THE DREAMS WE DREAM
Why is it we feel compelled to tell our dreams?
Like when we read a well written book, whether it's sad, or hopeful, or exciting, or suspenseful novel (as this happens mainly in novels or memoirs) we seem to enter a new world as if--where, when, and whatever is happening--we are participating as a spectator. Sometimes the novel is exciting; or funny; or sad; or engrossing to the point you deny any interruptions if possible, and whenever someone does, you almost resent them for doing so, like a kid at play who--even if it's suppertime wants to finish whatever he's doing no matter how hungry he is.
A dream is like that, only one is more immersed in it, as you don't just feel things like a bystander, you feel like you are physically participating--And, in a way, you are. It's a flight of fancy an author would want understand. An author wants you to worry with the character; to laugh at the spectacle; to fear for those lives in danger; to feel the thrill of doing something you've never done before, or something you would love to do over and over again. But, an author can't place YOU in a novel, that only a dream can convince of the experience.
Sometimes, as, In the Company of the Courtesan, by Sarah Dunant (I'm now reading), I would rather not imagine the horrors of war back in the sixteenth century when most was face to face--sword to sword--or with gunfire when close enough to see the bloody aftermath--close enough to see the surprise on their faces...as if they never expected to die, despite the fact they are in the midst of battle. Like they would be the lucky ones who somehow missed the bullet or sword. To be in such a scene physically is to be in a nightmare. Yet, authors like Stephen King can suspend your sense of reality, and get you so engrossed in a book that you can believe the unbelievable, and feel the fear of the victims. That kind of novel is read for the same reason one goes to a scary movie thriller which rises one adrenalin. The relief of life not really being that scary when you put the book down, or get out of the movie, can actually bring on an exhilaration of relief. Even a nightmare can do that, but its memory is that we were in that danger as if a reality... and we are left feeling low.
But back to dreams. They are so loosely put together: today lying next to many years ago at a time in our youth. Misplaced neighbors of the present as in my dream, living in the house next door as when I was a child. The old and the recent mixed in a fantasy in which you participate--not just follow in your mind--as in a novel--but you ARE there (in your mind). You see a black dog you recognize [though in reality it died a few years ago]... and like that crazy dog as a pup, it got so excited about something in a sloping tree that he somehow ran up the tree, and the tree falls as a result of its weight. You run to see if the dog is okay. Your now neighbor who is suffering a loss, has a daughter visiting who comes out to see what the ruckus is all about. You feel the awkwardness of interrupting another's personal life on such a thing as this crazy dog.
Like a patchwork quilt of times, places, experiences, or just an invention of this blend causing a new experience that, however ridiculous it seems now when awake, wasn't while dreaming. Dreams suspend that logic and disbelief for a short time, but when you awake, you want to tell someone about it... and they usually don't want to listen. So many excuses to not wanting to hear about your dream. All the dreamer wants is to share the emotions which were so inspired in oneself with the experience of the dream. But, like explaining a novel that no one but ourself is interested in, your dream experience is now almost a letdown because of another's not wanting to listen.
I heard that there are websites for dreamers who feel this way. Where they could excitedly tell each other their dreams. People who would 'listen'-through your writings of that fabulous [to you] dream...
...But would we really want to read about another's dream? No. We only want to tell about it, like a child's first experience at an amusement park--coming home to tell his mother about the wonder of something that took the child out of her or his regular world for a short while... It's own spaceship to the fantasyland one felt, saw, and participated in so the listener could also share in that pleasure and wonder. But... The only way to feel that wonder, is aboard one's own dream.
Like when we read a well written book, whether it's sad, or hopeful, or exciting, or suspenseful novel (as this happens mainly in novels or memoirs) we seem to enter a new world as if--where, when, and whatever is happening--we are participating as a spectator. Sometimes the novel is exciting; or funny; or sad; or engrossing to the point you deny any interruptions if possible, and whenever someone does, you almost resent them for doing so, like a kid at play who--even if it's suppertime wants to finish whatever he's doing no matter how hungry he is.
A dream is like that, only one is more immersed in it, as you don't just feel things like a bystander, you feel like you are physically participating--And, in a way, you are. It's a flight of fancy an author would want understand. An author wants you to worry with the character; to laugh at the spectacle; to fear for those lives in danger; to feel the thrill of doing something you've never done before, or something you would love to do over and over again. But, an author can't place YOU in a novel, that only a dream can convince of the experience.
Sometimes, as, In the Company of the Courtesan, by Sarah Dunant (I'm now reading), I would rather not imagine the horrors of war back in the sixteenth century when most was face to face--sword to sword--or with gunfire when close enough to see the bloody aftermath--close enough to see the surprise on their faces...as if they never expected to die, despite the fact they are in the midst of battle. Like they would be the lucky ones who somehow missed the bullet or sword. To be in such a scene physically is to be in a nightmare. Yet, authors like Stephen King can suspend your sense of reality, and get you so engrossed in a book that you can believe the unbelievable, and feel the fear of the victims. That kind of novel is read for the same reason one goes to a scary movie thriller which rises one adrenalin. The relief of life not really being that scary when you put the book down, or get out of the movie, can actually bring on an exhilaration of relief. Even a nightmare can do that, but its memory is that we were in that danger as if a reality... and we are left feeling low.
But back to dreams. They are so loosely put together: today lying next to many years ago at a time in our youth. Misplaced neighbors of the present as in my dream, living in the house next door as when I was a child. The old and the recent mixed in a fantasy in which you participate--not just follow in your mind--as in a novel--but you ARE there (in your mind). You see a black dog you recognize [though in reality it died a few years ago]... and like that crazy dog as a pup, it got so excited about something in a sloping tree that he somehow ran up the tree, and the tree falls as a result of its weight. You run to see if the dog is okay. Your now neighbor who is suffering a loss, has a daughter visiting who comes out to see what the ruckus is all about. You feel the awkwardness of interrupting another's personal life on such a thing as this crazy dog.
Like a patchwork quilt of times, places, experiences, or just an invention of this blend causing a new experience that, however ridiculous it seems now when awake, wasn't while dreaming. Dreams suspend that logic and disbelief for a short time, but when you awake, you want to tell someone about it... and they usually don't want to listen. So many excuses to not wanting to hear about your dream. All the dreamer wants is to share the emotions which were so inspired in oneself with the experience of the dream. But, like explaining a novel that no one but ourself is interested in, your dream experience is now almost a letdown because of another's not wanting to listen.
I heard that there are websites for dreamers who feel this way. Where they could excitedly tell each other their dreams. People who would 'listen'-through your writings of that fabulous [to you] dream...
...But would we really want to read about another's dream? No. We only want to tell about it, like a child's first experience at an amusement park--coming home to tell his mother about the wonder of something that took the child out of her or his regular world for a short while... It's own spaceship to the fantasyland one felt, saw, and participated in so the listener could also share in that pleasure and wonder. But... The only way to feel that wonder, is aboard one's own dream.
posted by Cranberry Jo @ 7/31/2013 01:15:00 PM
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