Dream Theater

Lately I've been having the most amazing dreams. Some are so vivid and seemingly real that I often have to go look up what all the symbolism means. But of course, all those dream interpretations are pretty generalized and subjective. Dreaming about a dog could mean one thing to one person, and something completely different to someone else. So I tend to pay attention to what's happening in the dream...if I even realize it's a dream...and see what it is I'm feeling when it's happening. Sometimes it all seems so obvious. But mostly I try to sit back and enjoy the show, as if I'm in a grand Dream Theater.

Last night I dreamed I was in a theater! An old Art Deco movie palace, which at first was a regular movie house. I walked in with my old roommate Gene from college. We hadn't decided which movie to see yet, so we looked up at the marquis. "Which one you wanna see?" he asked.

"I don't know..." I didn't recognize any of the titles, most of them were action type movies.

"Well how about that one, 'The Moon Mock"

"Sure, why not."

We waited in line and walked into the theater, but as I walked down a row of seats, Gene and the rest of the crowd disappeared, and a guy dressed in maintenance overalls called me over. "There you are! come on, this way!" I recognized him as the guy who played Horace in the tv show 'Lost'. I followed him down a corridor and into an empty lobby, with Art Deco furniture and ornamentation, soaring in smooth lines along the walls and ceiling. I looked around the room, impressed with the decor, but also noticed it was dusty and in disrepair from years of neglect. "Look at this place!" he said, gesturing around. "It really had potential at one time. But it was never really finished. Part of it is a museum now....follow me."

We continued walking down another corridor to an open area that had a deep pool of water in a square hole in the tile floor. "You hungry?"

"Come to think of it, yeah! I'm starving!"

He held out a bunch of green grapes. "Take some!" So I plucked a few and ate them, they were juicy and delicious...I asked for a few more, but he threw them in the water and they sunk to the bottom. "Hey! What'd you do that for?"

"Look down into the water and see if you can see them." So I looked down, but could just barely make out a blurry shape, among other shapes down there. "If you want any more, you're going to have to go down there. In fact, you have to go down there anyway, to the bottom."

"How do I breathe?"

"It's okay, the water is oxygenated, you'll be able to breathe. And I'll be jumping down there too, so c'mon, let's go!" Horace jumped in and I jumped in after him. We sank down to the bottom, under the water. "Okay, try breathing." I reluctantly inhaled and was alarmed as I could feel water enter my lungs, but I was still getting oxygen, I could still breathe. Looking around, I saw all kinds of artifacts from colonial times...furniture, swords, mannequins dressed in costumes from the time, all laying around. There were also windows in the room, and outside it was a clear sunny day in a park setting. I recognized some of my old bosses from Mindscape out there sitting at picnic tables, enjoying the sunshine. I wanted to call out to them. It was odd to see them from a room submerged in water.

Horace handed me a colonial suit of clothes. "Put these on. We have to dress up like the mannequins in case tourists come by. And we need to straighten all this up for the museum."

He pointed to an antique desk, stacked with old letters. "Start with those. They're letters from Ben Franklin. Some of them are worn and illegible, so you'll have to rewrite them." He handed me a quill pen and a pad. "But...I don't..."

"Go ahead! it'll be fine. I'll be back in a while." He left the room and I started writing. Automatically I scribbled line after line, and soon I had an entire page filled. Looking at it, I was astonished to see that the handwriting was the most clean and exquisite calligraphy I had ever seen. "Did I do that??" Amazed, I wrote some more and saw that the words flowed from the pen in perfect lines and margins, and the curls and flourishes on each word were effortless. I was actually impressed with myself, that I was capable of writing that way. "Wow, I wish people could see this...they'd be impressed too!"

Horace returned to the room...all still underwater...he asked how it was going and looked at the writing, "Ah! very good!"

Then he turned, as lights came on from another window within the building. "Oh! they're here already...okay, stand up and assume a pose, like you're a mannequin..." The water started to solidify and harden, like gelatin. "Don't worry, you can still breathe, but you won't be able to move..." The water completely hardened into a clear solid plastic, and I was frozen in it...alarmed, but I could breathe. Through the window, a group of tourists came by, and I recognized all of them! "oh my gawd! it's Shawn! and her mom!...Mimi, Jim, Mike and Berta! hey! you guys, it's me! can you see me?"

But they couldn't see or hear me...they looked around at the artifacts and moved on to another room. The solid plastic that encased us returned to liquid, so we could move around again. "There's still a lot to be done," Horace said, "so let's move on to the next room." We walked up a staircase and out of the water, and our clothes were completely dry. Arriving at another room, I noticed a ton of canvases and frames, all leaning against the walls. Some of the paintings I recognized as my own!...others were unfinished, but I could see they were going to be spectacular...majestic mountain ranges, cityscapes with buildings that looked as if they were miles high. Paintings of simple leaves and grass, with detail all the way down to their molecular structure, yet still natural looking. "We'll get to those later...there's this entire building to consider first. It's not ready to be a museum just yet."

"You're the guy from Lost, right?"

"I'm the guy who sends the boats."

"Huh?"

As we walked through a corridor of arches, I had the feeling that I'd been here before, maybe from a past dream...it was all becoming familiar. "I know this place...I've been here before."

As I looked up, I saw that the roof was open, and the stars beyond.

"Yeah, now I remember...A year ago I thought this place was a ruin, that it was better off being torn down...but that was wrong...the place is unfinished."

"Yes...like I said, it had a lot of potential once...and I think it still does...but first, it needs to be cleaned up. A lot of dust and cobwebs..." He handed me a broom. "Come on, let's get started."

Then I woke up....wow...