead of me, but even they don’t make it in time. We go outside and Sarah shows us what the prize would have been. It was orange pants and a shirt. I’m really pissed off that I can’t get it because I want those to wear at Princeton (school colors are orange and black). I complain to her that I want that prize instead of the one I got (maybe I won a game earlier). I wake up and think about whether I should go to school to see if I can get her to switch the prizes. After a minute, I realize it was just a dream.

8/12/08 2:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. 9 hours

Caleb’s Loft

3. It’s night time, and I’m sleeping over at Caleb’s house. I’m not actually with him for the majority of the dream. At some point I look out a window. I talk to his parents and they tell me where he is. I go up the stairs with no railing and make it to the top floor. He’s there watching a movie. He might be sick or something.
Caleb’s house is so cool in real life, which I guess is why it’s always absolutely amazing in dreams.

Awww Shit

2. I have a bunch of dream friends over at my house in my room, and I either poop myself or…well I don’t really know what else could have caused it. I find some crap in my pants and boxers, and I go to the bathroom to change. I get on a new pair of boxers, and come back to my room. I pick up a pair of shorts and put it on, but it happens to be the one I crapped in.

Eating at Ruby Tuesday

4. I show up for work at Ruby Tuesday. The restaurant is almost completely white, and I recognize no one working there. It’s open for breakfast, which it doesn’t do, and I’m supposed to be working, which I don’t do in the morning. I want to eat because I’m really hungry, so I sit down at a table. I get up though, because I’ve decided to order at the bar (which is where we’re supposed to order). I can’t make up my mind what I want, considering hot wings and the breakfast food they have there. I walk back to the table, and on my way back, I see Bryce. He smiles at me. I know he’ll be mad if he sees me eating, so I go to the bar and tell the bartender to forget the food.

Some Random Olympics-Related Dreams

I had one about diving, and another about gymnastics. I had another one that was kind of like a news program where One of the athlete’s parents talked about something or the other.

8/13/08 2:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. 9 ½ hours

Odd Job

6. I am at work at Ruby Tuesday. It’s around 9:00 p.m. or so, so we’ll be closing in two hours. James asks me to go to some guy’s house and ask for some work to do. I think the guy was a pastor.

I leave the restaurant and begin walking to the pastor’s house, which is in my neighborhood. Fortunately Ruby Tuesday is on the road right outside my neighborhood, so it won’t be a long walk. I make it across Kingston Pike and begin walking up the hill by the church. There is no parking lot and the church is facing North instead of West. At some point, the ground is covered with snow, and I can see my footprints in it.

I go behind the church and onto Butternut Lane (yes, my neighborhood has the gayest street names. I live on Fruitwood, and the main road is Sugarwood). I walk down the first cul-de-sac and to the house at the end. The area is much more open and new looking than in real life. I don’t knock on the door, but instead stand there, wondering where the list of available jobs is. I see a plate somewhere stating that this is the home of Pastor whatever and his wife.

While I’m standing there like an idiot, the pastor comes outside, wearing a bathing suit and holding a towel. I try to seem friendly, asking if he has any available jobs for me. He says no. I stand there, dumbfounded, wondering why the hell I was sent here. Then he says he does have a job. I can come to the pool with him and his wife. She comes outside and they both get in the car.

They tell me to get in the trunk, but I say I’ll go home and change first, because I’m still wearing my uniform. They ask again whether I want a ride, and I say I’ll drive myself. I ask them how far it is and they say about 60 miles. That one stopped me dead in my tracks. I’m supposed to be closing in about 2 hours and it will take at least 3 hours before they get back. I say forget it, I’m not going, and they drive off.

I walk back to the street (at some point, I go back to the cul-de-sac, only to find that there are no houses in it anymore. I walk to the next one and see all the houses). I see a dog, a grey dog just like Champ (all those dogs look exactly the same) except it has a big box on its collar, like those lock-type things you find on the doors of houses that are for sale. The dog isn’t aggressive, but it isn’t friendly either. I try to read its collar to see where it belongs, but every time I reach for it, it tries to shake me off.

Reentry: I’m in my house now, and the dog is there, in my room. I walk into the hallway, and see Heather in her room, laying down on the bed crying, and Champ sitting on the floor trying to sleep. I know Champ and the other dog will get in a fight if they see each other, and the other dog sees Champ. It tries to wriggle past me, but I push it back and close the door to Heather’s room.

I walk down the hallway and out of my parents’ room comes Kratos, my brother’s cat (yes, he named him after God of War). The dog now has a black patch and a white patch on its back. Kratos walks down the hallway past the dog, and then the dog tries to attack him. Kratos knocks the dog onto its back and bites it in the neck.

His bite is too small though, and the dog survives. They fight, both incurring bad wounds. I throw a towel in between them to get them to stop and dry up the blood. I’m yelling at them trying to get them to stop. I think, “This can’t be happening!” and then I realize it isn’t happening; I’m dreaming. Everything turns black and I can feel my body. I’m awake.

A Family Event

3. I drive my brother in the Sentra from some house to our house. We get there and he’s pissed off that some kids are watching his tv, so he takes it and throws it in the trash. I plan to get it later, because there’s no way I’m letting that go to waste. He says he’ll drive back in his own car, and takes off. I follow him, and we’re back at the other house in a few seconds. I’m surprised that we got back in probably ¼ the time it took us to get here, but think nothing more of it (doh!). I go upstairs. It’s some kind of holiday or something, and this old guy in a wheelchair is coming over (he’s someone’s boyfriend). He shows up and the girl says that she’s breaking up with him. I think it’s really mean to let a poor old guy in a wheel chair come all the way here and then tell him to get lost.

And of course I had a bunch of random olympics dreams which I can’t remember.

8/15/08 2:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. 9 hours

Finally, Some Control!

6. I know there were parts of this dream in the beginning that I forgot. I am in a weird type of prep school. All the floors are checkered black and white and all the walls are made of a fairly dark brown. There are some random loft areas about 50 feet above the floor and carved into the side of the building. At some point, I can see some of the kids from up there movie style. Anyways, at some point, I realize I’m dreaming.

I’m with Chris Gilmartin either at this time or I find him shortly afterward. I tell him I’m lucid and he thinks it’s cool. I get up to the loft next to us and tell him to watch. At first I try to split my consciousness in two, but give up quickly. I then try to transform the wall (I can’t remember exactly what I was trying to do with the wall) but it’s hard to make it just do it out of nowhere so I make the dream vision flash kind of like a strobe light at about 5 times per second. I can change stuff pretty easily now, and I make the wall into some different stuff (unfortunately can’t remember) and then let it go back to the original. I come back down from the loft and Chris is really impressed. There are some kids and teachers down there, too, and they look at me like I’m a freak.

I see myself in a mirror, and I’m not distorted at all. I think about how real it feels, so I do a nose RC to make sure. It works, and I’m very pleased with how long I’ve been lucid without waking up. I do another RC just for fun to feel myself breathing through my nose when it’s closed. I go through some of the details of the dream to help me remember later. At some point I think about my body and waking up, and the dream quickly starts to fade. I fall down on my back and barely get a glimpse of what’s in front of me. Everything fades to black and I try to make the scene come back by will, and try rubbing my hands together, but it’s probably too late. Everything stays black, and I forgot the rest.

MM—I woke up and thought about the dream I just had (now long forgotten), and I remembered what felt like a pretty good dream from yesterday. Then I had a feeling like I was lucid last night, I just knew it. After a couple seconds I remembered. I love that feeling of waking up and knowing deep down that something really cool happened last night.

8/16/08 2:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. 9 hours

The “No Drinking!” Ruby Tuesday Police

4. Ruby Tuesday is very different than normal: the kitchen is not separated from the dining room by anything except empty space. There are no walls, as far as I can recall, and beyond the kitchen and dining room spreads empty, white, ceilingless building as far as the eye can see (wow I’m feeling stupid now). I give a group of four their food, and notice that they’re all somewhat tipsy. Bryce sits down by them and eats some of their chicken, talking about how it’s the worst product at Ruby Tuesday. He gets up and leaves.

A bit later, I’m standing by the table again when about four ridiculous looking police approach the table. They have mostly black uniforms with a little dark red. The four people sitting there are drunk and are going to be removed from the building because it will make the other guests uncomfortable. I go back to the kitchen after they are taken away and work on cooking some French fries. I remember how to cook some stuff from my days at Sonic, so I try to hit the timer for 3:30 but it ends up making a countdown from 5 minutes. I see when it hits 1:30 and realize I need to take them out now.

The people who were removed earlier are now back in the kitchen, being forced to work. I assume that they couldn’t pay for their food. For the next 5 minutes or so, we all just shift around the kitchen making food. They’re all really bad, and someone makes some raw French fries.

Vacation

5. I’m walking with a dream friend through a very tourist-ish area with his younger brother. He asks me to hold a chocolate milkshake which belongs to his dad. The shake has alcohol in it. He asks me if I think he could have just a sip of it, and I say there’s no way his dad will know. He takes a little bit off the top, and his younger brother might do the same. We walk up the path a bit further and meet his dad. His dad is a pastor (what’s up with pastors?) dressed in a nice suit. The manager of the place comes to us and says that our room is back the other way, the same place as last year. While I’m walking away with the other kids, I overhear the manager say to the dad, “So, not following the alcohol-free policy we’re trying to set?”

I get inside, and now the younger brother is gone, leaving me and my friend alone in the hotel room. We actually have our own room in the suite, a huge room, about 50 by 30 by 15 feet. There is a large bed in the center of the room with a sink right next to it. From what I remember, there isn’t much in the rest of the room. The kid’s dad comes into the room with his girlfriend, who’s wearing a 2-piece bathing suit. She’s really attractive for being probably 30 or 35. They leave and we’re left in the room alone again. We watch tv for a while, and I sip on the milk shake. It feels like I’ve only taken three sips, but I look down and see that the milkshake is completely gone. I’m a little worried because his dad will probably get mad at me and also I’ll probably get drunk.

I can hear the dad and his girlfriend coming to the room. I can’t find a trashcan, so I crumple up the cup and put it in my pocket. I take out my phone and practice making it seem like my phone is making the crumply sounds coming from my pocket. We quickly brush our teeth in case our breaths would smell like alcohol, and then they enter the room and we start eating dinner. I take a closer look at the pastor’s girlfriend, and my vision zooms up to her face. It turns out that she’s actually very old looking, with wrinkles in her face and just that general old person look. My mom is now sitting beside me at the dinner table, and I’m confused at how exactly she got here.

It's kinda funny how the pastor was obviously pretty weak to temptation (drinking and having a girlfriend, though he obviously had a wife before).

8/18/08 12:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. 10 hours

The Most Ridiculous Physics Assignment

3. I am back at school, in physics class, along with Kyle, Vivek, and some others. Mr. Milligan gives us an assignment sheet. I can’t remember exactly what we were supposed to do, but it required going to many different cities. Two of the objectives were located in Nashville, one in Knoxville, and one was somewhere in California. There was at least one more. We figured out just a while after we got the papers that we would have to drive for huge amounts of time to complete the assignment. Once we realize just how much time it would take to do this, I say, “Forget it, there’s no way I’m driving this far. Nashville is like 3 hours away.”

It’s a funny dream because Milligan always gave us a few absolutely ridiculous physics problems on every homework. Near the end, it got to the point where every problem was ridiculous. I often refused to do the problems, and would just put some bs work down (we got credit for trying).

Superhero Torment

3. (Movie-style dream) A man, about 20 years old, is running down the interstate at night (probably carry-over from the last dream). His family is driving in a car, close to him. The man is wearing a skin-tight suit and running as fast as the car; it is apparent he is a super hero. They make it to a light-up bridge and meet the superhero’s brother. Something else significant happens here (can’t remember).

Now the superhero is in a city, among huge buildings. Someone who is much more powerful than he is toying with him. They set him on fire and taunt him, “And now I bet you’ll break into that girl’s bath to put yourself out.” Above him is an apartment, with a window looking into the girl’s bathroom. She leaves the bathroom, and the bathtub is full. The superhero turns into a long, cylindrical dragon and flies straight up into the bathtub, dousing the flames. There was just no alternative.

NI-A commercial had a guy running as fast as one of those cars that can go like 400 mph.

8/20/08 2:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. 9 ½ hours

I’m Too Young to Die!

3. It’s night time, and I am laying down next to Champ. I can feel him breathing, and then I just know that he’s about to take his last breath. He does, and a second later, so do I. The thought is peaceful at first, until after about 20 seconds I realize that I don’t want to die. I kind of half-realize that it’s a dream but I’m seriously freaked out that I can’t breathe. I try really hard to breathe, and then end the dream (not sure whether I woke up or faded to black). I can feel myself breathe again, and I lose consciousness.

Family Feud

4. I am staying with a family. They have a family business, which competes with another family business. The two families are always fighting. Inside the house is an igloo-like area. I follow one of the brothers in as he gets some ice. I sit down inside the ice and pull it from behind me over my face. When I remove my hands, there’s an ice mask left. The face is kind of squashed down because I was pushing down hard. Outside the igloo, the ground is covered in snow. I’m surprised that I can walk on it with bare feet.

The family moves constantly (I think its houses get bombed by the competitors). At one point, I slide a grenade shaped like a piece of fruit into a house. Inside, a woman picks it up. I expect her to quickly throw it back in my direction, but she runs up the stairs with it in her hands. She meets another woman and they start dancing.

Back outside, total war ensues. Machine gun turrets and tanks appear, causing massive destruction. I feel like I’m a civilian caught in crossfire, and I decide to hold my hands in the air so people won’t attack me. Men with rifles are standing close to me, firing at the tanks, turrets, and airplanes. They’re being mowed down, and dust and debris are flying everywhere. I’m against a wall, and the only way I can get away is to go right out into the middle of the fight. I take a step out, and an explosion kills two men just to my right. I feel the shrapnel graze my arm. I either get killed just a second later or assume I do, and the dream ends.

MM—I was envisioning a scenario in counter-strike, throwing a grenade and then the person throwing it back, when I remembered the corresponding part. I have no idea why I was thinking about CS. The excitement of remembering this dream caused me to forget the dream I had just before I woke up.

Coming Home

6. Chris Wright is driving Kyle and me home on Kingston Pike at night. A police officer behind us turns their lights on and Chris pulls over into the bank parking lot by the road. I tell Chris to turn on the lights inside the car to make the cop more comfortable so they’ll go easy on him. He tries different things for about 30 seconds, but he cannot make the lights come on. He finally gets a very dim lighting, and settles on that. The cop walks straight past our car. About 10 feet away from our car lies a dead man.

I say, “Oh god, let’s get out of here.” It turns to day, and we drive through the parking lot towards the road. Along the parking lot are about 15 more bodies. There are officials everywhere, and I can hear the sounds of people being cut apart for autopsies. Chris is driving very slowly and I tell him to just get the hell out of here.

We make it back to the road and to the entrance of our neighborhood. The band is putting on a show, as is tradition (not really). There are some metal percussion type things on the road. I walk past these and up the hill a little ways. I think of how much more I liked the bass line and remember what they sounded like. Now the road resembles a forest, except with metal spires instead of trees. I weave through some of them to find Murph and Caleb. They’re getting paid $9/hour by Mr. Rogers to participate in the show. I still feel bad for them because they’re with the band though.


The pervasiveness of death in my dreams last night disturbed me when I first realized it. But now I think it was because I saw Neil Board yesterday; he fell 90 feet onto rocks and trees and stuff and by all means should have died. He survived by a miracle, and spent months in the hospital. Yesterday I saw him in Ruby Tuesday (to which I will never return!!!).

8/23/08 5:00 a.m. – 1:00 a.m. 8 hours

China

6. I am with Anjali at a party with some kids from Webb, none of which I know. We’re outside the front door and talking to some guy. He says something about this girl who’s late, and I hear her on the cell phone saying, “My parents found me when I was just about to score.” I knew she was going to show up drunk, and thought she meant get drunk by score. After a second I realize she may have meant get some action, and think about that for a second (the dream scene didn’t change there though).

I start down a snow slide on a raft along with Anjali and Carter Greenbaum. Near the end there is a steep drop and then I veer right off the track to a part a little further on. The two behind me are a little confused and annoyed, so I stop and they stop too. We’re right outside the building now, and Anjali has a white truck. She says to look over the hill right next to us.

I do, and behind the annoying construction projects I can see a very stereotypical Beijing. All the buildings are brightly colored orange, red, or yellow, and there are dragon heads all over the place. All the buildings are about the same height. I think it’s an amazing sight. I look away, and when I look back the stupid construction is gone, and I can see the city clearly. I look back away as Anjali pulls the truck under the building. I want her to pull it back out so we can stand on top of it and see more, but don’t ask her to. I go back and look one more time. Now there is an empty grass field stretching as far as I can see. After a second, there’s a huge flash and now I’m looking into a football stadium. I look back at them and say how weird that was. I could hardly believe my eyes! (Dang it!)

The stadium aspect takes over the dream, and I find that I’m in a spectator box looking down into the “Bird’s Nest” (actually just a regular stadium except around the field are vertical walls with windows for spectators. On the corners there are decorations at 15 meters and 25 meters above the ground. A man about 20 standing next to me jumps out the opening onto the stone, and does a backflip down to the ground. Another guy jumps out and then onto a lower platform, breaking the lower platform as he hits it. I know that the eight most important gems are located in these decorations, and I plan on gathering them all since no one has any clue. I’m about to collect the one from the broken stone when I wake up.

8/26/08 2:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. 8 ½ hours

Taken By Band, Again

3. I am in a room in my house with Steven Lawhon and some other saxophone players. The rest of the band might be there too. We’re warming up for a performance, maybe pregame. The warm up is over and I walk over to my couch. I’m worried about how I’ll keep my saxophone in good playing condition, and put the reed in my mouth to keep it wet. It feels like a long time passes, perhaps an hour, and I begin to wonder what happened to the band performance (I do stuff during this wait but I can’t remember what it was). After a minute, I realize that I’m not in band anymore. I say to myself, “Dang, this is just like that dream I had yesterday!” And somehow, I managed to not become lucid.

Then I watch a guy carrying a reed around in a flood. Someone is in a truck and won't get out, even though it's being carried away by the current. The guy with the reed pushes him out of the truck, but has trouble getting out himself. He hangs from the open door by one arm waiting for the right time to let go and fall in the torrent. He lets go, gets swept in front of the truck, and gets sandwiched in between the truck and a bunch of fallen trees, which break. It looked like the guy was going to die but he actually got hit up onto an embankment and survived.

NI—Guy hanging by one arm-tropic thunder; Car stuck in dangerous situation-CSI, car gets hit by train

A Question of Beauty

4. I’m laying down next to a woman. She smacks the pillow with her hand, and I wake up. I turn over onto my side, and my mind starts working like mad. Instantly I realize that I was just dreaming, and that I want to go back into the dream. I decide that the woman says something after hitting the pillow, and picture myself back in the scene as strongly as I can.

Instantly I feel something shoot through my body, like the first time I WILDed, and I already know I’m dreaming. However, everything is black, and I can feel both my body and my heart racing. I’m really excited that I finally got another WILD type lucid, but I manage to keep my mind under control so I don’t wake up. I make one of the scenes from the previous dream reappear, and kind of float around in the position I fell asleep in, as not to make myself move in real life. After a minute, I feel comfortable enough to move my arm and do so. I make the winner of the contest in the previous dream appear in front of me, and try to make her very attractive. I use The Cusp’s attention idea and focus on how real her body is and any good feature I can find. The lighting is so dim that I can barely see her, though, and I give up. Besides, she’s black, (and I’m not racist) and I just don’t find many black girls attractive.

I try to make some of the other girls from the competition appear, and instead the competition goes over again. It is one between “7 girls and a penis” as the announcer says, referring to the one guy as a penis (classic synecdoche). I see the chart of the competitors, and only the first three girls are taken seriously. I recognize the third one as someone very beautiful whom I know, but I can’t remember now who it was. Eventually, I lose lucidity and go into a regular dream.

So that was my first DEILD, and ridiculously easy to get. I'm definitely going to try to use that technique from now on.

9/7/08 2:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. 8 hours

Sidetracked

5. I am in a house with some family that I don’t know. They have a bunch of dogs including a Dachshund and some other dogs. I run up the stairs quickly and all the dogs chase me. For a second I fear that they might attack me since they don’t know me, but when I stop they just run up and smell me. Someone talks about Dachshunds and how they live mainly around TN (which is bull but I don’t really think about it).

I go downstairs with one of the daughters of the family, my age but not all that attractive. We’re inspecting some kind of mystery that happened in the house, looking for the room which some person lived/stayed in. I take a look at some of the doors, and somewhere in here I realize I’m dreaming. It may have been because everything was so hard to read, but when I saw that the words disappeared I wasn’t surprised at all. The girl and I keep trying to get through this door and read what’s on it when I think to myself that I’m done trying to follow the course of the dream; I’m going to do whatever I want now.

I look over at the girl, and decide I don’t care how she looks, and start making out with her. At first my tongue keeps scraping against her teeth and it’s really painful, then I keep my tongue in my mouth and will her to push hers into mine. Of course she goes too far and I gag, but then it stabilizes and everything is pretty nice. I was about to start having sex with her when I woke up. What a waste of lucidity.

9/13/08 3:00 p.m. – 3:20 p.m. Nap

Sensations

6. I lay down for a nap beside my girlfriend. About 10 minutes in, I suddenly realize that I’m not longer awake and cannot move my body. I think that when I open my eyes, I’ll be in the middle of a wide meadow. I open my eyes to find myself in my room back at home. I know there’s grass outside, so I dive out the window and roll onto the grass below. I see myself from outside my body, and feel almost nothing; it’s very disappointing. So I decide it didn’t happen like that. I’m back in the room, but now it’s the actual room I’m sleeping in. I start skipping around and focusing on what I’m feeling. I can start to feel sensations of the wind moving across my face and my feet hitting the floor. I remember that I talk in my sleep, so I start trying to talk to her while I sleep, saying “I love you” and “I’m dreaming.” She responds (not in real life. She did hear me talking though). I decide it’s time to fly. I start skipping in place, jumping higher and higher and feeling myself begin to fully lift off the ground, spinning in circles and being very excited that I can finally feel flight. I am almost jumping as high as the ceiling when she moves and wakes me up.