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THE STUFF DREAMS
ARE MADE OF |
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I woke up the other morning and announced to my
wife that I now knew what it felt like to go through childbirth.
She pretended to be asleep, but I knew she was
listening. "I’m serious," I continued. "I experienced the
whole thing, and let me tell you, it really does hurt. You were
right."
It’s hard to roll your eyes when you’re
pretending to be asleep, but she managed. "Go ahead," she
mumbled. "Tell me about your latest dream."
So I did. And it was a doozy. I was in a
hospital, and there were nurses and doctors running all around me, and I
was pregnant. This confused me a bit, because I was obviously still a man
in the dream (I checked).
Nevertheless, after some excruciating pain, I
managed to give birth to a really weird looking baby. Although I was happy
the pain was gone, I wasn’t very happy about the way the baby looked.
But then in the next moment the nurses scrubbed the blob down, and I was
the proud father/mother of what I think was a beautiful baby boy.
"That’s the most ridiculous dream I’ve
ever heard," replied my wife, eyeing me suspiciously. "And if
you were the mother, who was the father?"
I didn’t want to go there, so I let it drop.
"You should have someone analyze your
dreams," she continued. "But keep the results to yourself."
That seemed like a good idea, so I went on the
internet and found a site that interprets your dream. I knew my wife
secretly wanted to know, so I reported back.
"It means I am probably about to give birth
to a new project or idea," I proudly announced.
"Did you mention that you were the one
having the baby?" she asked.
"I think that’s probably irrelevant,"
I replied. "I’m sticking with the short answer."
But I had to admit I was a bit worried. I
actually did enter "father having baby," and the response was
"no matches found." Apparently, it’s not as common as falling
dreams, flying dreams, chasing dreams and naked dreams."
And while this baby dream was pretty weird, I’ve
had plenty of others that could compete with it. Every night it’s
something, and I often wake up wondering who or what is responsible for
such bizarre story lines.
It couldn’t be me coming up with these
ideas---I just want a good night’s sleep. But when I wake up trying to
figure out why my grandmother was flying the jumbo jet that was cruising
under telephone wires 12 feet off the ground through the streets of San
Francisco, with me naked on the wing…..well, it’s impressive.
It’s a lot of work to come up with those kind
of plots, night after night after night. I keep imagining an Entertainment
Director working feverishly as I drift off each night, desperately
pressuring his associates to come up with a new idea before the deadline,
or else go with a boring rerun.
But whoever it is almost always comes up with
something, or at least a new twist to a recurring dream. And while some
people don’t remember any of their dreams, I remember almost all of
them.
I’ve been chased by a giant meatloaf, I’ve
attended a 49er game naked, I’ve seen my wife run off with President
Obama, and I’ve driven a speedboat upside down through Oakland while
being chased by Arnold Schwarzenegger. And that was all in the last week.
I have no interest in analyzing any of these
dreams. Some might suggest that it’s because I’m afraid of the
answers. Maybe that’s why I didn’t probe too deeply when I made a
feeble attempt to analyze my "having a baby" dream.
It’s probably true. I don’t want to know. As
far as I’m concerned, my dreams are just the creative outlet for the
Entertainment Director in my head, along with his crew of staff writers.
They work for my internal network, and they’re doing their best.
So what if they get a little weird? Look at the movies,
or network TV shows. Normal stuff doesn’t cut it. Everyone wants action,
with a little sex mixed in.
Now that I think about it, I can’t wait for tonight.
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