Ribbon Realm of Black and White

There were two of us.  One was me, of course, but the other one was also me, somehow.  We were both me yet somehow also separate from each other and we were on a mission.  First was a briefing in which it was explained I was to retrieve myself from other worlds where I had gotten stuck in the past.  Apparently, I had gone to many worlds and in about 4 or 5 of those worlds or realms, I had gotten stuck and never came back.  I was still there even now and so I had to go and get myself out.   I remember thinking that 4 or 5 worlds wasn't too bad and I was happy that the number of retrievals still needed did not seem overly high.  I felt like I had been doing quite well to only have 4 or 5 stuck worlds!  The concept of me being stuck places but also having two of me here reminded me fleetingly of a really complex Dr. Who (a TV show about a time traveler) plot line.

After the briefing, I found myself looking at a barely visible natural looking scenery, similar to a wilderness scene at night.  Water seemed nearby like a river, but it was difficult to see clearly.  Overlaid on top of the scene as if a computer resided directly in my brain, was computer style writing and information, and at the top middle of my vision was a photo style image of a middle aged man with a slightly thin face and a friendly smile.  He was the one who needed retrieval but apparently was also somehow 'me.' 

The next thing I knew, I was traveling in a vehicle that reminded me vaguely of a horse drawn cart.  The movement was slow and methodical and someone else was driving it.  I spent my time sitting on top and looking out over the scenery, but it was dark and I was having trouble making it out clearly.  I concentrated.

Slowly, my vision became clearer but as it did, my field of vision shrank to a long thin horizontal ribbon, maybe 1/5 the normal width (which would really be height) that one would normally see as a human.  In addition, the range of sight was wider to the sides of my head than would normally be possible.  I got the impression that the narrowing of visual concentration would assist in perception. 

Slowly, I began to perceive more clearly patterns of light and dark reminiscent of trees and shadow.  Everything was black and white, shadow and light, moving this way and that, reminding me of things on Earth but not quite really anything you could put into words.  There were things there, many things that were like a natural environment similar to our forest and country side scenes, yet they were not exactly that either.  As my vision enhanced, I saw all parts of the scene as either black or white.  There was no grey.  A particular area where a slightly triangular area of white rhythmically shifted back and forth amongst the black particular caught my attention.

Slowly, a feeling of overwhelming awe and beauty built inside me. This place contained more beauty than I had ever seen before.  It was exquisite.  Intense emotion overwhelmed me.  I felt as if I was crying from the intense emotion, but that the concept of crying was just a description of what the emotional effect of the place was yielding in me.  It was the most beautiful place ever seen. 

Suddenly, I snapped awake in my own bedroom.  My physical body was not crying at all, to my surprise, but I did suddenly feel like I needed to pee.  I got up and realized I also had something that my mind immediately wanted to call 'a hard on' even though I am a female and such would not actually be possible.  There was an intense pleasurable sexual feeling emanating from just outside my body about where testicles would be if I were to have them.  It was very pleasant.  I was stumbling to the bathroom half asleep trying to think about how weird it all was.  When I got to the bathroom, I was further confused by the fact that only a little pee was actually present for release.  My body does not usually send false signals in that regard but it had this time.  I had not actually needed to pee but had only felt like I did.  Afterwards, the feeling of needing to pee as well as the feeling of the 'hard on' were both gone. 

I went back to bed, thought about it for a while, and then fell asleep.  I wonder if I failed my mission?       

 

City in the Valley, Reverse Dream

Often I hike on high trails along a nearby mountainside.  The other day, I was hiking along in an interesting kind of mood when I looked far down below me at the many houses in a small valley area, and I felt like scoffing.

"What kind fool builds their cities in totally unprotected valleys!?!"  I thought to myself!

"Surely they must realize how dangerous it is.  Then it occured to me, they must live in a time of unparalelled peace and prosperity to even consider a stunt like that!  Even those small peaks, as low as they are, would offer at least some protection from invasion and attack, and would be the logical place to build, but instead they have actually built their homes in the very depths of the valley!  Unbelievable!"

Then I shook my head and remembered building in the valleys is normal and everyone does it.  Or least that is what they do here.   

The Moon is TOO SMALL! Another Reverse Dream?

The other day, I was in the parking lot of some strip mall when out of the corner of my eye I saw the moon, a huge big beautiful glowing milky smooth thing, about 7 times larger than it usually looks. Instantly, a huge wave of primal relief and joy washed through me.  Finally, my big beautiful moon!  I was home at last!

Then I turned my head and realized it was just a big round white lighted sign for some restaurant.  Disappointment!  I have always felt the moon, the real moon that is, was just too small.  While other people have gazed up and commented on how beautiful and large the moon is, I can't help but inwardly scoff.  I  have always felt there is just something wrong with that little bitty marble they call the moon.  It's way too damned small!  But it wasn't until I mistook that restaurant sign for the moon, that sign that was big and beautiful like the real moon should look like, that I realized the depth of that feeling.  It is a true longing, but for what I don't really understand.     

Reverse dream II

Last month, I had another example of a weird memory that doesn't belong in this world. Perhaps it can all be blamed on the fever. I had the flu for several days and was feverish and tired. I was moving from a lit room into the dark bathroom when it occured. As I shut the bathroom door behind me, I didn't bother to turn on the bathroom lights. Because I 'knew' that the house technology would automatically turn on the lights in any room that I entered. Except it didn't work and I was left standing in the dark. At first, I was surprised to see the system had not worked properly. Such failures are rare and I wasn't sure what to do about it. Then I realized, "Oh yeah, it doesn't work like that here, you have to turn on the lights yourself. Silly me!" Where did I get that weird memory from? It's not something I have ever experienced in this world.

Reverse dreams?

In many of these dreams, it's like I enter some other life and experience that person's or creature's thoughts. At first, my own regular thoughts are predominate, but then shortly, I 'remember' the 'truth' about the place I am now at and my thoughts quickly are bent to those of the creature's mind that I inhabit.

But can it it happen the other way? Can their minds come into my mind? Can they briefly inhabit me with their thoughts before my mind takes back control?

The other day, I was driving my car at night. Few other cars were on the road. I was relaxing and enjoying the process of driving without tons of traffic in my way, when I found myself idly worrying that since it was late, how soon would it be before they shut down all the roads for nighttime? Would I make it in time or would they shut down the roads before I got home? I realized I had not planned properly for this trip.

Then suddenly I remembered that they don't shut down the roads at night. Duh! Roads are typically open all the time. Why had I even thought such a weird wrong thing in the first place? Where had such a thought come from?

How Not to Get Sleep

I've been so tired this last week or more. I am trying to get more sleep, but the sleep has not been fulfilling. Last night, I decided to go to bed very early in hopes of breaking the cycle and catching up on some sleep, but instead, I ended up just laying there bored. As tired as I was, sleep would just not come. And my body felt hot and sticky, even though the air was cold. I have learned from experience that when my body feels hot for no good reason, sleep will never come. So finally, I got up again and read a book for another hour and a half until my body began to feel the cold air again.

I slept for maybe an hour before waking to feel a nagging energy moving along my spine. Sometimes, energy there feels good but other times, like last night, it just feels irritating and exhausting. I lay awake for another half hour and then tried something that sometimes works. I don't know why, but sometimes if I turn around in the bed so my feet and head have reversed position, then I can get some sleep.

It worked for a while. I slept for another hour, until I heard a beep beep beep noise coming from the storage room that shares a door with my bedroom. My mother had piled all manner of storage items on shelves in that room and for the last month, something occasionally omitted beeping noises from there late at night. The beeping was short lived and always occurs late at night when I was sleeping, and each time, by the time I raced in there to find the noisemaker, the sound had already shut off before I could decipher what was making it. But over time, I had at least narrowed it down to a general location and this night, I raced into the room with renewed determination. And at long last I found it! Tucked into a corner behind some spray cans was a tiny portable battery operated alarm clock that was no bigger than the size of a large thumb. Victory! I had located the late night noise maker. I turned the alarm option to 'off' and waltzed back into my room plenty pleased to have finally solved that problem. Finally, I would get some sleep!

Then I lay for another half hour bored but no sleep. I almost decided to try my most desperate strategy, which is to lay on the hard floor. For some reason, which I fathom not, when I feel hot for no good reason and cannot sleep, I have found that if I lay on the hard floor for about 30 minutes, I can usually sleep after that. But who wants to lay on a hard floor for 30 minutes! Not me, that is for sure. And luckily, I finally drifted off before having to exercise that option.

Except that several hours later, I was suddenly jarred awake when my right hand and arm, apparently for no good reason, shot out from under the covers and clutched at the air violently, as if to catch an invisible fly or something. I didn't even know that my arm could move that fast! And why had I done that? I was not aware of having been dreaming and I am very good at remembering recent dreams. Now I was somewhat unnerved by the apparently illogical and alien actions of my own hand. In fact, I had clenched my hand so roughly and quickly that the ring finger nail had gouged itself into the flesh on the outside of my thumb, and now as I lay there not sleeping and feeling a bit freaked out, I could feel the top of the thumb throbbing from where I had gouged myself.

But by this time, I was oh so very tired and despite the weirdness, I managed to drift off again. I dreamt about a place where 10 foot tall brown plywood walls had been erected all around for the sole purpose of displaying artworks. The walls had been set up as if to form roads and allyways, but all the traffic was foot traffic and there was plenty of it! This was a culteral meeting place where many people would walk and discuss the art that had been given by volunteers. Theft was not an issue and neither was money. Surely, this must have been in another kind of world, but all the people looked human and I felt that this was a place I had visited countless times before. Ironically, I was not much interested in the art itself, but I loved the place for it's happy ambiance and good memories. I dallied here for a while until, in a semiconscious state, I knew it would soon be time to wake up and go to work. But now I was so tired that I did not want to face waking up!

I considered other options. Maybe I could just open one eye for a while and work my way up to two eyes. I tried this and it seemed easier. I opened the one eye and saw through a small round aperature the sight of several people walking around in the front part of a store. This one eyed seeing seemed relaxing until a part of me realized that eyesight does not involve little round aperatures and my bedroom is not in a store. Therefore, I must not actually be seeing with my eyes!

I was starting to become lucid and determined to see more so I opened both my 'eyes' and watched as people came through the swinging glass doors of this place. First came several black guys in their 20s dressed in casual clothes. They were my homies and I was glad to see them but despite that, we all remained subdued in our greeting. Behind them came a powerful figure of a black woman, tall and trim and looking to be in her 40s. Her hair was set into some kind of ultra refined dreadlock type style like thin cords of hair, that balanced beautifully with her handsome face and high cheakbones. This was a powerful and stately woman both in appearance and in demeanor. SHe commanded respect and was accustomed to getting it. And by the stern look on her face, she was not happy with me.

I smiled tightly and followed them all to a long rectangular table where we all sat down. She began to lecture me about being irresponsible. She spoke of some trouble that "Tony" had gotten into and talked about how it related to me, and I heard myself respectfully saying "Yes Ma." I had been gone away from them for a while and had not told them before I left. Even now, I had told them very little of what I had been doing and most of this meeting would be about me telling her as little as possible. She was angry but as the night wore on, I expected she would loosen up. I would just have to listen and do my best until the mood lightened. Even now, I longed to make a joke about sweet and sour sauce that someone's comment had triggered, but I knew it was too soon. Joking now would only anger my mother, but hopefully later, we could turn to a lighter mood. Meanwhile, all of us would wait patiently.

A part of me that was still me and not the black man was listening and trying to take notes. I jumped on the name "Tony" and vowed to remember it, but much of the rest was gone moments after waking. And waking I did, this time for real, as that day's work still demanded my attention. I crawled out of bed and considered the nights fitful events. Wondering about the incident with the grabbing hand, I inspected the back of my right thumb and found the stabbing imprint still there and sore, so I knew the whole thing had not been a dream. I had really grabbed out into the air for some reason and I had really stabbed into my own thumb. But why? Now my eyes were blurred from grogginess and a light pain between my eyes would be slow to resolve itself. My thumb hurt and so did my shoulder, perhaps also from the violent flailing motion of the grab. Looks like it would be another day of tired exhaustion.

Maybe tomorrow I would get to bed early and catch up on some sleep!

Back Again!

He came back again this morning! Or at least I think it was him. I was sleeping and I felt someone touching my back, a rather probing and experimental touch, as if he was checking on something or trying to do something, touching here and there, but not particularly sexual in nature. I was half asleep but did recognize that 'it' was happening again and that 'it' probably was that dream lover guy again. Then I lay there and wondered if I would see him more clearly like last time. It was an interesting experience also in that I was actually laying on my back, but yet I could feel him touching my back, as if the physical existance of the bed was irrelevant.

But I totally forgot how I had learned to materialize him last time and I forgot all the long list of questions I had for him! Instead, I just lay there like a lump on a log doing nothing. Duh! Eventually, the touching stopped and some time later, I woke up. And I could have just kicked myself!

Shadowmaker

I am lounging on the couch, watching tv, when a shadow moves across the wall behind the tv. I am startled and the shadow is soon gone. The sole source of light is in front of me an above me, a simple hanging light fixture. I quickly look between the light bulbs and the wall but I don't see anything. I am confused for a few seconds but blow it off and am soon back to watching tv.

Then it happens again. And again. And then one more time. The movement pattern of the shadow could best be described as a rapid floating pattern, too fast to be from wind or air in a closed room, but it moved in a slightly wavering up and down path, and would either turn off or disappear as it reached the console that the tv sits on top of. Each time, I inspected the situation more carefully, checking the air space, checking the light bulb for bugs, checking everything I can think of. The dog remains curled contentedly on the floor, barely taking note of my activities.

Eventually, I get up and attempt to replicate the shadow. From what I can tell, the source of the shadow must have been approximately fist sized and approximately half way between the light bulbs and the wall that cast the shadow. I have lived in this house approximately nine years now and but I'll be damned if I can explain that shadow.

The Long Road Home

I was on the train, my stuff all layed out in front of me on the table, when someone told me it was only a short distance before I needed to get off and make the connection to the last leg of the journey. I felt a bit panicky as I scrambled to get everything organized. If I didn't hurry, I would miss the connection! I remember struggling to concentrate so I could get it all back in order quickly. Then there was a brief pause. And then I woke up.

I have had these kinds of dreams innumberable times just before I wake in the morning. This morning, I dreamt I was on a train. But usually, I am either on a bus or rushing to jump onto one. Almost always, there is an issue of complex interchanges and connections that are easily missed and require considerable concentration. I worry that either my timing does not match the bus schedule, or the bus will not deposit me where I want to go. Or I fear I will become lost. Sometimes, I even pull out a map that shows pathways so complex that I would not be able to understand them in waking life.

The worst is if I am actually the one driving, because the car invariably moves me at insane speeds around sharp corners and strangely the spongy brake peddle barely works and the gas peddle seems stuck on 'too fast!' Add to that the fact that I can barely see the road ahead of me and I am surrounded by other cars! Then my main concern is just trying to stay on the road.

No matter which mode of transport, typically I am feeling nervous about making a mistake and thinking that I only have to catch one more connection, and then the next thing I know, I become conscious of lieing in my bed. Who would have thought it would be so complicated just to wake up!

Mental Winds

Two nights ago, I lay down to sleep and drifted off to blackness. Then I felt a huge wind blast through me. It felt as if it was not only physical but also mental, as if it blew through my mind going from right to left quickly. In retrospect, I heard no movement of any items in the room, so most likely it was only the perception of a wind through some of my senses. But I did hear the sound of the wind itself, first in the right ear and then in the left. I can't decide if I thought it was somehow alive or not. My mind cannot classify the feeling. But it startled me wide awake in an instant. I lay listening for some time and then chalked it off as yet another one of those weird things and then I went back to sleep.

I did not think of it again, until shortly after falling asleep the next night. When it happened again. This time for some reason, I was even more unnerved by it. It felt exactly the same, going from right to left as if a great wind passed through my spirit. Could it be a ghost? I lay away for quite some time until my nerves settled and I finally fell asleep again.

I wonder if it will happen again tonight.

You are All Evil

I approach the woman behind the counter and she says to me, "Oh I know you! You are evil!"

I am surprised. "What?" I say, as confusion mixes with slowly kindling anger at this insult.

"You are evil and so is your whole group." she says, "That's what they told me. Everyone knows that." And then she stands there watching me as placidly as a glacier in a gentle snow fall.

Vaguely, I am aware of several others who have come in with me and now stand around me and I wonder if perhaps those are the group members she refers to as also being evil. Anger gives way to confusion as I consider this statement. Am I evil? I don't think I ever considered it. So I look inward now at my strengths and weaknesses, at my faults and at my frailties. But no, I am relatively sure I am not evil, certainly not perfect but I think still far from evil. "I think you have gotten some wrong information." I tell her calmly. Too bad she can't look into my mind and see for herself, I think to myself.

The woman continues to regard me for a few moments and then another woman walks up behind her with a huge box in her hands. The two woman hold the box out and offer it to me over the counter, but I am reluctant to take it, as if the perception of greed might only worsen my supposedly already existing reputation of being evil.

But they insist the box is a free and kind gift so I step forward and look warily inside the big box to see a swirly white material on the bottom as if decorative cake topping had been applied directly to the bottom of the box. Colors swirled in on one end of the box make an obscure pattern and I wonder at the nature of the gift.

The women continue to assure me it is a free gift and so, wondering if it will be heavy, I finally reach out to take the box. Then I wake up.

Strange Sound (a story from waking life)

Today I feel like writing about some things that once happened in my real waking life. In between vast swaths of normality, I also have a few interesting memories of weird events. One is from my early childhood.

I remember in the first house I lived in, I would often hear a weird noise as I lay in my bed. The sound reminded me of what it would sound like if large rocks were slowly being tumbled in a dryer, like rocks that would slide along for a bit on metal, then get jumbled up, and then all tumble over the top of each other at once, and then slide along somemore. I often thought the sound came from inside one of the walls of my room, but when I tried to really localize the source of the sound, it always seemed to move and become illusive. I rationalized that the sound must be from pipes or some kind of machinery in the house, but often the sound made me nervous and scared. It was creepy!

When I was about 7 years old, we moved to another house that was nearby. I was surprised to discover the sound was also present in my room at the new house. I noticed it often when it was quiet at night, but not always. Sometimes it would stop and start. Again, is was impossible to really localize the sound but even so, I rationalized that it must come from a hot water heater in a wall adjacent to my room. I told myself probably the previous house also had a hot water heater and that is why both houses had the same noise. Although it confused me that I could also sometimes hear the sound just as loud in the daytime in other areas of the house far from the hotwater heater. I remember sitting in the living room as a child, drawing or playing quietly, and sometimes hearing the sound and wondering about it and trying to localize it but being unable to do so.

In about 3rd grade, I visited a friend some miles away and slept over at her house. That night, I was surprised to start hearing the sound at her house as well. I mentioned the sound to my friend and she became excited, saying she could hear it as well but when she had asked other members of her family, none of them could hear it at all.

That night, we took turns comparing notes about when the sound started and stopped and we always agreed. Whatever it was, we both heard it stop and start at the same times and our descriptions of how it sounded also matched. We also discussed how she could also hear it in other parts of the house but also could not localize it. Indeed on other visits to her house, both sleeping over or visiting in the daytime, I heard the sound on occasion in various areas of her house and also still could not localize its source. The two of us always agreed on the sound and she was very excited that I could hear it as well. She told me that she had made a big point of telling her brother that I could hear it as well, thus proving the sound was real and she was not crazy. She made a point of having me tell this to her brother personally so he would believe her. But her brother seemed unimpressed by this news.

I remember another time later when the hot water heater at our house sprung a leak and a repairman came over to install a new one. I was surprised to see the hot water heater was in a very different part of the wall than where I often felt the sound seemed to come from. This disconcerted me as I now knew the sound could not have come from the heater and I was now old enough to realize that no other pipes or systems existed in that wall. Now the sound was even more creepy. But again, although the sound often seemed to come from that wall, whenever I really tried to localize it, the sound became illusive and seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.

Somewhere in the course of time, I lost touch with that friend and I must have stopped hearing the sound as well, as I do not hear it now, but I don't remember exactly when I stopped hearing it. Often, I did not want to hear it as it was a creepy thing to hear an unexplained sound at night, and somewhere along the line, I must have gotten my wish.

In fact, I had forgotten all about the strange sound until about 6 months ago when the memory suddenly came back to me just as I was falling asleep. I was surprised to realize I could have forgotten such a strange memory for so long. Now I wonder how many other weird memories I have laying half dormant in my mind. And I also really wonder what the heck that sound was!