Entry tags:
- being of sound mind and body,
- creepy and kooky,
- eat the rich,
- eeevil,
- y-issue:contamination,
- y-meta:actors or stand-ins,
- y-meta:macguffin,
- y-meta:replay,
- y-meta:scripted,
- y-role:dreamer,
- y-role:female protector,
- y-role:male aggressor,
- y-set:building:bank,
- y-set:building:theater,
- y-set:geo:europe:ireland,
- y-set:space:passage,
- y-set:space:tunnel,
- y-sym:act:attack,
- y-sym:act:deceive,
- y-sym:act:search,
- y-sym:act:steal,
- y-sym:act:violence,
- y-sym:body:eye,
- y-sym:body:illness,
- y-sym:object:blade,
- y-sym:object:glasses,
- y-sym:object:safe,
- y-sym:object:vehicle,
- y-sym:other:business,
- y-sym:people:grandmother,
- y-sym:people:mother,
- y-sym:people:police,
- y-sym:sense:sight,
- y-theme:injustice,
- y-type:nightmare
Dream: My Grandmother murdered
I dreamt of an old woman. In the dream, she was my grandmother, and was a very intelligent woman, determined to see things done right. In an early part of the dream, she wrote out the reasons for the family not to invest in a certain product/project, and they were deterred. Later, she became convinced that a certain company was doing something wrong--contaminating the area, I believe--but this time, the family was unconvinced, and took her to be a touch senile in her old age.
Grandma was determined to prove it. I watched her slip down a manhole to the sewers for reasons unknown. Later, she once again tried to convince the woman who was my mother of the company's deceit, saying she'd show her, that the evidence was all there down in the sewer. Then she slipped down into the sewer again through the slot opening on the street. She ended up sick in bed, with Mother tittering disapproval. "I don't know about evidence," she said, "but she touched something, and then her eyes, and now she's lost her sight."
I knew there was something wrong then, because Grandma had been blind all along. Most people didn't know, because she didn't need her eyes to see and behaved just as if she could see perfectly.
In a dim theater some time after, she turned to me and asked me for her lenses. These turned out to be three large glass lenses, like contacts, but too large to be put in the eye. The third, the middle lens, was a semi-transparent blue, and as I opened the box it fell out onto the seat next to her. Before I could reach for it a hand grabbed it, and I looked up into the face of a tall man with a bluish dead countenance. Grandmother seemed to recognize him, and cried out for the lens: "My third eye!" or "The inner eye!"
It was gone, but the man's unspoken threat remained.
She went out, presumably to secure more evidence, via a small carriage or rickshaw, to a shabby part of Chinatown. This scene had apparently been played before, for all the characters were vaguely aware of how it was supposed to go: in the previous instance, the tall man had put some sort of bomb in the safety deposit box my grandmother was going to retrieve, and killed her. Knowing what to avoid, it was with a surprised but smugly cocky look that she acknowledged him and allowed the tall man to climb up into the rickshaw with her the second time.
It was with equally disturbing surety that the old-fashioned policeman, coming across the abandoned rickshaw, picked up a piece of planted evidence and announced, "Ireland this time, eh?" What this was intended to mean is uncertain.
Grandmother circled the dirty alley in confusion; it wasn't where the scene was supposed to take place, there was no bank or deposit box. I knew, watching as dreamer, that they'd been stupid. Of course the tall man would change the script, knowing he was expected. And so, with a small sharp metal object that might've been scissors or knife or tweezers, he began to attack her like a bird would, pulling away small strips of flesh, and I tried to cover my eyes not in the dream, but as dreamer.
Notes and explanatory details:
#1. My grandmother is currently being treated for cancer. Is the dream an attempt to deal with or deny this? It's an obvious possibility. The dream certainly lacks the feel of my usual "yay neuroses!" dreams.
#2. All of the characters in the dream were portrayed by actors. My dream self was about ten years old, and the dream grandmother was Patricia Hayes, who played Raziel in the film "Willow." I blame Warwick Davis, as another of his films was on TV last night, and "Prince Valiant" pulled out a ridiculous false clue similar to the planted evidence in the dream.
Finally, the tall man in the dream was the Tall Man from the Phantasm films. It's worth noting that the original film was inspired by "the rituals that surround death in America."
The players were literally actors portraying characters, part of the dream was scripted, even if one malevolent player/character derailed the script, the setting of a theater suggests an audience, and I was not simply a character but an active audience--dreamer as Dreamer. Was I being shown a message or a lesson? Or am I perhaps detaching myself from my grandmother's illness and the events around me?
Grandma was determined to prove it. I watched her slip down a manhole to the sewers for reasons unknown. Later, she once again tried to convince the woman who was my mother of the company's deceit, saying she'd show her, that the evidence was all there down in the sewer. Then she slipped down into the sewer again through the slot opening on the street. She ended up sick in bed, with Mother tittering disapproval. "I don't know about evidence," she said, "but she touched something, and then her eyes, and now she's lost her sight."
I knew there was something wrong then, because Grandma had been blind all along. Most people didn't know, because she didn't need her eyes to see and behaved just as if she could see perfectly.
In a dim theater some time after, she turned to me and asked me for her lenses. These turned out to be three large glass lenses, like contacts, but too large to be put in the eye. The third, the middle lens, was a semi-transparent blue, and as I opened the box it fell out onto the seat next to her. Before I could reach for it a hand grabbed it, and I looked up into the face of a tall man with a bluish dead countenance. Grandmother seemed to recognize him, and cried out for the lens: "My third eye!" or "The inner eye!"
It was gone, but the man's unspoken threat remained.
She went out, presumably to secure more evidence, via a small carriage or rickshaw, to a shabby part of Chinatown. This scene had apparently been played before, for all the characters were vaguely aware of how it was supposed to go: in the previous instance, the tall man had put some sort of bomb in the safety deposit box my grandmother was going to retrieve, and killed her. Knowing what to avoid, it was with a surprised but smugly cocky look that she acknowledged him and allowed the tall man to climb up into the rickshaw with her the second time.
It was with equally disturbing surety that the old-fashioned policeman, coming across the abandoned rickshaw, picked up a piece of planted evidence and announced, "Ireland this time, eh?" What this was intended to mean is uncertain.
Grandmother circled the dirty alley in confusion; it wasn't where the scene was supposed to take place, there was no bank or deposit box. I knew, watching as dreamer, that they'd been stupid. Of course the tall man would change the script, knowing he was expected. And so, with a small sharp metal object that might've been scissors or knife or tweezers, he began to attack her like a bird would, pulling away small strips of flesh, and I tried to cover my eyes not in the dream, but as dreamer.
Notes and explanatory details:
#1. My grandmother is currently being treated for cancer. Is the dream an attempt to deal with or deny this? It's an obvious possibility. The dream certainly lacks the feel of my usual "yay neuroses!" dreams.
#2. All of the characters in the dream were portrayed by actors. My dream self was about ten years old, and the dream grandmother was Patricia Hayes, who played Raziel in the film "Willow." I blame Warwick Davis, as another of his films was on TV last night, and "Prince Valiant" pulled out a ridiculous false clue similar to the planted evidence in the dream.
Finally, the tall man in the dream was the Tall Man from the Phantasm films. It's worth noting that the original film was inspired by "the rituals that surround death in America."
The players were literally actors portraying characters, part of the dream was scripted, even if one malevolent player/character derailed the script, the setting of a theater suggests an audience, and I was not simply a character but an active audience--dreamer as Dreamer. Was I being shown a message or a lesson? Or am I perhaps detaching myself from my grandmother's illness and the events around me?