Running Without the Benefit

Last night, I had a dream where my family and I were staying on some island that was suddenly taken over by Nazis. I know that I spent most of my dream screaming at my family, trying to get them to escape, though they insisted on staying the rest of the night and fleeing in the morning. I believe that we did actually get out alive, which is nice, I guess.

My reason for posting this dream isn't really the dream itself, but the aftermath. I often have these strange, almost violent dreams where I'm running or screaming or getting out of breath in some way. When I wake up, the covers are on the floor and I'm usually missing a pillow or two. And very, very tired.

I sometimes wonder if I've been running in my sleep, much like a hyperactive dog does while he dreams. My father has told me that once, during a vacation, I sat up in bed and screeched, "No! Stop! STOP!" (I still remember that dream, incidentally. It involved George W. Bush shooting at a bunch of us executioner-style. I even recall shouting. I don't think that this dream has any symbolic meaning-- Bush was probably on the TV right before I went to sleep. It could just have easily have been Anderson Cooper taking aim at me, which would have been much sexier.) So it seems to me that if I could have used enough muscles to sit up and scream, then I very possibly be running while horizontal.

I find this really irritating. I dislike the idea of waking up more tired than when I went to sleep. It seems like a waste of time and, frankly, counterproductive. And how exactly can I tell my professors that I've been vigorously exercising in my dreams, therefore, I can't pay attention to the implications of propaganda on our society? Nobody's going to buy it.

If you have any ideas short of drugging me to help me get a restful night's sleep, please let me know. I would hate to have a dream about running the marathon, only to find myself unable to get out bed for days because my body has run 26 miles through the bed sheets.

K.

PS. Posts until 200: 5

The Kitchen Nightmare of My Dreams

It became clear to me that I had been watching too much of "Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares" (the American version, unfortunately) when I had a dream about being best buds with Gordon Ramsey. He was convinced that I was a pretty good cook (in this dream, I hadn't poisoned myself with bad chicken as I had in reality), which totally had me on the gushing fangirl train. It probably does not bode well for me that I have half-crushes on older guys who scream at people. I sense that my self-esteem is going to take a beating in the future.

Stay out of my dreams, Gordan Ramsey!

K.

Sky High

In reality, I probably should be in bed, healing before I have to work at the Eagles game later today, but such is my determination to do this NaBloPoMo thing right that I am dizzily sitting up typing this post.

Because my brain cells are currently firing at a very low level, I decided that I needed to find a prompt. So, here it is:

If I Had a Super Power-- from 55 More Blog Posts I Hope You Write

Okay, so mine is a pretty common one: I'd like to fly.

I think one of the reasons that I took up swimming when I was a kid was because it was the closest thing I thought I would ever get to actually soaring through the air. When you sink to about a foot off the bottom of the pool and just glide, it's easy to pretend that you're looking down at the ground. The lane markers become remarkably straight rivers, the tiles city grid maps. You can hang on to this fantasy for as long as you hold your breath. Then you need to surrender to your burning lungs and burst through the surface. The freezing air on your skin and the shouts of a public pool remind you that you aren't flying after all.

Sometimes I dream of flying. It's fun for a while, but then I suffer from what I call the Hitchhiker's Guide Syndrome-- namely, if you think about it too much, you start to plummet. I glide for a while, but then I begin wondering exactly how I am moving. Do I have some sort of jet propulsion in the soles of my feet? Am I being pushed by air currents? If I move my arms breaststroke-style, can I go faster? All the while I am steadily losing altitude.

It bothers me sometimes. Why can't I just enjoy flight and give up on the science of the whole thing?

Maybe next time I have this dream, I will concentrate on how fluffy the clouds look from this angle or count the number of bald heads I see from above. Anything to keep flying.

K.

Dreaming of Elysian Fields

I had a dream last night where I was in a cemetery.

The sky was blue, the kind of blue that you only see touched up in photos. Tombstones dotted the rolling hills, stretching far out into the distance. The stones, I seem to remember, were engraved with Hebrew, so it was clearly a Jewish cemetery. The strangest thing, besides the sheer size of the complex, was my lack of fear or trepidation. Grave yards are not, have never been, my thing.

I was standing with my family among the tombstones, apparently waiting for something. Suddenly, I saw movement in the hills. People were standing by each stone, looking around and squinting in the sun. Around me, men and women began to emerge from the graves.

Aghast, I grabbed my father, begged him for an explanation. He smiled at me and said that once a year the dead climbed out of their tomb to stand in the sun and see their families. At the end of the day, they would re-inter themselves, not to emerge for another year.

For some reason, I accepted this, no matter how strange it was. I guess it helped that the corpses I saw were fully formed with a glint of life in still-intact eyeballs. Live families were reunited with the deceased, hugs shared all around.

I met my Bubbe for the first time.

(I'm crying as I write this.)

She died from cancer before I was born. She always wanted grandchildren, but I came far too late. I've been told that I'm a lot like her in personality and habit. Before the day ended, I had met her and was reunited with my Granddad, who passed when I was four. As the sun set, the dead climbed back into their graves.

What does this dream mean? I suppose if I were more spiritual, I would have many interesting suggestion, whereas in my unenlightened state, I have none. All I know is that when I woke up, I was smiling.

I apologize for the horrendous writing in this post, but I had to get it out.

K.

PS. Bonus points for those who know what the Elysian Fields were.