The People Behind My Eyes

No matter where I was in the dream there was a paintbrush and canvas near by. I started out at my grandmother’s house where I use to live as a child. I lived there on and off. The last time I lived there was not permitted to live in the house. I had to live in the RV parked outside in their driveway. The RV had no heat, no running water, no electricity and in the end no lock on the door. In the dream despite these conditions all I wanted to do was paint. I set up a table outside by a tree, took one canvas and began painting a everyone in Morton’s Pride. Beside the table I had three Dixie cups filled with dog feces. I was using it as paint thinner. A bird then plopped two inches from my canvas. The small table I had then switched from being under a tree by the grandparents house to the entrance of a building I lived in before I moved here. The building has 21 stories, I lived on the 19^th floor. I still painted despite being in a different place.

I was waiting on Blossom to come down from her apartment. Since she was late I had to go up and get her. She was fiddling around doing Lord knows what. We argued a bit over something trivial. She told me she’s tired of me always thinking I’m right. She said I take too long to paint and that it’s all I ever think about and all I care about and that there’s no time for her, etc. I walked out of her apartment pissed. I tried to get in the elevator to leave but something was strange about it. It only went to floors 5 and below because the upper floors no longer existed. I got in the elevator alone. It stalled, the lights went out and the doors opened. A guy who looked like death warmed over and really bad teeth said all I was going to get was floor 5 and below because the other floors no longer exist. The doors opened, the lights flickered and stayed on but low. I went to the bottom floor where all the lights were on. The foyer was filled with people, mostly standing around. Then the dream switched to a huge auditorium from grade nine (where I specifically remember dissociation becoming a daily disruption). So in the auditorium I showed a lady a painting of mine that had four layers to it. If you peeled back the top layer which was a very nice portrait piece you could see a second image not so classic or “pretty”. As you peeled back the layers, one by one they became more and more emotionally telling. Layer one was a show for the world but the last 3 layers were paintings of Morton’s Pride in various stages of healing and various degrees of distress.

In the dream the auditorium became a movie theater. The big screen showed flashes of my life for everyone in the room to see. Most of the images were of me in tan pants and a white shirt sitting in an auditorium. I sat in first 20 chairs, then 50 then 100. The movie panned in and out, zoomed around and moved quite a bit. Each zoom and move there were more of me, all in the same outfit sitting in an auditorium chair. Some of the viewers got up to leave but most stayed and watched. I sat beside my mother who laughed at some of the viewers, made fun of their names, clothing and skin colour. I told her it was unacceptable and got up to leave. The lights stayed off. I walked outside and down the red carpet hall with Hollywood memorabilia on it to the well lit area which was again the foyer of the apartment building I use to live in. I met Blossom there who was finally ready to leave for our visit to the local garden show. As we walked out of the door we saw a man tormenting a blind man. He convinced him to get on a skateboard saying all he had to do was keep it straight and he’d tell him when to stop. The young man got on the board but was allowed to run right into a glass window. Blossom and I were pissed!

COMMENTARY:

It is of interest to me that I dreamed about how much I focus on artwork and how the layers show levels of pain. At first glance the painting is a pretty picture but underneath it is strong pain. I would say levels of light represented levels of distress. I also found it interesting that the guy told me even if the other floors use to exist I would have to accept what was given to me and just live with it. This is what you’re going to get and you have no choices.” The guy is from a painting of mine called “On Death and Dying” which isn’t a pretty one. After he told me to just accept it the doors close, the lights flickered and the elevator moved to the bottom floor… but not without stalling several times. WOW! Very intense moment in that dream. Most of it moved around and switched from time period to time period but that one pretty much had straight forward message to it. Accept what you get and don’t ask questions. I say B.S. to that.

Blossom and I argue about my artwork all the time. She says I have no time for her because I’m always painting something or on the computer.

RECURRENT DREAM THEME:

Feces, shape shifting, movie theater, arguing

FEELINGS UPON WAKING:

Sick, shaky, anxious, angry, concerned about what it means to dream about feces so much

J of A

Dreams Layers-Saturday, July 12, 2008-3:47PM EST