Memory full.

No matter how advanced computers get, we still find ways to fill them up with so much running crap that they wind up lagging and lollygagging. Then we have to get new computers that can run that crap properly, until we fill them up again. 

Unfortunately this is not an option with my brain, which resists all upgrades. 

During the stressful period in which I am slogging, I have found my dreams to be unreasonably detailed. Not clever or smart, but loaded with data. I might be traveling down a quiet road and find myself without warning in a rural neighborhood; the neighborhood is fully populated with people and their dogs, and I'm invited to have a look at someone's vast library (of course I can read none of the titles but the books are in all kinds of colors and conditions). Or I am trying to ride the subway along with enough people to make up the cast of Ghandi, and every grotty detail is visible but not the stations or where we're going. 

All this leaves me as tired when I wake up as when I went to sleep. I'm running new software on my old hardware, you see, and something has to slow down somewhere. 

Why do we go through all these mental gymnastics anyway, when all we want is rest? These days most scientists from which I've heard think that the purpose of dreaming has to do with learning and memory, a way of sorting out the data. It's possible, but my dreams seldom deal with anything in my life at present. I dream about commuting more that you'd think possible, and I haven't had to do that in years. Still, who really knows? 

Compounding the riddle of dreaming is that we smarty-pants humans are not the only ones who do it. We know for certain that dogs dream, always running with li'l paws or boofing out barks in their sleep. It's really cute. Less cute is that, according to a piece in the Smithsonian, lots of animals are dreaming: 

Young jumping spiders dangle by a thread through the night, in a box, in a lab. Every so often, their legs curl and their spinnerets twitch—and the retinas of their eyes, visible through their translucent exoskeletons, shift back and forth.

“What these spiders are doing seems to be resembling—very closely—REM sleep,” says Daniela Rößler, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Konstanz in Germany. 

I feel worse for knowing that spiders dream. ABOUT WHAT? 

The article does note that we still don't know dreaming is about, whether we're man, dog, bug, or eucalyptus plant. (NB: Nothing about dreaming vegetables in that article.) It's mysterious, and it wears me out.  

I'm with the late great Mitch Hedberg on this topic: 

Dreaming is work, you know - there I am in a comfortable bed, the next thing you know I have to build a go-kart with my ex-landlord. I want a dream of me watching myself sleep.

Right on, sleepy brother. 

When it's bad, it ain't bad enough.

The bear situation has been getting to me. 

If you're just joining us, there is a black bear that has been roaming the neighborhood, making himself quite at home in daylight hours as well as in dusk and dawn. It was seen most recently by me from the porch last Wednesday as he sauntered down the street. 

My wife wants me to call the state fish & wildlife office. The local authorities have no interest in bear matters, so it must be referred to the closest state office -- one county and forty miles away. So you can bet they'll just come racing down here with sirens wailing, ready to capture a big ol' bear. Yeah.

Every time I take out the trash or take out the dog in the dark, I also take out my big ol' cop flashlight, the kind you can use to beat the fight out of a fleeing felon. Probably would not give me the edge in a fight with the bear, but it's better than nothing. I believe it when they say bears would really prefer not to get too close to humans -- but this guy is already taking liberties. 

Meanwhile, we have Eastern Coyotes again all of a sudden. Do they follow bears, looking for scraps? I don't know, but my wife has heard them howling, and I'm pretty sure I saw one in hot pursuit of three deer through the gloaming.

So last night I dreamed I was outside the house (not my actual house) and looking into the backyard (way larger my actual backyard) while on the phone with my friend Will (my actual friend). Dog Izzy was in the back. Suddenly through the high grass bordering the yard came a multitude of wild critters -- a rhino, cheetah, a gigantic African elephant, and other assorted miscreants. Izzy froze at the sight. I said, "Will, I'll have to call you back," and got the only useful-ish thing at hand, my three-pound sledgehammer. I wished like the comic book Thor I could use it to shoot lightning, but I figured if I screamed enough and bopped the right people in the snoot, I could give Izzy a chance to run for it. Just as I made my move, I woke up. 

I have to say I was a little proud of my dream self, ready to plunge into danger to save my beloved dog. Most of the time I consider myself the kind of guy who, in a crisis, looks around to see who else is stepping up to solve the problem, and if no obvious problem solver appears, to kind of shuffle sideways out of the area. So, yay for dream me, I guess. 

Yeah, there I am.

Should I call the government about my bear problem? Not because of my own worries, but because it's dark when the teens are on the school bus stop now. Plus Halloween is coming, and that means little kids at dusk carrying sweet, sweet candy. I'm afraid our bear will think it's like a frozen dinner with the dessert in a separate compartment. 

Have you had to deal with bear business like this? Anecdotes and advice are welcome. 

Living the dream.

The American Dream has become one of the most misunderstood parts of the American Mythos, nearly always represented as selfish, soured, a nightmare hiding beneath a shiny gloss.  

The term dates back to 1900 and is described aptly by Webster's as "an American social ideal that stresses egalitarianism and especially material prosperity." So let's have a look at what the dream is really all about. 

1. Prosperity 

Often the American Dream is stated as "Work hard and you'll get rich," but that's twisting it, either to benefit those who sucker you or those who know that riches are rare and so disappointment will follow. 

Prosperity, on the other hand, is nothing more than a good living, a fair reward for one's work. Since so many people who came to the United States came from places that still had a feudal mindset, in which the efforts of the many only really meant prosperity for the few, this was and is a big deal. Even today, in places where slavery and serfdom are supposedly banished, people still can't achieve prosperity from their own labor because they live in crooked kleptocracies, low-trust societies that are all about theft, bribery, and using the law to steal from everyone. Corruption is the only means to rise from poverty.

We're supposed to be a nation ruled by laws, not men, and this is why. No one ever gets a fair shake when the law is merely a tool for those in power -- which is quite what many people in America are trying to do today.

2. Freedom

Prosperity means freedom from the tyranny of need. Noted French jerk Jean-Jacques Rousseau famously wrote, "Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains."

Oh, really? 

"Okay, baby, you're free! Here you go!" [chucks baby on lawn]

The chains to which all people are born are nature and necessity; only a baby born able to walk and eat grass and survive naked could be free as Rousseau demands. I never met a baby human yet who fit that description. 

But the American Dream promises a chance to not have to live under the shadow of terrible need, of hunger and exposure lurking daily outside the window. This is a far cry from promising mansions and yachts to everyone, but to my family who came over here from Europe, it was a huge improvement. They never expected Uncle Sugar to provide them with ease and comfort, just protection from lawbreakers and a chance to earn a fair wage. That was plenty to keep the wolf well away from the door. 

3. The Wealth Trap

The other proposed downside to the American Dream is meant to be the awful people who achieve it. Well, there we have to concede a point, if by those who achieve it we mean only the very wealthy, not the prosperous middle class. And yes, and they say on Instapundit, we currently have the worst ruling class in our history. Noblesse oblige is not considered their obligation for honor and generosity, but rather their responsibility to order the rest of us around. 

The rich are not usually concerned with the little people. We get in their way of them focusing on the ones they really hate -- the richer people. The guy a little farther up the hill who looks down on them. 

And if you are one of these moneyed mooks, you have a lot of incentive to hate everyone. People are always looking to separate you from your dough; you have no peace. For the type who holds the keys to the kingdom -- say, a repulsive, horrible creep who produces movies -- it must seem natural to demand humiliating services from those hoping you will unlock the door to fame and fortune.

And even if the rich can avoid all these temptations of pride, lust, envy, and so on, there's something about avarice that takes on its own life -- the hunger grows with the eating. 

Notice how well all these descriptions jibe with those in America's entertainment industry, the source of much disparagement of the middle class and the American Dream. They like to make the American Dream look bad, in their own actions and in their media, then take it out on the rest of us. It's America's fault! 

4. The Dream Is Good

The American Dream is still good, still right, and not to be disparaged because it sometimes fails, or because we fail it. It is not a promise, far less a guarantee. It is aspirational. It ought not to consume us, but encourage us. It ought not to be the whole aim of society, but a society that is rightly ordered makes it possible. It is still a dream wherein a people with no tribe more important than being Americans can look one another in the eye; where, as Joseph says in the series Jesus of Nazareth, "A man who's skillful in his work will stand before kings." 

News of... the Future!

Friends, I have seen the future and am here to tell you all about it! 

Last night I dreamed I went to the office -- although I haven't been to an office in years -- and by the time I got there I realized that I was now a thousand years in the future! How did it happen? How did I even know it had happened? Beats me. All I knew was that I was in the 3020's. So I decided to continue to the office and see how things had changed. Maybe I still had my job! 

It didn't look like this at all, FYI.

Here's what I found in the far-future city of New York:

1) Everything is bigger. The long-prophesied mile-high skyscrapers apparently came to pass, but I can't say for sure because I could only see them at the bottom levels. They had exceptionally large lower floors to support all the weight, though. So I guess maybe. 

2) Everything still sucks. The old company was still in the same spot. I didn't know how to get in, so I went in the service entrance. The corridors were dirty and the wallpaper was water-stained and peeling. The future is filthy. 

3) The bathrooms are stupid. Apparently our preposterous bathroom issues have metastasized. I asked someone where the can was and was sent into a large room that had merchandise all over, like the floor of a cheap department store. The urinals and whatnot were against the walls in the rear, but good luck finding them. Also, there was no separation of the sexes, but that hadn't become a casual thing -- people seemed annoyed by it and the women were trying to stake out their own territory. Of course some fellow in a dress wanted to use the plumbing on their side even thought his own, er, plumbing was presumably different. I just left.

4) Vending machines are a big deal. But also stupid. I left the building through the front entrance, which was below sidewalk level. There was an enormous spiral walkway that led up to the street. Along that were large vending machines with all kinds of stuff sold in little boxes, but I couldn't read the names on the packages. Maybe the written language had changed that much -- or more likely it is because you can't read in dreams. I thought about getting something to eat, but I had no money -- then realized the thing was busted and I could just take something. Some guy in a suit reached in and grabbed merchandise that had fallen to the bottom. I did too, and I still couldn't figure out what I had. So I put it back.

And that was about when I woke up, because indeed, I had to use the can. 

So, as you can see, my dream visit to the future was kind of a waste of time. Pretty typical for my forays while slumbering -- I never get anywhere and I just get stressed out. 

I'm basically an idiot in my dreams. Maybe even in real life! 

Hallmark of quality dreaming.

So, to continue the theme of dreaming from yesterday, I beg you to be patient while I relate a dream I had. It actually had a plot that came to a reasonable resolution. That's because it followed the logic of a Hallmark Christmas movie, albeit one that could never be made. 

Why a Hallmark movie? Maybe because the Christmas is already starting to elbow Halloween out of the stores.

Christmas is coming.
It's practically here. 

And I'm not ready for any of the holidays. 

But here's the plot -- and just take it as read that throughout the dream I was sometimes the protagonist, sometimes just a viewer. 

A guy (we'll call him Jack) is in town as the local family-owned department store is gearing up for its famous Christmas season displays. Jack owns a shop that repairs and renovates old machines; good blue-collar man with handy skills. He's happy to see the store is in full swing, but when he goes in to browse through its comic book section (it has an excellent book department), a girl of about ten (Suzie) tells him this is the last Christmas. A woman pops up -- the girl's aunt; she works in the store and is also trying to watch her sister's kids for the day. The woman (Alice? Why not) tells Jack that COVID sent the store into heavy debt and also killed two of the older members of the family that own it. Online shopping has also wrecked its finances. The store has been sold to a venture capitalist, who is considered likely to tear it down and build a Walgreens or a CVS or both on the spot, along with other chain stuff. Jack also meets Suzie's little sister, Sweets, who is six and doesn't speak because of her terrible shyness. However, she is going to appear in the store's pageant, and is dressed like a little clown (the cute type) complete with rainbow wig. She carries a Harpo Marx type bike horn, with which she does communicate -- short blasts, sad moans, and so on -- throughout the movie. 

Word gets out that the venture capitalist is going to give a speech in the town square with the mayor. Everyone is furious at this guy, so when the mayor, a genial old lady named Gwen, introduces him, they boo him off the stage. It's an ugly scene; the man (looked a little like young Bill Clinton from afar) is hounded into his limo and all the way to the little county airport, where he flies off in his private plane. 

After a commercial break, and probably a good deal of time-wasting with drama and romance, Jack and Alice and the girls speak to the elderly accountant who handles the store's finances. He dresses all in white -- suit, shirt, tie, shoes, hat, even carries a white stick. He gives them the facts of life -- the townsfolk have probably ruined the only chance they had to have something remain on this spot with economic viability. If he were that investor, he'd sell the store at a loss to someone who would promise to build a parking lot out of it, or he'd just hold on to the property while the store closed and fell into a wreck. (Lileks readers may see the influence of his sorrowful Main Street feature here.) Their only hope is to apologize to the investor and try to get him back on board.

Jack loads them all into his van -- Mayor Gwen, the accountant, Alice, Suzie, and even Sweets (still dressed as a clown) -- and they drive all the way to the Big City to try to find the guy. After some bonding adventures along the way, they get to his office. Only Suzie's little-girl earnestness gets the admin to help, as she tells them the investor has gone to spend the Christmas season alone in his cabin. He's out of contact... but they get the address. 

More seriocomic adventures follow as they go into the mountains. At last they meet the venture capitalist again (now played by Kelsey Grammer). He allows them in but only will speak with the adults, so the sisters stay outside the room. However, while Jack and Alice beg forgiveness and plead for the store, we see, from Kelsey's vantage point, the door slowly open, and then a little rainbow wig start to rise next to Alice from behind the desk. Sweets toots her horn and breaks the tension. 

Kelsey gets down to brass tacks -- if they can show him that the store can at least make a profit over the next two years, he will keep it afloat. Gwen and the accountant get to work with him, with numbers and municipal promises, and after some time they all come to an agreement. Then everybody loads up back in the van to go to the store and announce that it has been saved. 

Happy ending. Sweets finally speaks -- telling Jack she loves him -- and Alice does the same. Jack reciprocates. Cue snow, crane shot, the end.

🎄🎅🤶⛄❆

So that's my screenplay, and it would never be made. Too many Christmas advertisers are online vendors like Amazon, who are the unseen villains of the piece. COVID is still too hot-button an issue, and may remind viewers that Made In China not only refers to most of the stuff they will buy for the holidays but also the Wuhan Mystery Flu that has killed close to 7 million people. 

The point I wanted to make is, that unlike my typical dreams, the plot made sense, and rather than trail off into nonsense it ended in the right place, and I woke up. Very unusual for dreams. So now I wonder what I was eating the night before. If I could can it, I could sell it as Fred's Special Writer's Block Busting Eats. Made in the USA, of course. 

Dream food.

It isn't clear how exactly some foods got the reputation of causing weird dreams. We all recall how Ebenezer Scrooge told a ghost he was a bad dream brought on by something he ate: "You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There’s more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!" 

Winsor McCay used this for his fantastic comic strips, explaining that they happened to people who ate Welsh rarebit. (Welsh rarebit is basically cheese toast; the nickname may have come Welsh being associated with cheapness or poor quality -- this "Welsh rabbit" being too poor to have actual meat. Well, I love cheese toast, so fie on you, Welsh-haters!) McCay's Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend was a hugely popular strip; it even was made into a short silent film in 1906. 

McCay later introduced Little Nemo, his famous boy dream adventurer, into the strip; he was later spun off into the gorgeous and brilliant Little Nemo in Slumberland, which has yet to be made into a really top-notch film. (Please, no one tell Disney.)

In 2015, authors of a study in Frontiers of Psychology explained that some people still believe that foods are linked to vivid dreams. "Three hundred and ninety six students completed questionnaires evaluating sleep, dreams, and dietary habits and motivations. Items queried whether they had noticed if foods produced bizarre or disturbing dreams and if eating late at night influenced their dreams. The perception of food-dependent dreaming had a prevalence of 17.8%; with dairy products being the most frequently blamed food category (39–44%)." 

Aha! Cheese toast again! 

The authors concluded that while the idea that food caused weird dreams may have begun jokingly, as a means of expressing the dinner's indigestibility, there might actually be something to it: "The impact of food on dreams may, however, be deserving of more serious consideration."

More on this topic tomorrow. Questions for the viewers: Do you associate any foods with vivid dreams? Should Cheese Toast use by regulated by the FDA? What's with the Welsh, anyhow? All these and other questions are flying around like a rarebit fiend's bed -- they need answers!

Slumber cola.

I reviewed Starlight Coke back in April, and now it appears Coca-Cola is going to spring a bizarre, inscrutable soda on us at least once a season. Thus the Dreamworld Limited Edition that I picked up this week. 

What's it supposed to taste like, we wonder. Cherry Coke tastes like cherry, Vanilla Coke tastes like vanilla, and Starlight Coke tasted like exploding hydrogen. (Not really.) So what does Dreamworld Coke taste like? Making an important speech in your birthday suit? Falling? Handing your mom a cigar while Dr. Freud takes notes? 

According to Coke's site, "Coca-Cola Zero Sugar Dreamworld makes the most fascinating parts of our imagination real. This limited edition sparkling beverage from Coca-Cola Creations explores the realms of the surreal, the imaginary, and the otherworldly. Experience the familiar Coca-Cola Zero Sugar taste now with a surprising and unexpected flavor from a dream world." 

Okee doke! Here we go! And…

Tastes like Coke mixed with fruit. It's not too far off that Diet Coke Twisted Mango they were selling a few years ago, which I liked and no one else seemed to. Maybe with some guava and papaya as well. Maybe if you chewed some Mike & Ike Tropical Typhoon candies while drinking a Coke Zero you'd get the same flavor. It's not bad, but it doesn't say Dreamworld to me, unless your dream is a cheap Caribbean vacation in a country where they have to fence off the resort. 

I admire Coke for shooting the moon when it comes to naming these things. Starlight and Dreamworld both evoke a sort of floaty, ethereal, peaceful feeling, although the first is more glorious and the second more weird. 

If someone were to tailor a beverage to my personal dreamworld, it would have to taste like hotel continental breakfasts, business vending machines, and whatever could be gleaned from a train station stand, because my dreams are always about work, city streets, commuting, and hotels. I have no idea why. Once in a while in a dream I will decide I am going to drive somewhere distant, like northern Canada, and only after going along a highway for a while do I realize I will not be able to get home by bedtime as planned. Try stuffing all that into a bottle, Coke. 

A cock-and-bull story.

 

Washington atilt.

My wife had a crazy dream. Unlike her husband (moi) she does not often have vivid dreams, or remember her dreams. But this time she recalled it and told me about it when she woke up.

Apparently a large portrait of George Washington was supposed to be installed atop one of Manhattan's skyscrapers, presumably in the neighborhood where she used to report for duty in person sometimes before the Chinese Death Virus came to play. When it was put in place, she noticed that the painting was somewhat askew.

It seems that the artist of the painting had created it with that intent, and insisted for the sake of his stupid artistic vision that it be installed just so.

Well, it didn't take the biblical Joseph to interpret this one, I thought. I said that the news about elections and riots and all have made an impression on her, an impression that some people have a very skewed vision for the United States, that they may even co-opt symbols of this great nation but they prefer their own weird idea of the country to that of the founders, and those who love the country as is.

"That painting would have made me crazy," she said.

"There are too many people in the city with OCD in New York," I said. "They'd charge the building with torches and pitchforks."

Although the dream irritated my wife, she is neither obsessive nor compulsive -- except about dental hygiene. "I'll be brushing my teeth five minutes before my funeral," she said recently, and I believe it. Still, as far as things to be crazy about go, brushing after eating is far from problematic.

It was interesting that she was dreaming about this stuff. She's not one to pay a keen eye to the news, and was surprised to hear from me how bad the pillaging of our cities has gotten and how the state and local authorities have allowed it. I suspect many people who think they are well-informed have no idea at all. Perhaps if they find out, they'll dream about an upside-down George Washington. Or maybe one getting lynched. That seems to be in the cards these days.

Night mares.

Had a bad dream that woke me up the morning of September 11. Not sure if it had anything to do with that anniversary.

One part, the fun part, had me leaving an office to go to the stadium to see the Giants play. It's not the first time I've had a vivid dream that conflated sports with work. In this dream the stadium was much smaller and cozier than any real football stadium, but the Giants were losing, just like in real life. I decided to go home, but first I had to cross the stadium attached to that one; it was like a three-ring circus, one stadium after another (not unlike the old Meadowlands, which had Giants Stadium, Brendan Byrne Arena, and the Meadowlands Racetrack, except these were attached). In that next field was a horse race, and it was horrible.

This was no round-the-track-once race; the horses had to go around and around hundreds of times, like Indy drivers, and of course it killed them. But they kept going. My exit required me to walk right across the track, where by now the running horses were reduced to mere skeletons with bits of flesh and gristle. Someone complained about the smell.

Well, that was a fun thought with which to wake up.

I'm glad I don't go to a psychic. "Skeletal horses? Oh my stars! Doom! It's DOOOOM!" Well, maybe not, but it couldn't be good.

What causes these things? What was in my mind that brought that particular stew of images together?

I think about the things that had been happening that week: football season kickoff, work stress, anniversary of 9/11, the birthday of a childhood friend who died. More: I was reading a war book, working on a mystery novel, checking a soccer book for children. Scenes from real life? I don't live in Death Valley, where we all know picturesque animal bones are tastefully laid out in the sand. Nor do I attend Hogwarts, where the skeletal Thestrals pull the wagons. And I haven't been to a Giants game in decades, and I've only gone to the horse track twice (Meadowlands once, Saratoga once).

But who knows? Dreams are so hyper-personal that we may not even know ourselves from what parts of our large experiences, many thoughts, and complex personalities our dreams are getting data. My wife has heard that the people in your dreams may be faces you saw only in passing who sparked no conscious memory. But wouldn't anyone who pops up in dreams have had to have been committed to long-term memory?

And why do we even dream anyway?

According to sleep guru Michael J. Breus, Ph.D., writing in Psychology Today, "While some scientists posit that dreaming has no direct function—but instead is a consequence of other biological processes that occur during sleep—many studying sleep and dreams believe dreaming serves a primary purpose."

He goes on to list six possible purposes:

1. memory processing (consolidation of learning and short-term memory to long-term memory storage)
2. extension of waking consciousness, reflecting the experiences of waking life
3. working through difficult, complicated, unsettling thoughts, emotions, and experiences
4. responding to biochemical changes and electrical impulses that occur during sleep
5. consciousness uniting past, present, and future in processing information from the first two, and preparing for the third
6. self-protection by the brain to prepare itself to face threats, dangers and challenges

It's interesting, but also interesting that after so much time and study we really still don't understand dreams.

Whatever they are, I wouldn't mind so much if my brain would just stick to its usual stupid themes -- work and walking around places and hotels. No more animated dead, please, stupid head.

Keep reaching for the stars.

Morpheus is a jerk.

Last week was tiresome. I was filling in for someone who was on vacation, and I found out just how annoying his job is. I mean, I thought the worst part of his position was having to deal with, well, me. But that was just part of it. (Of course, I still have to deal with me all the time; how fair is that?)

Between that and a huge project for another employer on which I am slowly grinding to the end, it was a tiring week. And as usual, especially when I'm under work stress, Morpheus was a jerk.

Not the guy from the Matrix movies. I mean the Greek god of dreams. He sucks.

The problem is not dreams of running around Yale naked or trying to work when I can't read or even the world coming to an end. No, it's that I'm dreaming about workish things and that itself is a lot of work. 

It's exhausting. Like the late Mitch Hedberg said, "I hate dreaming. Because when you sleep, you wanna sleep. Dreaming is work, you know -- there I am in a comfortable bed, the next thing you know I have to build a go-kart with my ex-landlord. I want a dream of me watching myself sleep."

In one recent one I was at a work event at a stadium, where we were all going to a ball game; I had brought a bunch of pizzas, which I was carrying, and wearing a suit, and I didn't know most of the group and was trying to fit in. No one else was dressed for work. I got lost in the stadium and wound up wandering the halls of the run-down hotel attached to it. I was tired when I got up. And not only tired -- for an hour or so I had this vague sense of something I had to do, until I realized that the thing on my mind was that I worrying that I had to meet up with the imaginary gang to deliver the imaginary pizzas at the imaginary ballpark.

This went on all week. I would have a dream where I could not accomplish something, and my brain would keep working on the problem even after I was awake. Even last night. I had to make two stops at a grocery store that hasn't existed since I was kid and got the wrong things both times, so I had to figure out what I really needed to get for the first fifteen minutes I was up. This is stupid.

Look, Morpheus, I've had it. I already have a bunch of clients who need me to fill in some holes while others are on summer vacation. I don't need unpaid assignments from you. Knock it off.

Dream reader.

Sleep reading is something we discussed back when I was a kid. There was a longstanding theory that if you went to sleep with your textbook under your pillow, you would absorb the information within as you slept. Kind of like how you could press your pants by putting them between the box spring and mattress overnight.

The pants pressing works if you do it right, but the sleep absorption never seemed to work, and not just because it's ridiculous. Apparently there are a few things you cannot do while dreaming, and one is read. You can fly, you can get shot to death, you can eat and drink anything, you can meet famous people, you can go to lands that don't exist, but you can't read.

Why? Bookriot, who ought to know, tells us that "When we dream, the part of the brain responsible for logic and intellect shuts down, allowing us to accept crazy dream stuff as reality while at the same time inhibiting our ability to interpret letters and numbers. Indeed, trying to read something and not being able to is considered one of the surefire signs that you’re dreaming (a few others are not being able to read clocks–one of the reasons why you find so many clocks in surrealist paintings–distortion in everyday patterns like brickwork or wallpaper, and not being able to see yourself in a mirror–you either won’t look like yourself or your face will be blurry)."

In fact, Bookriot asks, the last time you tried to read something in a dream, "Did you actually see letters? Was it a blank sheet of paper, or an incomprehensible jumble? Chances are it was."

I'd wondered if it was true, and indeed, within the last month I had a couple of dreams that convinced me there was something to it. In the first I was in a strange train station and trying to find the right train, and the sign looked like a jumble of letters; I tried so hard to read it (like an act of will would pull it together) that I woke myself up. In the second I was reading for work -- as an editor, I do that a lot -- and all I could see were words of no more than three letters, none of which made sense.

Which brings me to Pentecost. I was at the vigil Mass last night, and the first reading was the familiar Tower of Babel story from Genesis:

Then the LORD said: If now, while they are one people and all have the same language, they have started to do this, nothing they presume to do will be out of their reach. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that no one will understand the speech of another.

The story is often told as if the main sin involved was the tower that was being built in Babel, but you don't actually hear the people saying, "Let's build a tower tall enough to get to heaven so we can take over!" All they say is "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the sky, and so make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered all over the earth." Which is close, but there's no indication that God is being challenged. The sin of pride is obviously what offends the Lord, and the threat these people pose to all creation by being unimpeded in their desires.

Also, God doesn't throw down the tower; it seems to just not get built when the people are scattered. Tarot cards not withstanding.

So what does the legend of Babel have to do with being unable to read in dreams? What silly connection have I made now?

Simply put: pqr nbz re. Or, in awake terms, language.

As in dreams, when the logic center shuts down, the prideful people in the legend of Babel also lose their reason, because of pride. They had a dream to "make a name for ourselves" and in that dream they lost their language.

The reason this is read at Pentecost is because we see the restoration by the Holy Spirit after the ascension of Jesus. The apostles, submitting to the will of God, receive the Holy Spirit and emerge speaking in tongues, astonishing the listeners in Jerusalem who came from all over the known world. What was scattered and confused in pride is gathered and restored in humility.

Now, last night I dreamed I was a voice actor for the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, a job of which I was quite proud. But I was feuding with one of the other actors who had a better part. As the dream went on I came to realize that A) my character was a very minor CGI alien and B) I had no idea what I was doing. I'm no actor! I don't understand the directions or process of voice acting! I don't know my lines! Pride falleth before the truth, eh? And by the way, I couldn't make out any text on the script at all, except for scribbled margin notes that said things like pqr nbz re. 

Well, movies have no logic anyway.

Need to calm down.

So, how're things?

I know I get way too wrapped up in stuff that I can do nothing about. I also have read way too much science fiction and comic books in my life, and movie makers really enjoy blowing stuff up these days.

Which is why the other night I was jolted awake during a very odd dream. Usually my dreams follow predictable patterns---I'm either in a hotel or office, it's always work-related, I'm either not where I'm supposed to be or just vaguely aware that I'm expected someplace, blah blah blah. The scenery changes but the plot is about the same.

The other night, though, I dreamed that disaster had struck---we knew it was the end. I mean The End. I must have read once about the enormous wind caused by a nuclear blast, because in my dream such a wind suddenly sundered our house from its foundation. I was with my childhood family (some are no longer with us in real life) and instead of my two dogs there were four, but we were together in one room. Outside the window the scenery was rushing by at an enormous clip. We clutched one another's hands; I turned to my mother and said, "This is IT!"

We were not smashed to pieces. Rather, the house flew on until it came upon an even stretch of road that was at the same incline as the sundered base. We skidded along the road for quite some time until we ground to a halt. We had survived.

But I knew that civilization, and very much of the world, all was gone. There would be no help. I said, "We can't even feed the dogs, let alone ourselves." And I was very upset that we hadn't been killed quickly, but would instead have to struggle on until we died slowly.

That startled me awake.

I've never had a dream like that before, not even in the "shelter drill" era, not even after escaping Manhattan on 9/11. I don't think it's prophetic, but I think it shows a momentary ramp-up of my current anxiety over the nation and the world.

Perhaps I need more prayer. Or maybe some medication.

Anyway, the next night I was in a hotel on a business trip and had a suitcase full of inappropriate clothes, so my dreams were back to normal.

I had too much to dream last night.

With apologies to the Electric Prunes, there was no drinking involved in my dreaming, but there was too much dreaming anyway.

It was probably because of a new medication -- a new medication the dog is on. He has not awakened me to go pee since he was brand-new and still had that new puppy smell. But lately he's been extra thirsty. At 1:30 Saturday night, he was whining like a fuzzy engine for whining, maybe just about the time I was going from dreamy REM sleep to flatline delta wave sleep. Or something like that. By the time we came back in it was hard for both of us to get back to sleep. So basically, I feel like I was in deep dreaming all night, when I wasn't out in the yard.

Two things I want to make 100% clear:

1) I have never been a student at Yale. I have never even been to Yale. I have never even passed New Haven. I have barely ever been in Connecticut. Members of my family are more likely to have gone to jail than Yale.

2) Prior to the last couple of months or so, I've never had any of those dreams of being naked in public. I know it's a very common nightmare, like falling or forgetting your lines on stage.

So why I would dream of being a student at Yale perplexes me. Worse, I was a new student in the middle of the semester, so everyone else was well along in their classes. Worse still, I was working my way through school by helping out with the buildings 'n grounds department, which the other Elis disdained. Worse worse still, my dog Tralfaz made a cameo as the school's dog, who dug up an underground vent, which I had to fix. Worsey worse worse, I realized that I had bonded with that crazy dog, and was very sad because when I left the school I would have to say good-bye to him. And totally worst or all, at some point in the proceedings I realized I had no clothes on -- maybe my wristwatch -- and had no idea how to get back to my dorm so I could get dressed.

There goes ol' Fred, streaking through campus.

This went on and on, and was far from my only dream that night. When I staggered awake my wife sent me back to bed, where I slept for another couple of hours, and still felt like a zombie all morning.

I don't know where all this nudity is coming from. It's not like I've never had anxiety dreams -- I have actually had that dream where I'm about to go on stage in a play and realize I have no idea what my part is. I've not been in a play since fifth grade, and the last time I was nude in public the doctor swatted my butt to get me crying. So I guess I'm due for a falling dream, which, with my fear of heights, could be the end of me.

If you should hear that Fred died in his sleep while clinging to the headboard, say a prayer. Because while people may think I went quietly, in truth I died while naked over Manhattan, losing my grip on the helicopter. (Which was probably being piloted by my dog.)

Or would you rather be a mule?

Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, a veritable butterfly, enjoying itself to the full of its bent, and not knowing it was Chuang Chou. Suddenly I awoke, and came to myself, the veritable Chuang Chou. Now I do not know whether it was then I dreamt I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man.

--Zhuangzi

You're a man.

In the first place, while mammals dream, insects don't even sleep as we do. They may be in state called torpor, sort of like you after Thanksgiving, but their little buggy brains don't function the way ours do even in sleep. It is extremely unlikely that insects dream at all. So you're not a butterfly dreaming you're a man.

Even if butterflies could dream, how would they know enough to dream such a thing? Bugs have a very limited concept of the creatures around them, unless they are excited to attack. A butterfly wouldn't know what a man was even if you sat him down and talked about it all day. He could only think of it in butterfly terms, which, let's face it, are pretty limited.

And I don't want to start any fights here, Teach, but I really doubt you ever did dream you were a butterfly. You know what I dream about? My boss is a pest and I don't know how to do my job, I'm on a stage and never saw the script, my fly is open at a funeral, I missed the last bus to someplace I was supposed to be yesterday. I don't dream of being any other kind of animal. How could I? My dreams take my experience and my anxieties and put them through the paint mixer and pour out some stupid concoction based on that. Being a very non-human creature is completely alien, and doesn't come up on Morpheus's Wheel of Fun. Unless you've actually been a butterfly in this lifetime, I flat-out don't believe you could have dreamed you were one.

If you're going to keep up that story, I'm going to want to know how you felt looking at the world with compound eyes, and sucking up your lunch with the ol' proboscis.

No, I smell a rhetorical question here based on a fabrication, and I'm not going to play this game, Teach. Come back when you have a question based on the dream about falling off your house, or your mother catching you naked on the golf course.