My dreams...

I've been thinking about this posting for a while. I think that is how this blog thing works for me. I have an idea that brews for several days, and then something happens that makes it "boil over" somehow, and I have to write about it.

I've been having very vivid dreams where I remember many of the details. I don't remember this happening so frequently in the past. My theory is that with my current job, I get up at the same time everyday, and I often wake up just before my alarm clock goes off, so I remember the dreams that I was just experiencing. I think this happens more for me now than in the past when I got up at different times every day depending on what work was scheduled in the mornings.

Regardless of the reason, I have been affected by clear memories of dreams. The one that I had yesterday morning was really great. The Chargers were playing the Baltimore Ravens in San Diego, and Nick Kaeding kicked a game-winning field goal to win the game as time expired to send the Chargers to the Super Bowl. I don't know if my dreams are prophetic, but this could happen next week, so this is a dream I really hope comes true!

But more often, my dreams are darker and more discouraging. There is a variation of a dream that I have a lot - maybe as much as once a week. I call it the "Incompetence Dream." I hate it! I wake up in a cold sweat, my heart is racing, and I feel terrible about myself because of it. It is not a good start to the morning. The one I had a few days ago is one that I've had several times. I am teaching at Coconino HS again, and no one in the class is listening. The students are nearly rioting, and nothing I can say will get them to calm down. I yell myself hoarse to no avail. In this dream, I am irrelevant, ineffective, and out of control. It raises my blood pressure just to write about this one. I haven't taught HS for over 10 years now, but that dream makes it feel like I still teach now. I had some bad days and some challenging students, but my dream makes it a hundred times worse than it ever was in reality.

The one that I had this morning is another one that frequently happens to me as well. In this one, I am acting in a play for which I am completely underprepared. I barely know my lines, and I am due to make an entrance. I haven't acted in a show since 1995 (it's been a while), and to my knowledge, this never happened to me in real life. But in the dream, I'm backstage and something or someone delays me or distracts me and I have to go out without knowing what to say. For the dream this morning, I was in "The Taming of the Shrew," and some of my friends from high school were trying to get me to do something, but I needed them to leave me alone so I could get into costume before the show. I got so distracted that I didn't notice that the show had started and I wasn't ready. I couldn't remember my lines, I didn't have all of my costume on, and I was downstairs in the dressing room and not in the wings for my entrance. The stage manager was calling for me over the intercom, and I woke up sweating 12 minutes before the alarm was to go off.

Did I mention that I hate these dreams?

The rational side of me says "You were thinking about all your friends and the theater experience because you were scanning your old photos for Facebook," and "Perhaps these unsettling dreams are just symptomatic of the uncertainty you feel about your position at Sony coming to an end in three months." The rational side of me is right.

But the dreams still really, really, really bother me. Maybe I am just having a fragile day today. But they make me feel ineffective, incompetent, useless, and small. I don't like to feel that way. And I feel that way a lot lately.

Here's where I come to the difficult part. I never know how to end these posts. I'd like to end with "... but I've realized ... and that makes everything so much better!" Or put some other positive spin on it somehow (like saying it is a learning and growing experience.) But that hasn't happened. I don't know what to do with these or what they say about me other than they make me feel bad, and I don't like them. And they seem to happen a lot.